Labor Day

Spent the weekend at Hackberry Flats looking for Redtails and Falcons. The red area in the picture is the refuge area and you are not allowed to enter into this area after October 12th.

We have gone ti the flats every year a couple of times in the fall and normally the area is under water with plenty of birds flying around. More often than not you can spot many adult Redtails, and Harriers. In previous years i haven't looked for anything else but this year is a little different as i wanted to see what falcons where there.

Ryan VanZant went trapping there in 2009 and Caught a Prairie Falcon. Because of the heat and the lack of rain the landscape is vastly different. The lake is only down to a few acres of water and the normally flooded wet plains are dry. We spotted a few ducks and Canadian geese on the lake sure but that was about it. I did spot a Falcon by the primitive camp grounds diving in and out of the long grass.

There should be 2-3 feet of water here. I want to go back in a few weeks on my own and try trapping again but unless some rain comes really soon there probably wouldn't be much point.

Awesome Weekend

This weekend we headed down to Celina to see a gry/peregrine cross fly. We watched in awe as this bird circled around gaining height and then it was stopping so fast you could hear the wind of it's wings. It hit a pigeon so hard that the air was full of feathers and there was an audible thud.

The bird was stunning , ill remember a camera next year and Jay the current handler has done a brilliant job training it and getting it to the stage he has. Next season the plan is to hit ducks and hit them very very hard.

We then went south towards Dallas. In McKinney, Frisco and Dallas there are a number of flood fields that have been surrounded with housing and construction. This has forced rabbits into isolated pockets. There is no predication , no coyotes hence lots of Rabbits. We had bunnies bouncing out left right and center. Steve's bird smash was full on and all about them. We ended up bringing some home in the game bag. Smash would have continued hunting but we where all worn out after about 2hours of falling over one rabbit after another.

On our way down to these fields we saw so many red-tails it was unbelievable , nearly every other telephone post had one if not a pair of redtails. Redtails were soring hunting and resting.

In some ways i was very jelous of steve and his hawks. The flights where spectacular and rewarding but i couldnt help but feel , when is it going to be my turn ! The fall can not come soon enough.