and so it starts

Dropped our first feather and hes eating like there is no tomorrow he is back up to trap weight of 940g and still pretty tame , bates rarely.

Feeding a mixture of Mice, Squirrel and Quail right now

End of Season

Things have got busy and its the end of the season now anyway. Under Oklahoma Falconry regulations i could carry on rabbiting but allots going on right now. I'm still having asthma attacks and that's wearing me down a litttle. So with all that in mind i decided to put Shiloh up for the summer, get the molt over and done with and getting going as soon as possible. I'm going to try him on Rabbits and Squirrels in the Autumn and probably Crows and Pigeons.

It's been an interesting season, i caught more with Willow as in a rabbit and a skunk but the whole experience just wasn't fun. Didn't catch anything with Shiloh but we sure did give it our best try and had plenty of slips. He's a gaming bird just got to work on getting him to follow better. I wish i had had some success like some of the other apprentices in North Oklahoma, jacks, Cotton's and everything else would have been nice and i tip my hat to them. I think the most i learnt this year was about medical issues as well as behaviour issues. I also learnt to trust my instincts when something isn't going right. It's easy to doubt yourself when your in charge of a wild animal and am wanting the best for it as well as have some fun for yourself. The biggest difference i think that helped me this year was a screen perch. The amount of batting that was reduced because the bird was higher up and wasn't able to go very far was allot more satisfying than with the bow perch on the ground.

I did gain a new friend in Bill Boni one that I'm thank full of. Thanks also as always goes to be best friend Steve Armstorng who even though wasn't around much this year and we only got to hunt with each other half a dozen times this year ( Not enough by any stretch of the imagination) was around when it mattered. Also thanks to Ryan Van Zant for a couple of pointers he sent my way.



Things will be different in October , i will be eligible to upgrade to a general and have multiple birds. I want a Passage Coopers Hawk. I love accipters they are considered the Ninjas of the falconry world.

The Mews is going to be modified to take 2 birds and the pigeon coop has already under gone some major changes.  


 I'll post more pictures when i have completed it. The few pigeons i have left seem to appreciate the changes and have already produced 3 chicks this month.

So to sum up Shiloh is fat 900 grams and we await the molt and feeding lots of Mice and Quail.