Chase but no catch

Took Abby to Lucy Park this morning. I was there at 6:45 and it was 38 degrees, very light winds. This is the same park a couple of weeks ago had squirrels every where. I don't know if they were in their nest and not coming out or what. I was able to get 1 squirrel out of the nest and Abby gave it a good chase, but could not get it. A little while later she spotted another one and it out smarted her. Walked around for a while longer and could not find any more. So I got her to the fist and took her to another part of the park which is real thick. After a bit she saw another and gave it chase but it got into the undercover and took off. I spotted one a little while later and I could never get her to see it. After a long wait I was about to give up than she took a real long flight to a huge high tree next to the river. I ran over there and she was staring down a hole in the tree. Apparently the squirrel was jacking with her, because every now and than she would charge the hole. After a while I realized she was not getting the squirrel out of there so I called her to the lure which she hit right off. Hooded her than took the 20 minute walk back to the truck.
11/18/08 1030 grams

THA mini meet

Well Saturday was cold and very windy. I picked Abby up from Noels. He said her fly weight should be around 1050. I think that will be high. I put her up in a tree Saturday and tried on a bunnie field but she would not follow. I do not know if it was the crowd of people, the high winds, or she prefers squirrel hawking. So I called her to the lure and put her up for the day. Got a later start than I wanted to on Sunday, we met Noel around noon and went to the park where Abby got her last squirrel. She had a few chases but was not following that good. Both days she was right on 1050 grams. She did not connect with any squirrels but was activly chasing. As I said however, she would not follow. Called her to the lure with only 30 grams of food because I wanted to try her on bunnies on the way home. I stopped at Karma field and she was at 1080grams. Put her up in a tree and immediatly I got her 3 or 4 bunny slips and she just watched them run by. I moved to another part of the field and she followed. I put a bunny right under her and she went after it but it gave her the slip. I thought good now we can get some where. Boy was I wrong, she stopped following and started rat hunting. Even though I continued to give her slips. Called her to the lure and went home.
11/17/08 1080 grams

Some pictures of Abby's First Squirrel of the Season

Things ended up better, but I miss my Bird.

Well Saturday I went to a field hoping to see some bunnies. I put Abby up in a tree in the middle of an area with some thick mesquite and cactus. As I walked through the trees Abby surprised me and was following great. We worked the area pretty heavy but to no avail. After about 45 minutes and sweating my butt off I decided to call it a day. I was frustrated because she was doing so well I wanted her to get a bunny. I pulled out the lure and she hit it right away and traded off good and hooded easy. She was at 1090 grams.
Sunday I was taking her to Noels house to hold for 2 weeks to see if she will loose her aggression in her mews due to being territorial. He asked me if I wanted to hunt her on some squirrels or bunnies, and I said sure. We decided to go with the squirrels since Kylie had never seen successful squirrel hawking, and I knew Abby was better on squirrel than bunny. So we loaded up and Noel took us to this pretty thick area, but had lots of trails and high trees. We saw a lot of leaf balls up in the trees so I knew there were squirrels. Abby chased a squirrel after about 5 minutes in, but missed. A little bit later she saw another one and she took chase that ended up in some ones back yard. I took off after her and decided to jump the neighbors fence because I could not get in the yard she was in. I got over and pulled out the lure with a small reward on it and she came right away. I hooded her and handed her over the fence to Kylie. We walked off a ways and decided to see how she would react unhooded on Kylie's arm. Since we are trying to get her used to others I thought this was a good idea, but nervous about Abby freaking out and face grabbing Kylie. She struck the hood and Abby looked at her kind of like who the heck are you, but showed no aggresion. We figured Abby would freak and take off. Kylie ended up having to toss Abby up in a tree. We went on with a coulple of more chases, but typical squirrel hawking, lots of chasing. After a bit she went after another squirrel and chased it to about 3 or 4 differant trees and the squirrel went to a tree by Noel, so Noel started hitting the tree and I came up the other side and started doing the same. The squirrel made that fatal error and bailed out the tree and went running down a washout. Abby nailed it and I took chase. I got there and was very pleased to see that she had both feet on the head. I dispatched the squirrel and let Abby have one hind leg and the head. We thawent and hunted Kylie's bird Katana on some bunny. After that we took Abby to Noels and dropped her off.
11/3/08 1070 grams 1 Squirrel.

Better today

Well I got home from work and decided I need to get some game under Abby. She was still heavy so I decided to take her to a field where I knew would be lots of easy slips on rats. I got home and weighed her and than hooded her as I did not want to get footed again. I changed out her jesses and put on the bells. This was a challenge because she kept trying to strike, so I was dodging talons plus trying to slid things through moving holes,lol. I did not get concerned with this as she has never liked me messing with her feet while hooded. We got out in the field and I walked into the field leaving her hooded. She was doing a lot of screaming which she does when she is ready to hunt. I got to the area where I knew the rats would be and unleashed her jesses. I than struck her hood and raised my arm above my head so I could duck if she decided to come at me. She looked around a while than flew to a close tree. She immediately remembered how the game works, I walked over to a piece of tin to flip it and she flew to the branch right above me. I raised the tin and she immediately hit a rat. This went on about a half hour and she ate three rats and I traded her off on two. So that is 5 rats total. Some would consider this on there head count, but I will not because of the fact they were easy kills. I hope my goal was accomplished as to let her get some aggression out and get free food.
10/30/08 1095 grams

Aggresive Red Tail

This is our third year together and this year is a whole new challenge. When I started bringing her out of the molt and dropping her weight, she was not dropping no matter what I did. I would try just a few grams a day, and would try a large crop every other day. No matter what I did she would only loose 10 grams a day. This last weekend I did not feed her for 2 days, lost 20 grams, and than cropped her good with 170 grams. My bird is not very aggressive except when there is food involved, and not to get to the food, but if there is no food. I will explain. When she is on my glove I can run my hand all over her with no problems. I can pull on her beak, play with her talons, she is a little fidgety, but not aggressive. When I cropped her up this last weekend, the whole time she was eating off the lure I was running my hand all over her with not to much problem ( I usually do not mess with her while she is eating, just trying to re-enforce the fact that I will be moving in on a kill). The next night I took her out of the chamber and took her to the shop and weighed her, she dropped 113 grams, a little more than half what I gave her the night before. So it looked like her metabolism was kicking in. The problem came when I brought her back to the chamber. I put her on a perch in the chamber and removed my glove and folded it and was holding it in my hand. I turned to look for a casting and she hit the elbow that was holding the glove. I dropped the glove and she hit the glove. I had to use my other hand to push her off the glove and she kept jumping at it. I was than able to leave the chamber. Let me give you some idea of where her weight is at. First off I trapped her at 1380 with a small crop. The first year I flew her at 1010, last year I flew her at 990. This year at the end of the molt she weighed a whopping 1420. At the time she hit my elbow she was at 1175. It gets worse, last night I weighed her and she was back to where she was before I cropped her up at 1110. I carried her back to her chamber and went to put her on the perch, but instead of stepping off the glove to the perch she turned and hit the left side of my face. So I am at a loss as to what to do as she is not at weight yet.
10/29/08

Still dropping

Well most of the week has been just feeding her small amounts about 30 grams of chicken. Still only losing about 10 grams a day. Sunday evening gave her a full crop of rabbit, 178 grams, hoping to kick the metabolism in, which she weighed 1110 grams before feeding her. Monday night I did not feed her and she was very aggressive and weighed 1175. Which means she burned off 113 grams Monday, so we may be headed in the right direction. The problem is, I took her out of her chamber and weighed her and than put her on a perch in her chamber. I took off my glove and held it in my hand while my back was to her looking for a casting on the ground. Than all of a sudden Abby hit my left elbow with both feet and dug in good. I had to take the glove and throw it across the chamber to get her to release. She hit the glove like it was the lure. I may need to take her out and see if we can get some game under her, whether she is at weight or not.
10/28/08