the Ultimate Dirthawkig boot

The ultimate dirt hawking boot should be able to with stand two seasons of thrashing briars , wood piles and pretty much anything. Because of a week ankle from breaking it when i was a teen ager ( chasing a girl called Niki at the Logos School in cyprus) i have increasingly needed a supportive boot.. This year i turned to Redhead brand.

I bought the redhead tracker 6" boot.

They was on sale for $90. Waterproof and very comfortable.

The laces where the first to break but that's to be expected and I'm on my third pair of laces.

 

The seam on the toes has come away.

 

the side seams have started to break.

 

 

So my quest this summer is to find the ultimate Dirthawking boot. I really want something that can withstand allot of abuse but last more than one season.

one more day till the end of January

All week i have been in meetings or it has been too cold to fly for any length of time so yesterday it was good get out for a while. We had some good chases on rabbits and small birds. We had one rabbit that he couldn't keep hold off and it bolted into a rabbit hole with jez trying to get down the hole after it. We also had some pretty cool flights on small birds. We chased a good rabbit out into the open, Jez grabbed it by the butt and both rabbit and Harris tumbled along. Jez wasn't going to let this one go. Total count for the Night was 1 small bird, 1 rabbit and 1 vole.

If the rain holds off tonight we will see if we can put another in the bag.

Back on Track....and not so on track

So the last month has been interesting with the weather, new foster kids, sick dogs, new puppy and the holiday season all to boot. We have caught things just not rabbits in that time. Today was the first day in a while that the temps where above 30F so i arranged to meet with Kent Carbaugh and going hunting in a spot that's local. Kent flew his birds first and both caught decent sized rabbits. Then we took mine out ( the plan eventually is for us to fly both sets of birds together).  We where hitting some pretty dense brush and moving them about and had some good chases and some completely ignored chases. Eventually i was about to call it a day when we flushed a rabbit heading back. Jez gave good chase over a good distance and went for the grab and missed. I saw where the rabbit hid and picked Jez up for the re flush. The rabbit tried to bolt back to where he had originally came from. Jez grabbed it by the butt and being closed i ran over and secured it.  It always amazes me how a bird can tackle another animal twice its body weight.

I let him feed up on it for a change as i want to get him really turned on to rabbits. ( i also have a plan to use a dog dummy wrapped in fur for days we don't have good chases and i will drag it behind).

On the Finlay walk back he was still chasing rats even though he had a full crop. you just got to love these birds.

 

Next few days are going to be interesting weather systems again so hopefully we can get out.

 

 

 

Bella is coming along nicely i have her pointing a Quail wing on a fishing rod. and shes almost has "Sit" down. House training seems to be working and generally shes a pretty sweet dog.

 

Remington on the other has some behaviour problems we think is due to the medicine he is on. The medicine he is on has been solving the electrolyte issues to the healthy range (30) but there seems to be some stress trigger that we are now encountering. We are going to try a few different things to give him a chance. We are looking at maybe changing his medicine to a different type. Not quite ready to make that final decision.  

Gift Horses from the wife should always accepted

So my wife surprised me in finding an English Pointer litter locally in Dewey. Now if you know my wife you knwo this is a big thing. She has a love/hate relationship with remington and she likes the purse dogs that are all cute and cudderely. Her favorite saying is i dont want dogs so for her to say hey come look at this litter, well you just got to its kind of like winning the lottery.

With Remington's health issues she wanted me to have another dog but also one the whole family could get involved in. The owner is a Local hunter that was not intending to breed. He had papers for his Sire and Dam but the deal with the puppies was you vaccinated and did everything else yourself.

Ryan Van Zants another local Falconer and Pointer Trainer/Owner came out with me, as i trust what he's going to tell me, he holds nothing back and i respect his opinion.

We had the pick of all but one of the litter that had already been placed. we whittled it down to three possibles a male and 2 females. I eventually settled on one of the female. She was one of the few that kept coming back to me when i walked off and was interested in a quail wing that i started playing with. She also pointed Ryan's son a couple of times as he ran around the yard ( He had been playing with quail all day).

 

We spent about an hour with the owner talking about puppies , hunting before making our way home. Once we got home i went to tractor supply and got specter 5 as she had not been vaccinated and gave her her first dose. She'll live in the house for the first couple of weeks until she can mix with my other dogs.

oh and we decided on calling her Bella.

if i take one more step

So there we have it. we took one more step.
We have officially caught more seasoned game with this hawk than any other previous. The feeling is pretty good. In total so far Jez has caught Sorrel, Rabbits, Pack Rats, Voles, Mice and Birds. (34 in total) He has caught 5 things a Sorrel and Rabbits that have a dedicated season. How ever you want to count it i am pretty pleased.

I am pleased i haven't had to use a bagged game item to get him going like a quail or a rabbit. All we are doing is hitting the field every day for 1 1/2hours longer on weekends. He cant hit really think brush but so far it hasnt really mattered. The bird chases are pretty spectacular. Harry McElroy likes the Male HH to a Female Coopers hawk and in his opinion are just as fast but with out all the hang ups a Coopers Hawk has. I flew a passage coopers last year and i got to say i don't miss those hang ups. Its great being able to just pick the bird up and go hunting and know you are going to catch something. It doesn't matter if there is a dog or another person in the field.

Yesterdays hut had a spectacular chase on a sparrow followed by a Rat and Mouse. The sun was starting to set and i have had problems with great horned owls in the past so decided to head home. just as we was walking back to the car Jez was of the T-Perch and in 5 feet there was the sound of a bunny being caught. quick dispatch and a good trade of and we continued our trek back to the truck

One more rabbit

On Saturday i took a few friends from wok hunting with us in the field. We chased many rabbits and a few quail. We caught Rats, Voles and some small birds. The look on each of these guys faces (they are all hunters) was priceless. Big smiles all round.

Sunday i went out on my own again plenty of chases on rabbits and some long haul flights on birds. about 30 minutes into it he hit the ground hard and rabbit number 3 was in the bag. Trade off was better than any other. With the Rats and Voles i have been pinching the heads off letting him eat them and carrying them off. I have noticed he burns through Rats and Voles at 3 times the burn rate of say rabbit and quail.
I can't say it enough this year is turning into a fun year for this hawk and I. I only need one more Seasoned (Seasons as in there is actually an official season for it) game item and i will have caught more seasoned game than any other year. I have had official more kills on Rats, Voles, Mice birds and Rabbits than any other bird and any other season. It's pretty amazing feeling going out into the field knowing you're going to catch something , just not sure what.

Remington continues to improve. Right now we are trying to figure out the right dosage that gives him an active life but none of the side effects. right now he is drinking and urinating every hour with a few accidents in the house. I spoke with the vet this morning and we are going to drop the Prednisone from 5mg to 3mg. I'm also having to keep an eye on him as he has been showing signs of aggression to my other dog and growled at me once. I'm putting this down to hunger as his appetite has really picked up and he is starting to gain weight back. I still have him on Rice and Boiled chicken , he cant seem to get enough of it. I have had him running in the back yard after pigeons and started calling whoa when he stands still i let the pigeon go. Rewarding the good behaviour with a pigeon chase.

Good things come to those that..... well........ Hunt

We have been going out every day, most hunts involved 1-2 rats and 1-2 birds being caught in each hunt. The rabbit chases have been 2-3 in each hunt. on three occasions he bound but for some reason or another the rabbit finally got away. The cover is still pretty think in most places there seems to be two kinds of plants that i haven't seen in the past one has little yellow buds with a thin stem. The plant grows to about 3 feet. the rabbits can move freely under the main bloom but seeing through and crashing through the top part has been challenging. The other plant is well id say very close or must be related to some kind of heather very dense.

Today was different we had a rain shower earlier and i was expecting a storm to come in later( storm never materialized) but we went hunting any way he caught his first bird after about an 20 minutes then we started to get the bunny chases and re flushes. This particular rabbit was trying to sneak past us but never got more than 10 feet.

i traded him off (which wasn't to hot) but we went again and he caught another bird and chased 2 more rabbits into dense brush. One went on to a property I'm not to keen to go on at the moment even though i have permission.

Talking of permissions, even on waste ground never assume you can fly your bird there. I learnt a valuable lesson on Sunday , one that I'm kicking myself over and obsessing as my wife tells me. Also never assume one parcel of land is owned by one person. I found out that 4 different people own part of this property. none of it is fenced , no markers . It took a lot of detective work to find who owned what. All turned out well and i was granted permission but it's not how i want to practice falconry and made me feel immensely guilty.

I like the fact that there are challenges with flying a captive breed bird , food begging , sticky glove but i like the fact when you go out you know there are going to be some great flights and he/she will get something. With work and home life this is fun i can be out for 1hr -2hrs forget about the world and just concentrate on one thing finding those rabbits.

Summer Morning at the Lake

Remington and i enjoying Lake Copan in Oklahoma. I got him pointing on a couple of ducks by the lake shore really nice.

Game Scents and more dog training

One of the things i want to develop is remingtons nose. Remington is great on visual point but get over welmed with scent smells in the field. Witht hat in mind i head over to Gun Dog Supply and got a couple of scent bottles.

I bought the Quail and the Rabbit scents to see if it really makes a difference. I also got a large bumper. I plan on using this for training an will be wrapping it with rabbit fur.

Remington has pointed and chased a few Rabbits which I'm delighted with and i just want to encourage and re-enforce that. We are also currently working on the woah command and making sure he is steady on point.

This will work for a while allowing my pigeon loft to catch up on young , so far i have 5 breeding pairs with a mixture of Racing Homers and Common Pigeons.

End of Turkey Season

Well today is the end of Spring Turkey Season and i didn't manage to get one. Not for the want of trying as most weekend i was out looking. I learned allot and had a lot of fun with it. Was very different to Falconry. I must admit i do prefer falconry but i had fun none the less. So here is to the next turkey season in Fall.

I came close to getting a turkey twice. But unfortunately they were both times just out of range. I will work on my calls for next season and hopefully that will change.

i'm in the market for a gun, a big gun

I've been wanting to get a gun to go hunting for some time. A friend of mine is a gun collector and has been helping me to find what i want and what would best suit me.

Remington 760

Yesterday on the way back from a photo shoot Latrell and i stopped off at his house to try our a Remington 740 in both .308 and 30-06 Cal's and a Remington 760 .308

Remington 740

Latrell and i shot off about 40 rounds between us trying out the different guns, We where shooting at 6 inch targets from 300 yards. Latrel has a little bit more experience as she shots a M16 and a Saw for the National guard i have only ever shot once before and that was with the ruger 10/22. We also had a go with a lever action .22 which was a fun gun.

Both of us a little tender today but nothing like what i thought i would be. You hear all these stories about how a 30-06 will fl out of your hand and kick your butt. I was expecting the thing to nearly blow my arm off and be in allot of pain after the first shot.

All in all i preferred the 740 but in the 308 cal version. mainly because the pump action on the 760 i felt i was over stretching and therefore not comfortable , There seems to be very little in the amount of kick from a 308 and a 30-06 it is noticeable but in my opinion negligible. I felt both Latrell and i where a little more accurate in hitting our targets and yes we did hit them and hit them hard than with the 30-06.

Jim suggested we try a 30-30 and a .243 in two weeks time and then after that make our final decision. All i can say is watch out Deer and Watch out hogs the Olners are coming !

On another note on hunting i cam across a video on YouTube where a young land of about 14-15 was shooting a Hawk and laughing about it. I've since reported it to Operation Game Thief and am waiting on there report. I have never seen anything so irresponsible as i had in the video. I really do hope the game warden for that area catches the youth and the youth is really punished.

Hunting

I got my Combined Hunting and Fishing License this weekend. I have never had a hunting License before so it was very weired being asked what i had caught last year which was a big fat zero. The price for an Oklahoma combined resident Hunting and Fishing License was $37 + $5 which to me is nothing really.

Im thinking about getting a .22 Rifle again somthing i have never done before. Squirall season is open and i could stock up on some of this for the Autum

SEASON DATES: May 15-January 31 BAG LIMIT: 10 per day (both species combined), 20 in possession after the first day

Oklahoma Small Game

Getting there slowly

not posted for a while and that's not to say i have given up or anything. Steve's birds have been up and down or the weather has been to windy. That's not to say i have not been doing anything. I got given a load of reclaimed timber ( or lumber as the yanks call it ) More than enough to build my weathering area. Steve my sponsor came over on Saturday and he checked out where i was planing to put my mews and weathering area. We finally decided on placing it at the back of the house. great place for morning sun, protected against midday sun and very private.

We also checked out two potential hunting areas in the Platter area. We have allot of public hunting ground. We got out of my van and immediately bumped two squirrels so i guess more than ever i will be squirrel hunting . We also spotted some pretty decent sized rabbit sign so there is potential in that.

I also showed Steve my Giant Hood. I've been working on it for some time and planning it. Steve recommended timber for the hood as this will make it near pitch black inside and be more beneficial to my hawk when i get it. Chloroplast is nice and light but it still lets in light.

I have made the hood out of very very fine plywood, less than 1/8th of an inch thick. I then used 1/2 Inch square dowel as bracing. Screwed and glued all round and then put some outside trim (compressed foam with pine vainer ) along the edges. So far this is very very light and I'm very pleased with it. I'm sanding it down right now so i can coat it with a polyurethane varnish and then air it for fumes. Still studying and reading up for my exam but i will be starting to put my mews and weathering area together soon.

Steve is off on a road trip for a bit and one of his harris hawks has started molting