Long Night ahead

Today i took Zoie to do a bit of urban hunting. A few hundred yards from my house is the AG building for the high school. They have a number of cattle pens, it looked like a good spot for a rabbit or some rats. I also wanted to work some more on her being carried on the T-Perch. All was going well until she decided to fly up to a pole with a transformer. What must have been only a few seconds seemed to be a life time as i saw Zoie get electrocuted and fall to the ground.

I called my sponsor and drove home with her still body in the GH. She was in deep shock. By the time i got home she was standing up again and begging to be fed.

Steve put a call into the vet and i went over to his house with her. Tonight she stays with him . Dr Moore prescribed Lamsil and Amox a Anti-Fungal and an Anti-Biotic. If there is any change she's off to Dallas to be seen by him. Hopefully there will be no brain swelling or organ damage we will find out over the next few days. For now she gets a few days off a piece and quite.

It's amazing how much these animals get into your blood. Driving home and not having the jingles if her bells in the house is a bit like someone removing your left arm. feels very strange after such a short time of being in my life

Wide Open Spaces

This week i'm working on a few training things with zoie. Shes been very difficult when in an open field. She will fly off to the nearest tree or lamp post regardless of where it is rather than sit on the t-Perch . So i'm working on improving this.

Steve came over with smash so we headed out to platter with his Harris and my red tail, We hunted smash first, we had some awesome flights on sparrows and wrens. It can be quite amazing at how acrobatic smash can be when chasing small birds.

Then it was my turn. The plan was to head for a corner of platter that we know holds a few rabbits. The cover is quite dense so it takes a little planing to flush one up. We got one flush and she was on it for a brief few seconds and then it was gone in the undergrowth to the safety of a near by rabbit hole. We tried to kick a few others up found some fresh sign but the rabbits here are very weary. She had an awesome stoop on another one but again the brush is just to dense.

One thing is becoming very clear, Zoie is not an open field bird, she will fly to the safty of the nearest tree. She tolerates the T-Perch for a short while but then she is off.

Both our legs are cut to pieces with the brambles and wild rose bushes, i so need some chaps.

We are talking about heading over towards tishomingo wildlife refuge, there is a public hunting area just south of it and maybe give that ago. At least the evening are going to get lighter so more hunting time and the squirrels will be out later.

I think a plan of what i want to do for the future is starting to form . So far it will be hunt Zoie till March 31st. Nearly all the available prey I'm interested in stops being legal and the "let it lie"rule comes into effect. I'll feed her up and intermew her for the season after that point.

If i can afford it i want to go to the THA meet (15th Jan), I have a lift and the offer of a hotel room to share. My sponsor is giving a talk on the new Texas regulations and i have the chance hopefully of flying zoie on some good game. I also am looking for ward to meeting a few people.

I told you so.....

This morning as i was waiting for my sponsor there was 3 squirrels in our back yard less than 25 feet from the front door, to my surprise my wife was get zoie, get zoie you are so going to regret it if you dont fly her on those squirrels.

I didn't get zoie , zoie was boxed up ready to go out with steve.

Steve turned up at 11am and we headed off to some private land, here we found his Harris doesn't like horses and starts screaming at them. We saw a coopers hawk and a red shouldered hawk mobbing each other and we saw 3 ducks rise from one of the stock ponds on this property.

There wasn't much there for zoie so we moved onto a different spot. On the way there we sposted the most beutiful redtail hawk. She has a total white head and a white tail with a red band at the bottom. She even had white patches on her wings.

The spot is near the Roosevelt bridge on highway 70, core land. We went after squirrels but didn't see any , saw a few empty nests. We did have some amazing flights on two Cotton tail rabbits and some rats but the brambles where so dense that at one point i fell through 3 feet of them into a flooded patch. We also crossed an inlet that was covered in fallen tree's. Obviously at some point a tornado has come through this spot as everything was flattened. The rabbit flights where awesome , zoie likes to kite and then does this wing over into a stoop. Pretty amazing to see. The rabbits used the brambles as cover to walk through , the denseness of them keeping them safe ( our legs are cut to ribbons). We both got sunburnt and towards the end i had to sit down on a log cause we must have walked miles. Zoie was amusing in the end as she was tired and walked back to the car instead of flying, Couldn't help but pick her up and carry her the rest of the way.

got home had the usual beer with Steve only to hear my wife say "I told you so"

Well the weather out there if frightening

I have 4 days of and i was planning on hunting all of them... Well that was the plan i guess someone else had another plan because today we have had nothing but torrential rain and then this afternoon winds gusts of 12mph and snow. Zoie has been sitting in the living room on her indoor perch whilst my wife and i cook for Christmas day.

I borrowed two books of my sponsor.

Rabbiting( with ferret, dog, hawk and gun ) by Sean Frain and Understanding the Bird of Prey by Nick Fox.

funny enough Sean Frain is form my neck of the woods in the UK. I am looking for a good rabbit hunting book for the USA so if anyone knows one drop me a line.

Tomorrow is a new day and the storm should have passed with winds approx 8mph and clear Sky's during the day. Hopefully we can get out and go hunt something...

In the mean time a Merry Christmas to all those that read this blog..

Peace be with you, The Olner Family

Can't Buy a Bite

In england there is a saying when the fishing is slow, "I can't buy a bite" its a turn that was taught me by a friend called Jimmy. Jimmy was what i call a professional fisherman. He taught me lots and helped with my own fishing. We would fish the canals and lakes of saddleworth together mainly going after Perch, Roach, Bream and a carp if we could get it. When things where slow he would say "I cant buy a bite" in a northern accent. I feel like that with Zoie at the moment we cant buy a bite.

We headed out to a Pecan Orchard , 100 acres of prime land. I know the land owner personally and in the past have seen rabbits and squirrels on this land. Recently its been leased out for cattle and allot of that has changed. The grass is no longer long as the cattle keep it low and it gets mowed during the pecan harvest.

I only saw 2 nests , saw lots of birds, Ssparrows, Wrens, Cardinals and Starlings and the Stock pond in the middle of the land had 6 ducks on it.They were weary and flushed when i was 200 yards from the pond. We did get mobed by a Coopers Hawk but i chased that off .

We did have two slips one item i didn't see and another we think was a red fox. Both Zoie narrowly missed out, I tried to re-flush with no avail. After 2hrs we headed home both weary and ready to be fed up.

The lack of game or the narrowly missing out is getting frustrating for both of us , I'm going out but for one reason or another we just don't seem to be connecting. I need to find some more land or find someone that has a sure thing that i can fly zoie on for a few days because at the moment "we just can't buy a bite"

Hatched

Today i was checking on the pigeons before Steve and i took Zoie out. We have two very small chicks. I have one mated pair but don't think i have any others which is a bit of a disappointment so will have to prune a few down. I started making my hutch pigeon loft. it will be 3 feet by 6 feet and then 4 feet tall. I have placed it on legs so will be about 3 feet off the ground. I want to get this finished by next weekend so i can start free lofting Zoie in the mews.

Steve and I headed out to the creek, first time Steve's been there but this is my 3rd trip. Although we didn't manage to take any game we did have 5 very good slips . 3 of which we never saw the squirrel but was a very long flight and we eventually found Zoie on the ground walking around. 2 of the flights we did see and the chess match was on two of which ended in a stalemate with the squirrel either hiding in a nest or in a hole up a tree. Zoie started to rip apart the nest but after a while ( 3 minutes of us banging on the tree) she lost interest and moved onto the next chase. This flight resulted in the squirrel going to ground and leaping 40 feet to the ground with Zoie in hot pursuit.

We did have two more flights, one of which was exceedingly long and took her out of the wood along the lake. We are assuming this one might have been a rabbit as we did spot some rabbit sign.

After 3 hours of hunting Zoie decided it was time to call it a day so we headed home.

Steve was delighted by the hunt and seems to think Zoie and i are making a good team, she is following well and on the long flights i am somehow managing to keep up. I have also decided to give the T-Perch a rest for the moment, Zoie wont fly to it and for squirrel hawking its more of a hindrance than a help, what i did get was a tire check stick that long distance lorry (Semi ) drivers use. This one has a metal collar on the end which proved great for banging tree's and bushes. The catapult/Sling shot worked out well again today. I seem to be withing 6-8 inches of the target. I do want to get some heavier ball bearings as these ones seem a bit light

Managed to get out tonight but took longer than i intended. She was a little high at 960 but we both needed to get out long day, cold and wet. We had some really good flights and some very good following. I was also practicing my sling shot, its amazing the difference steal ball bearings make. I was reading Gary Brewers book on the subject and he is more than correct when he says small pebbles and stones don't have a straight trajectory. I managed to hit 4 out of 6 on target but didn't manage to stir any squirrels out of there nests. I might see if i can get a heavier ball bearing from Gander Mountain this weekend.

I ended up feeding her some rabbit on her lure. I've also started feeding her with the dog present and near me. The dog did manage to get footed when she stuck her nose up her butt, but Zoie didn't bate once with Emma around. The idea being the more used to each other they get, the more chance i have got of flushing some more rabbits.

I was quite pleased with tonight as Zoie was really good at following on. I did spot allot of coyite scat in a clearing where there where allot of deer tracks. Didn't spot any rabbit sign but by the amount of scat i found i would have been very surprised. Might be worth at some point in the future doing some varmint hunting in this particular clearing.

Wet Hunt

She was at weight 941 and had enough time to get her out after being to my wife's units Christmas party. We headed to a new spot some squire ll hunters had told me about.

When we get there we find the way bared by a rail line and no crossing. Just at that point 2 park rangers show up and i ask them about where the public hunting started. my step-daughters boyfriend was with me so we headed into the woods. I really wasn't expecting anything as the rain was the kind that whilst light soaks you to the skin and i figured that zoie would either put up in a tree or all the game was holed up for the night.

We was probably in the woods 20 minutes when zoie flew with purpose to one spot and stayed in the tree's. I spotted a squirrel and started shouting HO-HO-HO and running towards the squirrel. zoie was in the tree's following the squirrel and Luke my step-daughters boyfriend was also running towards the squirrel but from a different angle. The chase was on and lasted 20 minutes as the squirrel jumped from tree to tree with us all following it and trying to get zoie into position for the finally assault. But all of a sudden the squirrel runs down a tree trunk and vanishes. We found a small hole that was barely big enough for it to have fitted. I banged on the trunk but it was hollow and our squirrel was firmly tucked up inside. We started moving around trying to flush other stuff hearing the barks of other squirrel's flushing them away from us and zoie. zoie had one good flight on something else but i never saw it and she lost it.

We all including zoie at this point looked like drowned rats, every tree we banged we got a shower but i can truly honestly say it was one of the best hunts we have been on so far. Everyone came home safe and a good time was had by all. I fed zoie up for the night and plan to make another return to my new found ground.