Sherlock 2013 Imprint Coopers Hawk

[Jacklyna]

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130712_103328-1_zps830d51f2.jpg

http:// i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130712_104729_zpsd41f4720.jpg

I picked this coops up at roughly 8 days old from a friend that pulled him from the nest last week. I've been going through old Nafex posts for threads on eyas coopers hawks, and since there aren't that many, I figured I'd start one too. This is my first imprint bird, so I sure hope I don't make too many mistakes. I'll be following along with Steve Layman's method as best I can, and I'll try to keep this thread up to date with the good and the bad.

Sherlock is about 14 days old as of today and though he still sleeps for large chunks of the day, he's beginning to walk around on wobbly feet and exercise his wings every now and then. I've been hand feeding him since the day I got him and leaving a dish of chopped meat in his nest box 24/7. I've been clicking with my tongue when feeding in place of a clicker, but he hasn't quite made the connection yet. He's only just today showed the confidence to feed himself though, so I'll start putting his food on top of an opened quail or his lure instead of a dish.

He's been pretty social and doesn't seem frightened of anything yet. The dogs will play around him with no problem, and when out of his box, he'll wander a few feet then come back and flop against me with a small chitter. He was mobbed by a small group of young children today, and he didn't even bat an eye. I have the time right now to be with him all day long, so Sherlock comes everywhere with me. He seems to love the car rides the most. He's beginning to get more mobile and active, but he seems confused about his feet still. He nibbles his lure and the spare hood I keep in his box, but that's as much as he does so far.

I can't believe how fast he's been growing!

Edit: Sorry, realized this should probably go in the Imprinting category

http:// i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130711_085440-1_zps2c0b3603.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130710_200218_zps79c73803.jpg

[Breeze]

Hi Elena! Will be following your thread! Thanks for taking time to post and share with the rest of us. Love the name, Sherlock. :D

[hcmcelroy]

Elena,

He is looking good keep us posted. This should be a fun trip!

Harry.

[Jacklyna]

15 days old - 270g

I'm starting to wonder if my boy is actually a girl!

Sherlock has about an inch of feather showing on his primaries as of today, and he's been more actively flapping them in a puff of down. I left some food in his dish with some water for hydration overnight, and when I woke up this morning half was gone and the other half was scattered around his dish so at least he's trying! I gave him three meals today at 8am, 1pm, and 6pm, and I'll feed him until he's full late tonight before bed. He's been doing pretty well with the hand feeding so far. He did get excited a few times and try to chase the dish, but when he did that I mantled over it like a sibling. When he lost interest, I clicked and gave him a tidbit. For his afternoon meal, I set half of an opened quail in front of him and put a few loose tidbits on it to see how he would react. Sherlock chirped and nibbled at it a few times, managed to get one of the loose pieces first. He put a limp foot on the quail and nibbled the wing then looked up at me confused. He bit the wing again, I clicked, rewarded, he nibbled the body, click, reward, repeat until he was done.

It was a gorgeous day so we spent most of the afternoon outside under a tree. His nest box is pretty shallow, so a few times Sherlock got really curious and scrabbled out of it to wander a few feet, flap his wings, and cuddle up to me. He shredded a flower and footed a few leaves and his lure a few times but then looked confused like "what did I just do with my feets?" After an hour he'd climb back into his box, but an hour later he'd crawl right back out again.

He also spent some time on the couch this morning, and he would seek out a leg or a dog to flop and preen against. One of the dogs actually started to gently lick the leftover meat from his face, but Sherlock just continued to preen without a care. I'm loving how tame he is right now. He was mobbed by some children and a dog yesterday who tickled, patted, bumped, and buried him under his pine needles. He practically fell asleep.

So far so good!

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130713_111023_zps07ef4088.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130713_122718_zpsfb2027d9.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130713_115008_zpsc057dd9d.jpg

[allredone]

Size is confusing to me but looks like a male face and tarsus?

[Jacklyna]

I'll take any opinions here on the sex, I wouldn't even know where to start with a young coopers.

[FredFogg]

Hmmm, I was thinking female! Legs look a bit thicker than a male and 270g at 15 days, if it ends up being a male it will be big for a western male. It will be fun to see how big it gets and then we will know. Personally, at this age, I wouldn't ever let the bird be chirping for food, it should be getting more than it wants right now.

[FredFogg]

Edit button gone again! frus)frus) I meant to say I wouldn't let the bird be chasing the food dish, not the chirping part.

[Jacklyna]

I'll definitely keep up on weighing him at the same time each day to be accurate. As for the chirping, Sherlock seems to be chatty in general. He's silent when eating, but then chirps for a while after he's gotten a full crop. He chirps too when he sees something interesting and when the dogs play.

[Jacklyna]

Ohh chasing gotcha! Maybe chasing is the wrong word, leaning in towards the dish with great interest? He does get fed until he's stuffed, and he's never on a totally empty crop. But when I feed him, I want to make sure he doesn't get aggressive with the hand feeding. So when he gets excited, I'll mantle until he looks away, click, and reward. My intent is to have him feeding tamely from my fingers, not snatching the tidbits when I'm not prepared. Hope that makes sense!

[hcmcelroy]

Elena,

If he is 15 days of age and 270 g. along with the short rounded face I'll guess male. A female should be within the 300 range by now.

Nice job his behavior is impressive. Some would have him on two meals per day at this stage...while others would continue with food available at 24/7.

Harry.

[Richard]

[QUOTE=Jacklyna;294682]15 days old - 270g

I'm starting to wonder if my boy is actually a girl!

Sherlock has about an inch of feather showing on his primaries as of today, and he's been more actively flapping them in a puff of down. I left some food in his dish with some water for hydration overnight, and when I woke up this morning half was gone and the other half was scattered around his dish so at least he's trying! I gave him three meals today at 8am, 1pm, and 6pm, and I'll feed him until he's full late tonight before bed. He's been doing pretty well with the hand feeding so far. He did get excited a few times and try to chase the dish, but when he did that I mantled over it like a sibling. When he lost interest, I clicked and gave him a tidbit. For his afternoon meal, I set half of an opened quail in front of him and put a few loose tidbits on it to see how he would react. Sherlock chirped and nibbled at it a few times, managed to get one of the loose pieces first. He put a limp foot on the quail and nibbled the wing then looked up at me confused. He bit the wing again, I clicked, rewarded, he nibbled the body, click, reward, repeat until he was done.

It was a gorgeous day so we spent most of the afternoon outside under a tree. His nest box is pretty shallow, so a few times Sherlock got really curious and scrabbled out of it to wander a few feet, flap his wings, and cuddle up to me. He shredded a flower and footed a few leaves and his lure a few times but then looked confused like "what did I just do with my feets?" After an hour he'd climb back into his box, but an hour later he'd crawl right back out again.

He also spent some time on the couch this morning, and he would seek out a leg or a dog to flop and preen against. One of the dogs actually started to gently lick the leftover meat from his face, but Sherlock just continued to preen without a care. I'm loving how tame he is right now. He was mobbed by some children and a dog yesterday who tickled, patted, bumped, and buried him under his pine needles. He practically fell asleep.

So far so good! [QUOTE]

He's developing nicely. They are generally pretty much finished growing by the time they start popping out feathers. 270 grams at 15 days sounds like a bird that will top out at around 300 grams at hard penned. Then he'll probably have to come down a bit for hunting weight; perhaps to around 270 grams? A lot depends on gaminess, physical conditioning and your skills.

Some birds are silent; others are not. The little chittery noises are nothing to worry about. They should go away with maturity. He's just expressing himself; pleasure or displeasure. Our "momma dog" likes to lick the babies. She mothers anything she can get close to.

Enjoy the sweetness; it ends way too soon.

[Jacklyna]

16 days - 283g with a partial crop

Thanks for the input, I'm always ready to learn. It's interesting to see the weight variances with a young coopers.

Today was rather laid back compared to the others. Right now Sherlock is nuzzled up and cheeping in my lap as I type this up on my phone. He's been standing for longer periods of time and is still learning how to foot things (he still falls over every time he attempts to do so). Once again he'd finished half the food in the dish overnight and pushed the rest around, so he wasn't that hungry when I woke up to feed him this morning. I think I'll stop leaving the dish in for the night and instead just feed him up later in the evening so that he's more responsive when I wake up and he starts switching over to the 3 meal a day plan.

He's been responding well to the clicks so far and has been more patient and tame when taking the tidbits from my fingers. I've been placing the food dish a few inches away when feeding him and marking calm behavior (ie preening, looking around, being quiet) as well as any time he bites at his lure. After a few times, he would bite the lure then immediately look to me for a reward. I set an opened quail with loose tidbits on it in front of him again this evening, but he still seemed a little uncertain about it, so I marked any time he leaned in towards it or nibbled the body. His appetite is definitely slower than it was yesterday, and he seemed to lose interest in his food and get distracted sooner. He still is never on an empty crop, but he acts more content on a less full crop than last week.

Sherlock is also more keen on exploring and being out of his nest box now that he knows how to get out of it. I had him outside for a few hours again and he loved it-wing pumping, jumping, chirping. When inside, he would hobble from one side of the couch to the other, and when one of us or the dogs sat down, he'd often chirp and sidle up and sleep or preen against us. He also got to watch my boyfriend's Harris hawks get used to their new perches, something in which he took great interest, chirping and turning his head this way and that.

Sherlock slowly inched himself up against the dog's neck, chirped, and fell asleep
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130714_174113_zps5816932f.jpg

He decided to scramble out of his box and sit next to me on my rock
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130714_123210_zps0d513116.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130714_123341_zps961ba3c1.jpg]

[red_tailed]

Awesome pic of the coops next to the dog. Is that a pure Russell or a beagle/JRT cross? As it looks exactly like my 14 week old cross. I only hope that he will be that gentle with my birds in due time.

Bob
BC Canada

[Jacklyna]

Thanks! That's my boyfriend's dog Rielley, who is a 5 year old Jrt/beagle cross. He thinks the coops is his new best buddy for life :)

[Jacklyna]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBHD4zofHtM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Video of Sherlock playing with a ball of masking tape

[red_tailed]

Thought so about the dog. Did Dan pike breed him? If so I wonder if our dogs are related. As i can see mines face looking exactly like that. Also interesting on the name as "Reilly" was in final 3 names for mine. It came 3rd to Ripley and to the eventual winner of Casey.

Bob
BC Canada

[Jacklyna]

Yes, this is one of Dan Pike's dogs so there it's likely that they are related. If you're interested I can see about his actual breeding information for you. And that's kind of funny about the names!

[Jacklyna]

Day 17 - I'll get a weight later this evening

Took Sherlock on a drive again to bring my boyfriend lunch at work as usual, but this time he hopped out of his box right away and looked fascinated when I shifted gears. Nothing better to judge how smoothly I drive than having a wobbly fuzzy headed bird next to me!

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130715_093947-1_zps5000565d.jpg

He's getting better with hopping and managed to scale an eight inch step in the garden with a jump and a flutter. You can see here his tail feathers are already longer than last night.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130715_100552-1_zps6d154aff.jpg

[allredone]

Enjoying the photos!

[Ricko]

Great to see more Washington falconers on here. :)

[Jacklyna]

Glad you guys like the pics!

Day 17 cont - 289g with a partial crop

Yay progress! I offered Sherlock half an opened quail with loose tidbits again, and after about half an hour hour of looking confused and nibbling on the meat and body with no success, he managed to work a piece loose and something seemed to click in his little head. He ripped into the quail then, eating part of the breast meat, the heart, liver, lungs and kidneys. When he got caught on some tougher bit, I'd reach in and help him out with absolutely no issues or change in behavior from him.

Besides that, not much new. Some more footing and jumping practice, and lots of sleep.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130715_131616-1_zps3e9d1f49.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130715_093357_zps6fdcd8b4.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130715_141607_zps380a7fe0.jpg

[Jacklyna]

18 days

Sherlock is getting better at eating from the quail on his own and is starting to use his feet to hold it down while he pulls. Still no issues with me reaching in to help and feed tids from my fingers. He was huuungry this morning so it took a few two or three clicks for calmness before he became more patient. Spacing the meals about 5 hours apart seems to work well with us because he's responsive to the clicker training but at the same time he still gets fed all he wants at meal time.

I put some anklets on him today because of how active he's getting. I'd rather he get used to them now before he gets too ahead of himself and hates them later. The first went on easy, but the second took longer since he suddenly realized he didn't like the grommet setter. I spent a minute or two getting him used to the tool so that I could set the other one without fear from him. A few surprised looks and bites, but he ignored them pretty quick.

Noticed some fret marks towards the end of a few feathers which are likely from the day he was pulled and brought home.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130716_193703-1_zps84a1ec2a.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130716_193424-1_zpsb26c851b.jpg

[Jacklyna]

22 days - 292g

Sherlock has been floating between 290 and 295g the last few days with all his equipment on, so he's without a doubt a tiercel. Thanks for the input!

He's been doing pretty well so far, and I'm fascinated by the amount of growth he has every day. I do have a few questions though that I'd love to hear some of your guys' input/opinions on though since eyas coopers are entirely new to me.

First off, I've noticed that although Sherlock responds pretty well at mealtimes (ie click and immediately look for a reward), sometimes his attention will drift and at then the clicks don't even seem to register with him. For example, he'll be sitting on his haunches in front of me, and I'll mark and reward his calmness for a few bites. He eats them eagerly and with no issues, but then something else grabs his attention and he'll stand up, stretch, and go wander off to explore or investigate for 5, 10, 15 minutes. In that entire time, he completely ignores the clicker or even food that I offer. Earlier on, I tried to mark when he chased a feather or footed a leaf, but there was no response as if he suddenly lost his entire appetite. However, after this, he runs or hops back to me, looks up, and waits patiently, and I can resume feeding and shaping with the click and immediate response like nothing happened. Is that normal behavior for a young bird like him? Or should I work on solidifying that click/reward relationship everywhere he goes?

Secondly, I was curious as to when others have generally introduced their eyasses to the perch. He's been getting increasingly mobile, and though he still considers his nest box as his home base, he'll happily spend hours playing, preening, or sleeping elsewhere. I'm not sure whether it's better to start introducing him to the perch now or after his feathers have grown in a little more. Has anyone noticed a difference in how they respond to being tethered in relation to when you start?

Other than that, he's been a total sweetie and pretty calm in general. Last night, he was surrounded by about a dozen kids and parents who flooded him with sudden attention and noise. In the beginning, it was obvious he was a little unsure of all the petting but he relaxed pretty quick and even walked around out of his nest box for a little bit (much to their delight). This was, however, another time when I wish he would respond to the clicker outside of mealtimes so that I could reward his behavior in large groups. I'll have to see what to do about that.

And now for that important stuff!

19 days - sunning in the garden
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130717_150455_zpsbd73bb95.jpg

20 days - cuddled up during a movie and spreading bird dander everywhere
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130717_103240_zpseb05b860.jpg


20 days - I think the black leather suits him
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130717_092936_zps2076205e.jpg

21 days - Generally how his mealtimes look. He couldn't care less about the dogs being around while he eats (although here the dog had just snorted at him)
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130718_085550_zps6bbbc5fd.jpg

21 days - sunning some more
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130718_155359_zps747ee61a.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130718_160330_zps9731fe1b.jpg

No pictures yet from today, but I'll grab one or two later.

[Breeze]

Hi Elena! Just wanted to pop in and tell you I'm enjoying your thread! Thanks for sharing so many pictures and describing your adverntures with Sherlock.

[Jacklyna]

Thanks Deb! I'm glad you're enjoying it! :)

[Jacklyna]

22 days cont.

Well, I guess it's time to expand Sherlock's play area from just the floor to every piece of furniture in the house. After some intent staring, he made a leap and scrabbled his way up to the sofa cushion where he then chirped a bit like he was proud of himself. My little guy is growing up!

On another note, I brought him into my truck to take a drive as usual, but I guess the combination of heat, noise, and the fact that he hadn't been in it for a few days caught him off guard and I only made it to the end of the road before it was obvious he was getting stressed and overheated. Turned around right there and brought him back where he in the shade under a tree for an hour or so. Re-acclimating him to my truck is back on my list it seems. I really wish I had ac in there for the poor guy.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130719_141036_zpsa91c8309.jpg

[Jacklyna]

23 days
At the WAFA picnic.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130720_173522_zps735393e7.jpg
Both of us!
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130720_110847-1_zpsa4e45c4a.jpg
Tired from a long day
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130720_164513_zpsb246bea1.jpg

24 days
Testing his wings
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130721_173124_zpseed1e62a.jpg
He willingly steps up and down on occasion and has no problem being carried
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130721_182618_zpsae79c85e.jpg
Learning to balance
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130721_175444_zpse36190d6.jpg
Relaxing like a big bird
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130721_180424_zps8da39c02.jpg

25 days
New, smaller anklets
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130722_112544_zps00071cf2.jpg
His favorite spot in the truck
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130722_093150_zps881d0282.jpg

[Jacklyna]

26 days

I haven't been bothering to get a weight on Sherlock lately since he's so mobile these days and just hops right off the scale as soon as I put him on. Sorry for the lack of updates, I've been spending the day just enjoying my time with him!

He's definitely branching now which makes having him in the house much more time consuming since he sees every single raised surface as a great adventure to scale and and flap around on. He's started to make little noises like a squeaky toy when he gets excited. He can now fly a few feet at a time and, several times a day, will dash madly through the house circling tables and foot the chair legs with somewhat wild abandon crazyy It is pretty hilarious to watch though. For a little bird, he sure can book it!

I've still had him outside with me for a few hours each day, and he's taken to perching happily in one of the trees nearby. The robins, however, protest loudly and strafe his head every now and then. Sherlock did well with watching the skies before, but now he always has his eye on his surroundings. He's practicing hopping from one branch to another but doesn't do so well all the time and falls out of the tree sometimes. It's only a four foot drop so it's not that bad, but he can't make that leap up by himself quite yet and he's aware of it. So when he falls, he dashes around on the ground until he finds somewhere else to perch. Or, if he gets too close to jumping into the neighbors yard (which is at a lower level than ours) I pick him up and he rides on my wrist back to the tree. He understands stepping up and down now and being carried without a fuss.

His appetite has been changing around this past week, and by following along with his preferred habits, we're now on a one evening meal a day with random tidbits interspersed through the morning and afternoon. He just is not interested in food at all in the mornings which makes it a little more difficult for clicker training since he just tends to wander off after one or two bites. His appetite gets strong enough for a full crop sometime between 4pm and 8pm but it varies each day. For those meals, I've been switching around my methods depending on how responsive he is. Sometimes I'll have him work with the lure since that association doesn't seem to be solidified yet, and I'll have him walk to it and bite it for a reward. Other times, I'll open a quail for him and help him eat from that, using that time to mark calmness on the carcass. He's pulling more strongly at the meat, but still hasn't quite made the step to using his feet to help him hold the meat down. I feel like he should have gotten this part already, but I might be expecting to much.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130723_103609_zps8c2766e7.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130723_102235-1_zps5b4a0ecc.jpg

[Jacklyna]

33 days - 2nd official day of hack

Sherlock looks to have topped off in the 300-305g range (with his equipment on), so it looks like he'll be at an average tiercel coops weight when he comes down a little for hunting. He's wed to the lure now and will come to it from any distance if when he's hungry. He's come to it a few times on a partial crop but not very quickly. If he's looking in the opposite direction when I pull the lure out, I'll whistle or yell and he will turn to look my way , see the lure, bob intently, then fly and/or dash towards it. He can also feed himself from a quail without a problem now, only needing help when he gets caught up on bones around the chest cavity.

Now that he's officially at hack for most of the day, I feed him only when he comes to the lure. He eats a partial meal in the morning and gets a full crop around 5pm when I call him in for the night. I would cut out the morning meal, but he's already a bit noisy in the afternoon, and I think that bumping him to one meal at this point would only increase that noise/hunger level. In the mornings he doesn't feed from a full quail after coming to the lure. Instead, I focus on tidbitting and marking calm behavior or encouraging him to chase a tidbit that's thrown away from me so that his focus is not on my hands or my face at mealtime. In the evening, I help him start on a quail and mark tight feathers and calmness on the carcass in hopes that this carries through to when I make in to him on a kill. He shows no nervousness or fear when people or dogs are touching him, walking around him, or making noise while he's eating, and I hope to keep it that way.

He's developing rather nicely, and his ability to fly is growing exponentially each day it seems. As of yesterday, he was flying twenty or thirty feet without a problem. His third tail bar is slowly on it's way out. I've had him outside to wander for several hours almost every day since we pulled him, and when he decided to scale twenty feet up in a pine and preen for two hours three days ago, I decided there's no better time to start a hack than when the bird says he's ready! He's been chasing the bees and ants and hummingbirds in the yard and footing branches like crazy. I have not put any telemetry on him yet since I have no backpack mount ready and currently have no spare bells, but I was confident Sherlock knew where home was and how to get back. Yesterday I called him to the lure at 8:30am, picked him up and put him in a tree, and drove off to run some errands. There was no sign of him until about 2pm when I walked outside in the front yard and heard some sudden squeaking high up in tree somewhere nearby. I sat down in the grass for the next half hour and listened as the squeaking got nearer and nearer, and then out of nowhere Sherlock barreled into the ground next to me and jumped on my knee. He played near me for the next few hours until I called him to the lure at 5pm with an instant response and took him inside for the night.

I introduced him to the perch and being tethered this past week, and by the next morning he was regaining the perch. That same night he stopped bating from the perch and would sit and preen happily until about 7pm when he started getting antsy and jumping towards his box. I put him in and cover him for the rest of the evening and he would go straight to sleep. He rides the glove better now, but we're still working on regaining that if he bates from it. I'm not pushing glove training too much at this point since I rarely carry him around on it right now. Either he's flying loose or I'm carrying him to his perch where he stays tethered each evening.

27 days (?) He spent a few hours hiding under this bush
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130726_102938_zps768a4a0e.jpg

28 days - 2nd tail bar had just come out of the quills
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130725_113446_zps51e50331.jpg

29 days - Hanging around outside a shop where welding tools and loud machines were being used. He ignored everything and played with leaves all afternoon.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130727_184100-1_zps2adce57c.jpg

32 days - after breakfast, looking like a dork
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130729_090053_zpsc2ad65f0.jpg
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130729_090135_zps36762c8d.jpg

[Jacklyna]

And from today at 33 days. He's hanging out under a tree in the front yard right now

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130730_134907-1_zps55742e11.jpg

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130730_134939_zps21ca2d1a.jpg

[jeffandheidi]

He looks great! Those feathers really do grow fast!

[Jacklyna]

Called Sherlock down to the lure around 4:30 as he was acting more hungry than usual aka running around my feet the moment I walked into the yard. I had him chase the lure around the yard which he did eagerly, and when I let him catch it, he acted like he hadn't seen food in days. He mantled for the first timeover the food but wasn't aggressive to me. He whistled loudly and tore into the quail but didn't mind when I touched the food or his feet. I slicked his wings and tail back and marked that with a click and some tidbits. He'd whistle and flare his wings for the first few tidbits but soon calmed down and finished his meal like a total sweetie. We'll see how he acts on food tomorrow.

[Breeze]

Hello Elena! Just wanted to let you know, still following your thread and love the photos and hearing about Sherlock's progression. Thanks for sharing your adventures!

[Jacklyna]

Thanks Deb :)

34 days

Yesterday was an uneventful day at hack for Sherlock. He stayed within eyesight pretty much all morning and afternoon in one of the large pines bordering our yard, squeaking every now and then. Around noon, I sat out in the yard with him and tossed leaves and small rocks around for him to chase and "murder" which he did with a bit of hilarious action. I attempted to weigh him around that time as well, but he did NOT want to have anything to do with the scale. It wasn't that he was afraid of it, he just wanted to go away and do his own thing and not be held by the glove. That was probably a mistake, since I had to follow him around the house and pick him up against his will to take him back outside (so that he wouldn't bash himself against a window in the house) and he squeaked and bated in protest. However, once back outside, he was happy as could be again. He did manage to bend one of his secondaries sometime during the day, but it doesn't look all that bad, thankfully.

I took a few shots of his playtime after that with my phone so they're a bit blurry but I thought it was pretty fun! I called him to the lure earlier than usual, around 3pm yesterday since I didn't feed him as much that morning. He was after the lure instantly and showed no signs of mantling or aggression even with me walking around him, touching him, and messing with his feet. However, that coopers side is definitely starting to show. Before I distracted him with the leaves and the rocks, Sherlock flew straight at my face when I came into the yard and landed on my head, plucking my hair and squeaking at me. That's to be expected though, I just hope once he starts hunting that will pass. The rest of the day I had him perched inside the house in front of the tv, surrounded by noisy playing dogs and the whole family. He bated a bit at first but soon got over it and preened until about 7pm when he started getting antsy and bating again. I put him back into his nest box and covered it at that point for the evening. I don't have any spare GH's for him yet, but I'll rig one up after this weekend.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130731_131302-1_zpsce8b08d7.jpg

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35 days - 297g

Sherlock is able to regain the glove no problem now if he bates from it, but he still doesn't care for it much, and besides carrying him from his box to outside to a perch, I'm not going to push it yet. He flew about twenty feet to the lure, landed maybe 3' away to run the rest and started footing the lure. I'm going to try and reinforce him looking my direction if I yell "hey" so that I can get his attention that way if he's away from me in the field. I alternated tossing tidbits around the yard for him to chase and feeding him from my fingertips. He still has not shown aggression towards my hand, and I make sure to only feed him the tids from above his head and not from his feet.

He ate two quail legs this morning, let me pick him up and carry him to a tree, then took off flying into a higher one when I approached him a little later. I'll snap some photos later this afternoon when I call him down for his afternoon meal.

[Jacklyna]

Pictures will have to wait until after the weekend as I'm out away from home hunting with my boyfriend and some friends. Sherlock came to the lure with a little more biting than usual, but no mantling like before. He ate around 2:30 so that we could make the drive to eastern Washington.

Out of curiosity, we have Sherlock a baggie at 8pm and after a moment's hesitation, you could see it click and he took it down like a champ :-)

[Ally]

Whoooo glad you're having fun! He sure is cute. Little bird killer.

[Jacklyna]

First off, thank you to Aurelia Kucera of Cazador Falconry for making me this awesome, goat hide glove. It's super comfortable and I love the way it looks. I recommend that anyone looking for great quality equipment check out her website at www.cazadorfalconry.com.

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40 days - 9th day of hack

Sherlock's behavior has been changing daily, and I'm definitely seeing more of that cooper's hawk spaz in him. He spent three days this past weekend on the perch for the majority of the day since we were staying at another falconer's house in an area entirely different from what he was used to (not to mention the multitude of large birds perched outside in the yard). From what I was told from people that passed in and out of the house during the day, he fared pretty well, not bating much, not too bothered by the dogs or visitors. I fed him to the lure outdoors the first day, but decided after he showed much more stress than usual around the other birds that it'd be better to feed him indoors. I only hope that doing that didn't create issues for the future.

I gave him another baggie Sunday morning before we took off to drive home, and he tried to grab it in the air, missed, and chased it down on foot. He mantled a few seconds in the beginning, then slicked down and ate with no problems, even when the puppies started nosing his wings and the ground around him.

Now that he's home, he's back to an 8am-5pm hack. I've bumped him down to one evening meal a day to call him down at the end of the day. He's been a noisy bird since day one, and he's gotten to be pretty vocal all day long now. Thankfully though, the noise doesn't bother me so I really don't mind it. Sherlock hasn't been wandering far at all during the day, preferring to stay somewhere in one of the pines bordering the yard.

He's always had a habit of jumping down to be near me whenever I come outside, usually landing behind me or somewhere by my feet and then proceeding to chase leaves or rocks for a while. However, yesterday, he decided that a better way to get my attention would be to fly at my face and pluck my hair which he then did twice. I figure it's probably because the last few days the only time I handled him was at mealtimes because that's when I happened to be back home from hunting with the others. Today though, (with my new glove!) when he tried that trick again, I offered him my fist and he landed on that instead. I spent much of today hanging around him and walking in and out of the house so that he doesn't associate my appearance too strongly with only food. By the end of the day, he would fly to me when I walked out, but no longer with such excitement, and would instead land a few feet away from my feet and run around in front of me.

I've noticed more things are starting to stress him out such as the dogs playing around him. I'll likely take him in from hack early tomorrow and perch him indoors before mealtime so he's used to being surrounded by people, dogs, and noise again. he's also been on and off aggressive on his food. I had him chase a quail wing yesterday, and when he caught it he mantled like crazy, whistled at me and tried to foot and bite my hands whenever they moved. When he ate a full meal on the lure later that night, he was as sweet and calm as could be. And tonight, he chased the lure aggressively, footed it often, and tried to take off with it, but then as soon as he was presented with the quail, he plucked it, mantled a little bit, but then calmed down and was sweet on his food again, allowing me to play with his feathers, his feet, and his food without argument. He whistled and mantled for half a second whenever I offered him a tidbit from the fingers, but then slicked and went calm again right after. It's definitely a learning experience with this bird.

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[Jacklyna]

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42 days - 11th day of hack

I've switched Sherlock back to two meals a day, the first being one or two quail legs, the second a full crop. Because of his hunger/aggression levels, I've decided that until he hardpens, I'll focus more on developing time with him while he's fat and not just looking for food. Having a meal at 8am and then another around 5pm seems to work quite well with him where he stays more docile and sweet on and off of his food. Yesterday on the lure he mantled and leaped for my hands when they came near for the first half while his hunger was sharp. I would like to delay and soften that response as much as possible while I can.

This morning he came to the lure instantly and footed it then broke into the quail leg I offered him. I also offered tidbits from my fingers throughout the meal, marking when he was calm and tight feathered on the lure. He responded very well and besides a few flared feathers every now and then when something startled him, he kept his wings in, was fairly quiet, and did not show any aggression towards me.

Because I've been having him at hack outdoors for the majority of the day, when he comes back indoors after his evening meal, it isn't long at all until his nightly anxiety kicks in and I box him for the night. I have the time, so today, after leaving him outside for about an hour before breakfast, I brought him in and have him sitting on the perch indoors so that he gets used to the dogs playing around him again and having me mess with him. So far he's been an absolute sweetie: preening, fluffed out, occasionally talking but not bating much after his initial surprise of being back indoors. He's pretty much looked this all morning:

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I think I'm going to alternate hacking him outdoors and indoors until he's hardpenned and maybe a little after that. I've been able to watch him and he really does not stray past the next door neighbor's house. I still have not put telemetry on him (mostly because I don't have a backpack set up), however, I really don't feel that there's a need yet. At least not until he starts wandering a little farther during the day. Now that the others are starting to hunt and get down to business I can't wait to get this little guy ready to go!

[Breeze]

Hi Elena! Still following and enjoying your thread. Very lovely bird there. Thanks for continuing your thread on Sherlock!

[Jacklyna]

46 days - 15th day of hack - 308g with equipment

Sherlock is hardpenned now and his days of hack are officially over today. He quite happily dive bombed my boyfriend's mother and landed on her head this morning while out flying around, and yesterday I heard him harassing the ducks in the neighbor's lawn across the street (which I thought hilarious but it's best to stop that). We live in the center of a very populated neighborhood so now that he's flown at someone that looks nothing like me, I'm going to keep him inside and start a very slow weight reduction to get him ready to hunt.

I've been fiddling with his meals to see how time and frequency affect his behavior, and it's a drastic change between one meal and two. For example:

On two meals a day - sweet, calm, friendly, no vocalizations, tight-feathered, and facing towards me.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/20130809_143315_zpscbeb73d0.jpg

On one meal a day, fed around 5pm - aggressive, screaming, attacks anything that comes near him, mantling, facing the opposite direction (until the last 1/3 of the meal time when he calms down and settles his feathers)
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Outside of mealtimes though, Sherlock is still incredibly tame and sociable. Anybody can go up and handle him without any change in behavior from him. The dogs will play around his perch and accidentally knock him off, and Sherlock will just shake his feathers and jump back up.

He trades off from the lure without hesitation and I hope this transfers over to his kills. I've been making it more difficult for him to catch his lure as he's progressed, mostly to help improve his footing and flight and to simulate a baggie. He's been able to twist and turn on a dime now and grab the lure in midair on a curve. He does have a tendency to try and carry it sometimes when he does catch it, but so far I haven't let him get any headway with that. Hopefully in the next week or two I'll be able to get him hunting.

[Jacklyna]

47 days - 300g @ 4:30 meal

I had Sherlock on the glove for a solid three hours today, and he settled down and started preening much quicker than yesterday. He's also been fairly quiet when I'm holding him which was a bit of a pleasant surprise. I've also been working on stepping up on command with him and he will do it inside. I still have never fed him on the glove and I don't really intend do. He adapted well to the giant hood too, no problems putting him in or taking him out, and no bashing around while he's in there.

I tied a quail wing to my lure today, just the feathers so he could pluck them, and worked on calling and transferring from it outside. He got the lure about half a dozen times and jumped off for a tidbit tossed a little ways away each time. There was one toss where he saw the tidbit in my hand before I was ready and he flew at my hand to get it. I didn't let him have it, distracted him with the lure, and tossed out another tidbit. I had to show him my empty hand a few more times before he ignored it again as if it had been a fluke, and we finished the session without another problem. Besides that mistake, Sherlock was actually rather well-behaved on the food. A little mantling to start, but he soon calmed down and let me touch his feet on the lure and he stayed tight feathered. He's completely hog fat from the hack.

[Ally]

nice job recognizing that Sherlock seeing that tidbit in your hand could Have very quickly turned into a bad behavior. great work Addressing it right then and there.

[Jacklyna]

48 days - 300g @ 3pm

34g quail on lure transfers taking off from fist outside. Responding to command step up after transferring to tidbit, slowly but response there. On later tids, would run around area to look for other tids before letting himself be picked up. Watched intently as I shook bushes then tossed out lure with wing like a bird scared out. Aggressive to lure each time, but when I dumped out the rest of his meal after the last lure catch, he was fairly slicked down and calm, allowing me to touch him and his jesses. A little reluctant to give up the lure but released it each time with no issue. No targeted aggression to my hand besides his usual protective charge once when I moved too fast, so mistake yesterday might not be an issue.
3:30pm - 334g

Ally, I remember hearing you talk about your training of BJ and how one mistake can go a long way, so I hope what I did and how he reacted today means I averted something that could have been worse.

I did want to take him out into the field this week or this coming weekend to see how he acts to real game. I know he's pretty fat, but he responds instantly to the lure so far (as long as the surroundings at somewhat familiar), and he's definitely shown interest in things that flutter.

[Ally]

Elena - glad I at least gave you SOME useful information. Seems like he's forgotten all about it, great work.

He shouldn't go anywhere at this point...even if he doesn't want to come back to you right away because of his weight, you should be able to wait him out until he does. Good luck!!!

[Jacklyna]

53 days ~294g at mealtime

Well, we went over to Eastern WA this past Saturday and tried to find some quail for Sherlock but weren't successful in finding a good slip. For his first time out though, he did very well. He was a little confused at first when we started walking the field with the pointer, but soon after he rode the fist solidly and was mostly quiet except for a few bates while he was learning. He didn't even bat an eye when we walked through a wasp nest and high-tailed it out of there! The quail we found was on the other side of a high bush line, and only one flushed where we could see it but it was still a good 50' out and 30' up. Sherlock eyed it intently and it was obvious he was interested, but it was just too far away. I'm happy with his behavior though, he's definitely in the right mentality.

We gave him a baggie quail yesterday in the backyard here at home. Sherlock was on it the instant he saw it twitch, footed it, mantled like crazy, and started plucking it. However, he was incredibly aggressive towards me but especially Matt as he knelt beside us, leaving the quail to attack and foot anything that moved - hands, feet, face, leaves blowing away. Matt called up Steve Layman to get some input since neither of us is experienced with imprint coopers hawks, and Steve helped walk me through the process. He said this behavior is actually a great sign and in no way a negative. Sherlock sees Matt as a sibling and will therefore act much more competitive on game to beat him and can be flown at a higher weight than normal because of that edge (He did, in fact, immediately calm down a bit the moment Matt walked inside). The best way to go about with an imprint coops at this point is to provide as much mental stimulation in the hunt as I can to keep him sharp. I started this by having him "kill" the lure multiple times during a session, but this was the next step up.

Following his advice and with Matt's help, I let Sherlock pluck to his heart's content, then offered him the lure with half a quail breast on it. While he finished that, we cut up some tidbits and hung out around him. By this point, Sherlock was noticeably calmer even with Matt around, only half mantling, not really vocalizing. When he finished with the lure, I offered him the glove (garnished with a tidbit to entice him up), then proceeded with tidbit hunts from the glove until he was almost full. Called him back to the glove one last time and offered him a feathered leg to pick at until he was content.

By the end, his response was perfect, he was feather tight and comfortable, making almost no noise at all, and showing no signs of aggression towards me or Matt. It was quite the behavioral and learning experience for me.

Steve also let me know that right now, Sherlock is going through full-on dispersal mode and this would explain why he is suddenly antsy on the perch for much of the day and showing defensive behavior when he is approached. I wondered if it was a territorial display or maybe a weight issue, but Steve says that at his age, all he wants is to be away, and the best thing to do is just let him be when he gets into a mood. This is normal and it's the time when he can become fearful of things. We moved his perch to a more secluded room where he could be by himself more but still see what was happening around the house. If I lived in a less populated area, I definitely would have left him out at hack longer to help get over this stage.

This might be old information for some of you reading this, but I'll keep it posted here in the off-chance that it might help someone else that decides to raise an imprint coopers.

Anyway, I'll keep him around the 293-295g range for another day or two so he doesn't drop too fast in weight then slowly go from there depending on how he responds in the field. Hopefully we'll get some little birds for him to kill here soon.

[hcmcelroy]

Elena,

Do you have house sparrows to toss for him?

I enter all my quail hawks on them from gos to male Cooper's and Harris's.

Harry.

[Jacklyna]

Harry,

I have a friend that breeds quail that helps me with quail buggies, but no I don't currently have any sparrows on hand. I did start him off in sparrows when I did have them though.

[hcmcelroy]

Elena,

Its just as well the game birds drive accipiters any way you look at it.
The flutter of a wing is all it takes.
Only a suggestion but I have tossed a baggie at the end of the flight session every third day when birds are not caught.

Harry.

[Jacklyna]

This will be a long one...

It's been almost a month since I updated, but I've had several people ask me to post what I've been doing with Sherlock lately so I figure I ought to. I'm in the middle of moving to the Spokane area so I haven't been able to get Sherlock out hunting as often as I like, but once I'm settled I want to have him chasing quail and blackbirds every day of the week if possible.

He has not caught any wild game yet, but we're getting close with his weight. I think just a few grams lower and we'll be right on the money. Lately though, I've been working on shaping his behavior using Steve Layman's advice (as best as I can transfer it), and it's been interesting to watch/stimulate his emotions and his mental capabilities. I was able to take him out carhawking on blackbirds yesterday for the first time, so I'll start there.

His weight that morning was at 240g and when he was pulled out of the box, he was in quite the mood. I think had we provided a quail slip for him or flew him later in the evening, he would have been on it. As it was, however, we loaded him up in the truck and took off for a dairy farm where there were lots of sparrows bathing in a puddle. He bated a few times as he was getting used to the unfamiliar surroundings, including the new people and the many cows. I had never slipped him or even given him a baggie blackbird or sparrow, so he was entirely unfamiliar with what he was seeing Ultimately, this was more a test of his weight and how he would react than an actual hunt for him. He watched them intently from the window, bobbed a few times, almost jumped once, bobbed a few times again, waited a minute, and then flew after the bathing sparrows but checked off onto the roof as he was mobbed by the other birds.

I called him down to the lure, and we took him back to the house. We set up a carhawking scenario where we slowly pulled the car up around a tree and came upon the starling in the yard. Sherlock again took a while to commit since he did not recognize the starling as a source of food, but he did finally take it down. I was getting advice on transfers and lure work from another falconer as Sherlock ate, and due to a lapse in attention from me and a sudden movement from the other falconer, Sherlock spooked off the ground when he was done and I had to call him down to the lure. He did come down with a full crop after a short hesitation though, so I'm not too bothered. I know why it happened, and it won't happen again if I can help it. I think the rest of this week, I'll be using Mr. Frosty to encourage him to go after blackbirds, especially the ones that are not moving.

Although he didn't perform as I had hoped yesterday, he did show remarkable steadiness and a definite attachment to his lure in unfamiliar surroundings. His aggression was targeted and focused away from me the whole time. And he did finally go after prey that he was entirely new to, and this can be developed for sure. Positives, eh?

As for everything else - when I stopped posting, Sherlock had just started entering a highly aggressive and territorial state of mind, centered mostly around his perch, the house, and the yard. He would charge the dogs, threaten and even attack other people in the family if they got too close. He was never relaxed on his perch, always in a semi-aggressive posture. Bathing, preening, fluffing out, even pulling a foot up were things wholly forgotten with him when others were around. When I handled him, he would switch instantly from attacking his food to flying talons first at my face, hands, or feet. I was wearing safety glasses at one point because I just could not trust him while he was free. I moved him for a few days from the main living area to a more secluded portion of the house. I handled him as infrequently as possible. I called Steve Layman.

And of course, Steve's response was, "That's great!"

This is what he told me (as best I remember). Aggression is ten times better than fear, especially in a cooper's hawk. The phase that he is going through is actually something that Steve encourages in his birds because it knocks the fear right out of them. Anger can be controlled and molded into a productive force, and birds that have gone through this stage of being angry, dominant, and territorial will ultimately become better birds because they have been forced to control it and actually THINK about what they have to do in order to get what they want. The raw emotions they are feeling can be cued in the field and funneled towards their prey, making them fly harder, better, and longer. When they reach this point, the more OC games and mental stimulation provided for them, the better. And yes, there are other methods that work just as well for others, but this is what he has found works best for him. And I plan to follow his advice here, mostly because it makes the most sense to me.

And so far, it's been working. Now, I can put six noisy, active people in the same room with him, add two dogs romping around, chasing toys that fly a foot past his head, and have myself sitting directly in front of him, and he will sit there, cheeks fluffed out and foot tucked in. Right now, he's standing happily on his perch, preening intently, rousing every few minutes. He's even bathed in front of all of us without hesitation, facing away, half-submerged. He's silent more often than not, when in the past, he was screaming at us 24/7. When I exercise him outside and he's flying free, I can be certain he'll hit the glove every time, and not me. His muscle mass has gone up nicely, his keel feels a little firmer than before, and he's going through a solid 30-35g of food a day.

I've only just started developing a program for him when he's not being hunted, and it's not nearly as intense as what Steve and other falconers have going, but it's a start. He's been doing tidbit hunts and lure chases until he's exhausted in the front yard, restrained pursuits in the living room, he'll be getting trained with frozen quail and starlings this week, and OC games on his perch and the glove.

I'm almost entirely new to OC itself, so trying it out for the first time on an imprint cooper's hawk was a little daunting to be honest. So I started out easy for both of us. I did several short sessions throughout the day using tiny tidbits to reward and clicking my tongue as a marker. (It's a sound I've used since he was a nestling, and he still recognizes it.) Sherlock has a bathpan just behind and slightly off to the side from where he usually likes to face, so I thought that'd be a good place to start. Sherlock threw a tantrum when he realized I had food just out of his reach, and he bated and bated and bated. The moment he realized bating wouldn't work, I clicked and tossed a tidbit. Bate, bate...pause. Click, reward. He finally took a step back and got a reward. Turned around, walked back, and finally jumped back to his perch. After a while of waiting and jumping and being generally frustrated at not having food, he glanced randomly at his bathpan and was rewarded. You could just see the startled look and watch the gears begin to turn. He looked at his bathpan, then glared at it and screamed, stepped towards it, bobbed, and finally jumped onto the corner. By the end of the session he was instantly back on his perch after the tidbit and jumping to the bath, then towards me, expecting a reward.

The next day when I brought out the food, he instantly went to the bath pan instead of bating at me. He offered that behavior several more times, and then I had him do a loop from perch to pan to perch before he was rewarded. I wanted to make him think some more, and try to expand our learning with OC, so I stopped rewarding the bath pan behavior. He offered it again and again, getting increasingly more frustrated when nothing came of it. He threw another tantrum and tried bating towards me furiously for the food, but I ignored him until he went back to his perch. Rewarded that.

I had an idea, and waited until his gaze lighted on the ball point pen that just happened to be in reach of his leash. Click, reward. He was caught entirely off guard. I figured, a good way to cement the click-reward association would be to test it on something he normally would have no interest in. Repeat the process of look, glare, step, bob, and jump. Added in, step on it, bite it, and finally pick it up and drop it. Besides the education factor, it was almost fascinating to watch how much his behavior changed after just a few sessions. When he knew no food was available, he wasted no energy being aggressive or tense and would promptly put a foot up and look interested in everything until it was time to be fed again. He stopped charging me when I walked by. He completely lost interest in the dogs. He's still a little touchy with some things, but the shift in behavior is immense.

There were a few fiascos early on, such as when I accidentally dropped my glove in range of his perch, and Sherlock was on it instantly with no intention of giving it up. About to explode with rage and possessiveness whenever I approached him to get it back. So I called Steve of course, and he helped me out of it. He told me that even though I maybe have fed Sherlock just once on the glove, the coops sees it as a food cache, and therefore something of his that needs to be guarded and kept under his protection. Steve offered me three options:

1) Just go in, act like a large dominant female hawk and steal the glove back from him. (That just made me uncomfortable)
2) Ignore him and wait until he was finished and bored with the glove (I thought about that one but he was intent on shredding the seams and I rather like that glove). or
3) Cut up some tidbits, grab a wing or something with feathers, sit just outside of his reach, and play with it all in plain sight like a big female hawk that's got a kill to tempt him away from the glove cache. If he brings the glove with him, you've got the starts of retrieval; if he leaves it, just go from there. I opted for this choice.

Needless to say, Sherlock was the epitome of rage when he saw my food. Instantly leapt off the glove and bated furiously at me, screaming as loud as he could. Remembered his glove, and jumped back to it, mantling like crazy, remembered me, and charged me again. Back and forth and back and forth until he forgot the glove and focused entirely on me and "his" food in my hands. I waited until he stopped bating and had that shift in behavior as though he realized he was in a stand-off and he couldn't just steal the food, then clicked and rewarded with a tidbit. He went a little crazy, threw a tantrum, then calmed down again. Click, reward. And so on, until he was stepping away from me and jumping back to his perch with the majority of his aggression gone and the glove sneakily back in my possession. A few hours later when I went to fly him outside, it was like nothing had happened. Aggressive with the glove, but nothing towards me. And worried as I was about him getting food-association with my hand, Sherlock has not once (since that incident I posted about earlier) gone after my fingers. He knows I have the food, he knows what the container looks like, and he knows exactly where I keep it, but he never goes after me when he's free.

I think that's about all I've got for the month's overview. I'll post updates when I can or if someone requests more. Hope it was informative!

[BobbyB]

Glad to see an update Elana

On car hawking - I do not hood my Coop, and as you know, I have an imprint male as well. I have a trick you may find useful in regard to hesitation (and later - on him seeing the birds and wanting to attack too soon. Nothing blows a potentially great slip faster than a screaming, bateing raptor coming their way - even in a car))

I use a kid's cardboard school folder as a blind. To get started, I plant a recognized species and then have someone drive me around for a while. The blind is up the whole time, about 6 inches away from my bird on my fist. We drive up pretty slow and I drop the blind and toss the bird out. A few sessions of this and you are ready to rumble

I have done this with three Coop, and by the 3rd set up, they are instant off the fist when the blind is dropped - regardless of quarry species. Once real hunting commences, we drive to the slips a bit faster to give the Coop a bit of instant speed.
After a week or so of this, I hunt commercial areas that have a few mixed woodlot scattered amongst the buildings.

Ill try to find slips near the fields, and if no connection, I retrieve my bird and walk with the blind up till I find a field slip (sometimes in the beginning, I'll have a baggie set up in field). I use the blind in the field initially because I want to get as close to a real slip as possible, and position my bird for the best shot at success.

after some success, I dabble in field hawking with no blind. However, I still pack it with me because there are times I'll see something a bit out, and want to get a closer shot at the quarry

I've enjoyed your thread, and do hope you have time to keep us updated

All the best to you
Bobby

[Steveo]

This will be a long one...

It's been almost a month since I updated, but I've had several people ask me to post what I've been doing with Sherlock lately so I figure I ought to. I'm in the middle of moving to the Spokane area so I haven't been able to get Sherlock out hunting as often as I like, but once I'm settled I want to have him chasing quail and blackbirds every day of the week if possible.

He has not caught any wild game yet, but we're getting close with his weight. I think just a few grams lower and we'll be right on the money. Lately though, I've been working on shaping his behavior using Steve Layman's advice (as best as I can transfer it), and it's been interesting to watch/stimulate his emotions and his mental capabilities. I was able to take him out carhawking on blackbirds yesterday for the first time, so I'll start there.

His weight that morning was at 240g and when he was pulled out of the box, he was in quite the mood. I think had we provided a quail slip for him or flew him later in the evening, he would have been on it. As it was, however, we loaded him up in the truck and took off for a dairy farm where there were lots of sparrows bathing in a puddle. He bated a few times as he was getting used to the unfamiliar surroundings, including the new people and the many cows. I had never slipped him or even given him a baggie blackbird or sparrow, so he was entirely unfamiliar with what he was seeing Ultimately, this was more a test of his weight and how he would react than an actual hunt for him. He watched them intently from the window, bobbed a few times, almost jumped once, bobbed a few times again, waited a minute, and then flew after the bathing sparrows but checked off onto the roof as he was mobbed by the other birds.

I called him down to the lure, and we took him back to the house. We set up a carhawking scenario where we slowly pulled the car up around a tree and came upon the starling in the yard. Sherlock again took a while to commit since he did not recognize the starling as a source of food, but he did finally take it down. I was getting advice on transfers and lure work from another falconer as Sherlock ate, and due to a lapse in attention from me and a sudden movement from the other falconer, Sherlock spooked off the ground when he was done and I had to call him down to the lure. He did come down with a full crop after a short hesitation though, so I'm not too bothered. I know why it happened, and it won't happen again if I can help it. I think the rest of this week, I'll be using Mr. Frosty to encourage him to go after blackbirds, especially the ones that are not moving.

Although he didn't perform as I had hoped yesterday, he did show remarkable steadiness and a definite attachment to his lure in unfamiliar surroundings. His aggression was targeted and focused away from me the whole time. And he did finally go after prey that he was entirely new to, and this can be developed for sure. Positives, eh?

As for everything else - when I stopped posting, Sherlock had just started entering a highly aggressive and territorial state of mind, centered mostly around his perch, the house, and the yard. He would charge the dogs, threaten and even attack other people in the family if they got too close. He was never relaxed on his perch, always in a semi-aggressive posture. Bathing, preening, fluffing out, even pulling a foot up were things wholly forgotten with him when others were around. When I handled him, he would switch instantly from attacking his food to flying talons first at my face, hands, or feet. I was wearing safety glasses at one point because I just could not trust him while he was free. I moved him for a few days from the main living area to a more secluded portion of the house. I handled him as infrequently as possible. I called Steve Layman.

And of course, Steve's response was, "That's great!"

This is what he told me (as best I remember). Aggression is ten times better than fear, especially in a cooper's hawk. The phase that he is going through is actually something that Steve encourages in his birds because it knocks the fear right out of them. Anger can be controlled and molded into a productive force, and birds that have gone through this stage of being angry, dominant, and territorial will ultimately become better birds because they have been forced to control it and actually THINK about what they have to do in order to get what they want. The raw emotions they are feeling can be cued in the field and funneled towards their prey, making them fly harder, better, and longer. When they reach this point, the more OC games and mental stimulation provided for them, the better. And yes, there are other methods that work just as well for others, but this is what he has found works best for him. And I plan to follow his advice here, mostly because it makes the most sense to me.

And so far, it's been working. Now, I can put six noisy, active people in the same room with him, add two dogs romping around, chasing toys that fly a foot past his head, and have myself sitting directly in front of him, and he will sit there, cheeks fluffed out and foot tucked in. Right now, he's standing happily on his perch, preening intently, rousing every few minutes. He's even bathed in front of all of us without hesitation, facing away, half-submerged. He's silent more often than not, when in the past, he was screaming at us 24/7. When I exercise him outside and he's flying free, I can be certain he'll hit the glove every time, and not me. His muscle mass has gone up nicely, his keel feels a little firmer than before, and he's going through a solid 30-35g of food a day.

I've only just started developing a program for him when he's not being hunted, and it's not nearly as intense as what Steve and other falconers have going, but it's a start. He's been doing tidbit hunts and lure chases until he's exhausted in the front yard, restrained pursuits in the living room, he'll be getting trained with frozen quail and starlings this week, and OC games on his perch and the glove.

I'm almost entirely new to OC itself, so trying it out for the first time on an imprint cooper's hawk was a little daunting to be honest. So I started out easy for both of us. I did several short sessions throughout the day using tiny tidbits to reward and clicking my tongue as a marker. (It's a sound I've used since he was a nestling, and he still recognizes it.) Sherlock has a bathpan just behind and slightly off to the side from where he usually likes to face, so I thought that'd be a good place to start. Sherlock threw a tantrum when he realized I had food just out of his reach, and he bated and bated and bated. The moment he realized bating wouldn't work, I clicked and tossed a tidbit. Bate, bate...pause. Click, reward. He finally took a step back and got a reward. Turned around, walked back, and finally jumped back to his perch. After a while of waiting and jumping and being generally frustrated at not having food, he glanced randomly at his bathpan and was rewarded. You could just see the startled look and watch the gears begin to turn. He looked at his bathpan, then glared at it and screamed, stepped towards it, bobbed, and finally jumped onto the corner. By the end of the session he was instantly back on his perch after the tidbit and jumping to the bath, then towards me, expecting a reward.

The next day when I brought out the food, he instantly went to the bath pan instead of bating at me. He offered that behavior several more times, and then I had him do a loop from perch to pan to perch before he was rewarded. I wanted to make him think some more, and try to expand our learning with OC, so I stopped rewarding the bath pan behavior. He offered it again and again, getting increasingly more frustrated when nothing came of it. He threw another tantrum and tried bating towards me furiously for the food, but I ignored him until he went back to his perch. Rewarded that.

I had an idea, and waited until his gaze lighted on the ball point pen that just happened to be in reach of his leash. Click, reward. He was caught entirely off guard. I figured, a good way to cement the click-reward association would be to test it on something he normally would have no interest in. Repeat the process of look, glare, step, bob, and jump. Added in, step on it, bite it, and finally pick it up and drop it. Besides the education factor, it was almost fascinating to watch how much his behavior changed after just a few sessions. When he knew no food was available, he wasted no energy being aggressive or tense and would promptly put a foot up and look interested in everything until it was time to be fed again. He stopped charging me when I walked by. He completely lost interest in the dogs. He's still a little touchy with some things, but the shift in behavior is immense.

There were a few fiascos early on, such as when I accidentally dropped my glove in range of his perch, and Sherlock was on it instantly with no intention of giving it up. About to explode with rage and possessiveness whenever I approached him to get it back. So I called Steve of course, and he helped me out of it. He told me that even though I maybe have fed Sherlock just once on the glove, the coops sees it as a food cache, and therefore something of his that needs to be guarded and kept under his protection. Steve offered me three options:

1) Just go in, act like a large dominant female hawk and steal the glove back from him. (That just made me uncomfortable)
2) Ignore him and wait until he was finished and bored with the glove (I thought about that one but he was intent on shredding the seams and I rather like that glove). or
3) Cut up some tidbits, grab a wing or something with feathers, sit just outside of his reach, and play with it all in plain sight like a big female hawk that's got a kill to tempt him away from the glove cache. If he brings the glove with him, you've got the starts of retrieval; if he leaves it, just go from there. I opted for this choice.

Needless to say, Sherlock was the epitome of rage when he saw my food. Instantly leapt off the glove and bated furiously at me, screaming as loud as he could. Remembered his glove, and jumped back to it, mantling like crazy, remembered me, and charged me again. Back and forth and back and forth until he forgot the glove and focused entirely on me and "his" food in my hands. I waited until he stopped bating and had that shift in behavior as though he realized he was in a stand-off and he couldn't just steal the food, then clicked and rewarded with a tidbit. He went a little crazy, threw a tantrum, then calmed down again. Click, reward. And so on, until he was stepping away from me and jumping back to his perch with the majority of his aggression gone and the glove sneakily back in my possession. A few hours later when I went to fly him outside, it was like nothing had happened. Aggressive with the glove, but nothing towards me. And worried as I was about him getting food-association with my hand, Sherlock has not once (since that incident I posted about earlier) gone after my fingers. He knows I have the food, he knows what the container looks like, and he knows exactly where I keep it, but he never goes after me when he's free.

I think that's about all I've got for the month's overview. I'll post updates when I can or if someone requests more. Hope it was informative!

Great post, Elena. I've been trying to learn as much as I can about OC and this was very insightful! Case studies are such great examples.

[Ally]

Excellent!

[Jacklyna]

Not much of an update, but I just have to share this photo I shot of Sherlock yesterday. His face as he's surprised by a yellow jacket and falls silent mid-scream.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/DSC_0042_zps44312326.jpg

[Rmoglich]

Love this picture! I had to show all my friends. They all got a kick out of it because they know I have some insect-phobia tendencies...and they constantly give me crap about it....haha

[Jacklyna]

I glad you liked it, Ryan! I feel your pain with insect phobia haha, I can't stand things with stingers...

[falcon56]

Remarkable photo, Elena. Where was your camera when you were hawking with me?

[Jacklyna]

Ray - unpurchased at that point! I'll bring it next trip out, I promise.

[Ally]

Saw this picture already but it's AWESOME! Love it!

[Red-tail]

Not much of an update, but I just have to share this photo I shot of Sherlock yesterday. His face as he's surprised by a yellow jacket and falls silent mid-scream.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/DSC_0042_zps44312326.jpg
OMG I LOVE this picture!! Excellent! :D:D

[Jacklyna]

Still no hunting stories yet, but some more behavior training (hopefully the former will start next week when I'm done moving). I figure if anyone else has the same issues, maybe this will help a little with ideas. I apologize for the length, this is what happens when I try to condense several days into one...

In the last post, I mentioned we had gone carhawking with him and discovered that he really didn't know what to do with starlings or blackbirds. Most of last week was spent using Mr. Frosty the starling in the yard, setting up simulated hunts to teach him to look at starlings as prey. Started simple (walking him up to a clearly visible starling with a large tidbit tied around its neck, letting him pluck and eat the tid, transfer to lure, transfer to glove) and over the next few days as he started to exhibit more interest, slowly making the tidbit harder to see and hiding the starling around bushes or steps so he was forced to look. By Friday, he was down to a few seconds before pursuit instead of a few minutes. Later on, I'll incorporate the frozen starling into the restrained pursuits to both exercise and encourage his prey drive on it when he's not out hunting.

Sherlock has been treating his glove as a secondary lure, and his possessiveness and aggression on it heightens when he's indoors to the point of being unable to easily separate the two. Later, I'll try switching the color of the glove and using this current black one as a backup lure/training tool to see if that helps matters. For the moment though, I only have the one and I've been working the last few days on trying to manage his emotional intensity around it. Right now, he's so possessive I just cannot get a weight on him (besides feeling his keel when he's perched) or put him back on his perch because he's glued to the glove, mantling and screaming. Put the glove away and he's fluffed out, foot tucked up, making contented squeaky noises within a minute.

I started off two days ago by clipping him to the glove, sitting crosslegged on the floor, and staring pointedly away from him as he mantled and screamed ferociously, leaping at me on occasion. I didn't need to see him anyway for that session because I was only focusing on his feet. When he loosened his deathgrip just a little bit, or picked up a foot to replace it, or stopped convulsively tightening his toes, I marked and gave a reward. I did two sessions that day, mostly because I didn't exactly know what I wanted to do.

Not knowing made me run into some problems. Because I knew that in this state of mind, he would leap to attack or foot my arm if given the leash length, I was wary of giving him too much slack. I also knew he had started to get so eager for his reward, as soon as he heard the CR, he would leap for me or my hand trying to get it faster. I had him pretty close to the ground so that I could just toss a tidbit on the ground by his feet and he could jump off to get it or lean over to pick it up.

Issues I ran into that day:
1) The immediate leap for food after the CR made it difficult to make sure he associate the CR with the behavior I desired and not the bating
2) He didn't want to let go of the glove completely to get his reward which meant he often ended up with one foot on one foot off, jesses tangled, maybe even gripping the leash in one foot, and this just made for a messy, knotted mess because he would get freaked out by being stuck and bate and bate and bate and generally scare himself.
3) I wasn't as accurate with my CR as I should have been and both of us just ended up being confused and frustrated at the end
4) At the end of the session, I completely forgot to save a a tidbit so that I could get him back on the perch or back in his giant hood.

So. I tried again yesterday with a new plan and double the sessions. To fix issue #2, I didn't even bother taking him off his perch, and when I rewarded, I tossed the tidbit a good foot away from me so that he couldn't get himself tangled. I sat just outside the leash length so if he did decide to leap at me in frustration, he fell short. If he bated off my glove in general disorder and hung upside down, I would CR and reward every time he regained the fist on his own so that calming himself and standing back up was a definitive positive thing. For #3, I made sure to only give the CR if he loosened his grip AND he showed some sign of snapping out of his tantrum to encourage calmly standing on the glove instead of standing on the glove but still ripping at it and mantling. It seems straightforward enough, but when I CR'ed yesterday, it just seemed to make him angrier and I wanted to avoid that. And #4: I saved two tidbits...one for the perch, one for the box to avoid that fiasco again.

He still came to the glove super aggressively but he wasn't AS bad as yesterday. He lifted and replaced his feet more and stood slightly calmer on it after his initial spasms. However, he did go a little wild any time I wiggled the glove fingers, he still ripped at the glove delightedly, and he wouldn't step off willingly without a tidbit. The issue with leaping after the CR was still there though.

That leaves today. I noticed Sherlock bates towards me like a maniac whenever he notices me preparing for a session, and I decided to try something about that. Instead of just ignoring him and going on with the session, I grabbed the glove and food container on the other side of the room and stood watching him. He intently watched me back. When I stepped forward, he leaped for me and screamed, so I stepped back. He threw a tantrum and bated angrily. When he gave up and went back to the perch I stepped forward again, made it two steps until he bated and I retreated. This went on until he was staying firmly on the perch (albeit grudgingly) as I approached, sat down, and put on the glove. Once the glove was on, he bated like mad to get it, as I knew he would, but I waited until he gave up and was sitting on his perch again before I CR'ed and called him to the glove. Jumped him back to the perch, waited until he was sitting calmly, then again CR'ed and called him to the glove. My thought was, having the glove in his feet acted as a reward for him the same way that getting a tidbit did. I wanted him to think about why he got the glove instead of simply handing it to him in the midst of a bating, screaming tantrum.

I changed the focus today from loosening his deathgrip and possessiveness on the glove to fixing Issue #1 - leaping/attacking after the CR to get his reward faster. That was getting to be quite the roadblock in my OC and should have been corrected much earlier. The only way I could think to do this would be to stop tossing the tidbits and instead switch to overhead from the fingers. That way I could hold onto his jesses and prevent him from getting the tidbit before I wanted him to and only after he displayed some sort of calmness after the CR. I also wanted to work more on him willingly stepping off the glove to the perch.

I clicked for any loose-footed behavior and lifted my hand with the tidbit above his head (anticipation reward I guess. It seemed to work). He would jerk when he heard the click and saw the tidbit, then leap and bate towards my hand as hard as he could. Anytime he calmed down, I brought my hand closer, when he bated, I drew it away. He could nip at my fingertips at times, but coudn't get at the food between them until he was standing still, at which point I would click, open my fingers and he could have the tidbit. He started to understand what I wanted and stopped leaping. He would still scream at the first CR and push himself up towards my hand and flap a few times, but he kept his feet tight on the glove and only stretched his body up. He started off biting any finger in his reach, not really aiming, just wanting to "have", but we finished with him only going for the tidbit, not me.

Then I brought in the perch and had him put first a toe, then one foot, then both feet on it for a reward. Even on the perch, he transferred over his "grip the feet but streeeeetch the body" thing for his tidbit, which is so much better than trying to attack my hand to try and make me release the food like before. We repeated this several times until the food was gone. And lo and behold, the moment the glove was gone, Sherlock was bathing cheerfully in his pan and letting me pet him all over with the same fingers he had tried to eat this morning.

I'm going to work the rest of this week on solidifying what we started with the glove and perch and CR. I want this part nice and smooth before I start complicating his training with more exercises and OC games.

[Ally]

I think you're on the right track with him. What a little bipolar monster bird :D Can't wait to meet him. You'll get there!!!

[Jacklyna]

Hunting at sunrise. Sherlock's pose after chasing and missing a pheasant.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20131004_093907_zpscd88c10e.jpg
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20131004_200622_zps53d0204b.jpg

Another sunrise hunt, this time after flushing quail.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20131003_075212_zpsb169fdf1.jpg

Well, we finally moved. And this place is just loaded with feathered things for Sherlock to chase. I've had him out almost every day this week at sunrise and/or late evening which seem to be the best times to see game. Our house and surrounding land is filled with sparrows and other lbj's, and even though I've managed to flush several dozen right in front of Sherlock's face, he doesn't seem to show much interest in them as food. This is probably because I've never focused on them in his training or feeding. Ah well.

We've also flushed several coveys of quail for him at sunrise but had no success yet. It took a few days to switch him over to the new feeding time and get him used to hunting from the fist while walking again. When we flushed the quail, they were pretty close and he flinched and watched them, but his weight was several grams too high at first and it hadn't been remotely close to a full 24 hours since he last ate. I'm starting in the fields nearby, and I'll slowly move on out as we get into a routine.

He did, surprisingly, immediately fly after the first pheasant we flushed! We have a pheasant pen at our house, and occasionally we get wild ones that like to come and socialize with the tame birds. It exploded into the air a second before he got near, and Sherlock landed on the ground where the pheasant used to be. He looked around a bit, obviously a little surprised, then quite clearly upset. I called him back to the fist for a tidbit, and we tromped around a bit more in hopes of re-flushing the pheasant or finding another covey of quail, but to no avail. Sherlock's attitude quickly went downhill and after ten minutes or so, I took him back inside to do more operant conditioning and distract his rage.

http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20131003_111038_1_zps6d2464a7.jpg

This is our current set-up for some simple OC. As talked about previously, Sherlock already offered the "jump to the bath pan" behavior, but that was getting too easy, so this was a step up to make him think more. I put "WATER" on cue (as he is so kindly demonstrating in the photo), "HUP" as the cue to jump back to the center perch and wait, and "PERCH" to jump to the perch on the far right. We're still working on smoothing out the kinks, but this way, he's forced to decide between two objects on opposite sides for a reward. He only gets the reward if he jumps to the correct object when commanded, ie random and insistent hopping around does nothing now. He's still a little fuzzy on distinguishing water and perch, but I've been able to throw sequences at him like: "hup, water, hup, perch, hup" for a reward. It definitely calms his anger as he's forced to make those mental decisions and concentrate. And you can watch him waver back and forth between the bath pan and the perch when I throw an unexpected command at him (ie, water 3x in a row, then perch).

We're still doing restrained pursuits and training on glove calmness after the morning hunts so he's been pretty occupied. He has his own room now, but the door is always open so he can watch what's going on in the house all day long. And I finally figured out a way to get a weight on him without picking him up :P I simply put the scale underneath his OC perch and have him jump to that first thing in the morning before he gets any tidbits. Subtract the scale and leash weight, and we're good. For not being able to get a weight for several weeks now and guessing on how much to feed him, I was pleasantly surprised to see he was still around 235g. He could stand to lose a few more grams out in the field from what I've seen, but he's definitely close.

Hopefully he'll have a successful kill for you guys soon!

[kimmerar]

Elena I have a few thoughts that might help. Are you getting 100% success rate with one action before moving to the next. From your post it sounds like your training many things at one time? Animals with a smaller brain can find this confusing. Dogs are intelligent and can think around training mistakes. You can chain after you get 100% success with each action. My dad teaches clicker training using chickens to teach students. The chaining class (putting together numerous taught behaviors into one trick) is the last class of 4.

Spend a day training the bird to go to a scale. Instead of tricking him to use the scale.

Be clear on what your training. If you"re confused than the bird is probably confused.

Just a reminder - Mistakes are a part of it. If things aren't going well then go put the bird up, beat your head against a wall and rethink your plan - that's what my dad would say. Agression is a no no. Waiting for him to calm is good. You can turn your back on him too. BTW You can practice timing using a ping pong ball. Bounce the ping pong on a table. You need to click AS the ping pong is hitting the table. Not before or after. It sounds weird but the rate it hits the table is variable so you get better at timing. Try it.

Sorry if you already know this - I only read the last few post.

Good luck to you

[Jacklyna]

Kim,

Thanks for the reply and advice. I'm fairly new to operant conditioning so I do admit to getting a little excited and pushing forward too fast sometimes. I haven't tried sequences again since that first time because I noticed he still seemed fuzzy, and I am working on solidifying the three commands with him.

On another note, Larry Ray was able to come out and fit Sherlock with a great hood. It should have happened much earlier in his training, but the timing just never worked out. It was a devil of a time getting the hood on him in the dark, he had a tendency to turn his head sideways and get it caught in the hollows for the eyes right before it slipped on. Once the braces were struck though, he wore it solidly all through the night and was able to cast the next morning without a single problem or hesitation with the hood still on. Took the hood off this morning and let him eat his meal from the glove while holding the hood nearby in my other hand. I'll be calling up Steve for some advice on how to get him hood-trained at this stage.

[Jacklyna]

It's been a long time since the last update, but as it's now time for the molt, I thought a little info might be good.

We didn't end up taking any wild game his first season, mostly through my own fault. I moved halfway through the season, and due to finances and having to work two jobs to scrape by, time and resources to hunt were in short supply. However, we worked quite a bit on operant conditioning and mental stimulation "games" that kept him in shape and ready to go. I mentioned last reply that we'd started hooding, and he was difficult and wary at first, but we continuously had hooding sessions throughout the season. At the end of each session, he would be eagerly sticking his head into the hood in hopes of a reward.

A few weeks before the end of the season, we were chasing a pigeon, and he hit something the wrong way. When I went to pick him up, I saw that he had snapped his middle toe on his right foot as well as somehow punctured the pad on his other foot with his halux talon (we did not notice the latter until the next day as we were too focused on his toe. That's my mistake). And that was the end of our season...

His toe was broken right at the joint
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20140307_114750018_zpsf882a53a.jpg

And his other foot became infected and swollen the day after. He was on clavamox for two weeks in hopes the inflammation would go down. It still hasn't disappeared completely, and now we are wondering if perhaps there was another underlying issue with that foot that we were unaware of before. it is no longer inflamed/warm to the touch, doesn't cause him any issues, but it's still swollen. If anyone has input, I'd be interested to hear it.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20140416_114133781_zpsc887b1cb.jpg

He had a ball bandage on for six weeks, and when we took it off, it appears that it didn't heal entirely or correctly because there was a large lump around the joint. He's bending it more every day, though, so that's a good sign. Hopefully it doesn't cause too large of a negative effect next season...
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20140418_184705335_zps61210ce8.jpg

And this is the other foot from a few weeks ago. It is a little less swollen now, but haven't taken any newer pictures yet. It's still much larger than it a healthy foot should be. I tried soaking him alternately with Betadine and Epsom Salts, and that helped a little, but not a lot.
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/IMG_20140418_184648240_zps46540e54.jpg

After a little more time being hooded and being monitored inside to keep him calm and promote healing, I put him out into the mew. We boarded up the front windows but left the skylight open. This was last week, and I have to say, he's almost an entirely different bird now. I should also mention he's about 50g over his hunting weight for the molt and while he was bandaged up.

The very next day after I put him up, I went in to grab him for his meal session, and he started exhibiting behaviors I've never seen before. I was worried that,with his previous overly aggressive tendencies, I'd have to cover my face as a precaution but that wasn't the case. Instead, I walked into the middle of the room, and he treated me as if I were an threatening female and he was in my territory. He was panicked at first and repeatedly ran and zoomed around the mew, looking anxious. I chupped at him, didn't make any motions that could be taken as aggressive, and made a few courting calls. He immediately stopped running, fluffed up his feathers curiously, lowered his head a bit, and puffed up the feathers under his tail. A few more chups and he pulled up a foot. A few minutes longer, and he made a few experimental flights around my head, landed, puffed up again.

I picked him up (he still responded to the step up command), brought him inside, and offered him a quail leg. Again, I expected his normal aggressive mantling on the glove, but he no longer treated me like a sibling. He was tightfeathered, not anxious at all, he whistled a few times while eating, and when he was done, he dropped the bone and pulled up a foot.

He did the same the next day and the day after. The next night, he not only fluffed up but he feaked, roused, and turned his head upside down at the dogs. I was entirely taken aback.

I started showing my white shirt off as though puffing my undercoverts too while in the mew. I also brought in a handful of sticks and dropped them on the floor of the mew, then started to slowly fiddle around with them and make the beginnings of a nest on a shelf while chupping and calling. He would run or fly around me, puff up, whistle a few times, and I'd leave. I arranged the spare sticks in a line for memory's sake, and when I went in the next morning, it looked as though he had scattered some of them around.

The only time he didn't follow that pattern is when I fed him while we had guests over and sat in a different spot of the house. He was anxious and unfocused the entire time, but when we went back to the routine, he was tame once more.

This was him a few days ago
http://i1284.photobucket.com/albums/a578/emurzyn/2014-05-22_14-01-36_428_zps940003fe.jpg

[BestBeagler]

Your brave for putting yourself out on a limb by posting pictures like this. I have my guesses why he looks as bad as he does but not knowing the full picture I won't make too many assumptions. But I really wonder if those swollen ankles (or whatever they are called) are due to being injured by the pigeon. I would say MAJOR husbandry issues are to cause for a lot his appearance and health (except for the broken toe due to the pigeon incident). Do you know of any good austringers in your area that could help you out?

All the best.

[Jacklyna]

I won't take offense. If you have something on your mind say it. All it can do is improve what I've got for this bird. I've had a few guys over that know me and how I do things, and they didn't have much to shed on the situation either. The vet I took him to about his feet suggested the Clavamox, Epsom salts, and Betadine, but didn't really know what else to do otherwise.

[FredFogg]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I doubt the toe will ever heal well enough to game hawk again. My female coops dislocated the same toe and I also splinted it and it looked as good as new but it dislocated again the very next time we went hunting. We played the fix it and try again several times and I finally transferred her to a breeding project. Good luck!

[Jacklyna]

Thats what I'm worried about...i have a feeling it will probably turn out that way. For now though, hes fat and pretty content