Yeah Vincent, we've had a successful season! How long do you plan to keep hawking your sharpy?
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Yeah Vincent, we've had a successful season! How long do you plan to keep hawking your sharpy?
Jeff,
My game plan is to hunt her through October and mid November. I've been at this almost daily since she hard penned in July. I'm planning on going to the NAFA meet this year and am only wanting to bring my Harris. I'll start hunting the Harris in a couple of weeks and will be at it hard with both birds for a while. Thinking of taking a mid season break with sharpie and starting back up in Feb or early March to hit spring birds and starlings with her for a few months until she molts. However, I know myself, I'll probably be at it most all season with her until the molt. Probably in for a very long season but that's how it goes when you pull an eyass in June. But as the saying goes "best laid plans of mice and men" Do you have a specific game plan? I know when I hunted my Merlin for three seasons a few years back the passage coops were merciless and everywhere late Jan and Feb out my way.
My plans are very similar, except I can't make it to NAFA. I have a second year RT and have been bringing her weight down while a couple feathers finish growing. Mostly we've just been doing jump ups in the back yard, but with this cooler weather I think we can start progressing a little faster. There's not much of a chance that I could fly both daily into November. Having said that I know it's going to be tough to put the sharpy up when she has become so successful. As you said, the best laid plans..
I started the molt last night! Put my little sharpy under lights, but will continue hawking with her pretty hard till she drops the first feather, then I will reign in the hawking a little bit. Probably still go a couple times a week, but till then, I'm hoping for every day.
Yesterdays hunt was a success only in that I came home with a bird! :-) I don't want to hijack Jeff's thread (Think I came close a couple times already. Sorry!!), but thanks for asking.
Sounds good Paul, I really like that we are able to compare notes like this. Good luck again today. Are you going to use a full spectrum reptile type light bulb over her perch or just keeping her room light switch on over night?
Probably just keep the light on overnight. Thought about the full spectrum light, but I did the 24 hour molt several years ago with a ferrug that I had, and everything seemed to go just fine. The thought has been in my mind of a full spectrum light, but unless I can find a reason that she needs it, I'll probably just leave the regular light on.
You ever done anything with the 24 hour molt?
First time for me, will probably do the same as you, keeping her in a high traffic family area. I still haven't decided if I'm going to feed her on the perch or lure in a different room. We will see.
We caught another sparrow today after several misses or refused flights. I couldnt figure out why, some were wide open and others were in tall weeds. One sparrow flew across the open grass to a small tree, Ruby tried to grab it off the branch and chased it back into a rose bush where it escaped. Great flight!
The one she caught was trying to escape by dumping to the ground in tall weeds and saplings. She still took her time to pluck and stop lying down on it, so tomorrow I will have her a half gram lower. Cool and windy today.
Oh yeah, she also caught a shroom.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...03D013D512.jpg
Don't worry about the shroom, mine caught a piece of dog crap...
Hey Jeff I'm curious, didn't you have to bag her on shrooms to get her to go after them?:Dpeacee
It's a learning curve, and we are in America where everyone gets a trophy for just showing up.
Doubled on sparrows today. We are expecting heavy rain again tomorrow, hoping to get out again by Wednesday. Lots of birds in the field today. I even managed to get a poor quality video of one catch.
http://youtu.be/4daHhgAW4Mw
Jeff. Thanks for posting video. It's exactly how my hunts are sometimes . It's cool to see how were having the same experiences a few states away. Talked to another sharpie flier who put his up today. He's putting it under lights to start a molt for spring season. Are you thinking the light route?
I think so. Right now she is on the living room floor and does very well. I would like to continue flying her for a couple more weeks before we stop, she is on such a roll putting on some incredible flights every time we go out.
Example: early in the season when something flushed she would just explode off my hand and chase whatever she was after flapping crazily until she caught it or not. Lately when she leaves my hand she just jumps off but keeps her wings in until she is low to the ground and then flaps in short bursts to build speed and it seems like she twists her tail to maneuver between flaps. It's always over so fast, but I can tell a difference in her flight.
I'm kicking around the idea now of setting up a table perch in the downstairs family room for the molt. There's still lots of family activity so she won't spend much time alone, but the constant lights won't be a distraction to the rest of us when we want to sleep. Also this is the best way I can think of to be sure my RT never sees the sharpy. Ever.
How are you planning to feed during the molt? At the perch or in another location? Just curious. I don't know yet how I'm going to handle it.
Some type of table perch is the absolute way to go to moult out these small accipiters. There are lot's of designs. Here is the one I use. It is set up in my living room.
I would often have lights that would turn on and operate most of the night to speed up the moult.
http://i180.photobucket.com/albums/x...7/DSCF0162.jpg
Nice setup Keith! Do you use any special type of bulb?
A regular incandescent bulb seemed to work for me.
That's what I'm using. I did it years ago with a ferrug, and it worked. Think I'm just gonna stay with that. I am still flying her for now, and will for the next few weeks till the first feather drops. I feel like I've missed out on this hunting season cause of work falling at the WRONG TIME, but thankfully Twiggy seems very forgiving, and we had a great flight yesterday on a dove. She chased it for 100 yards, then pulled off. Sure was fun.
That's one thing I love so much about this little bird, she takes up very little floor space and it doesn't seem particularly bother her if we have to miss a couple days of hunting. The rain this week has really kept us inside. I think there is a chance of sun tomorrow.
I flew my last sharpie through December until she was injured by the rabbit she decided to tackle. I'm tossing around the idea of hunting her through Spring and putting her up for the molt in a smaller outdoor mews I have this summer. It's simply fun going out with her and watching how she has improved over the last month in her flights and abilities. I'm not ready to put her up just yet. Wanting to try for doves in our later dove season here. If I decide to try and molt her with lights I will fatten her up an keep her in my office on the setup I pasted a pic of below. I've been very happy with it so far. As for feeding her, I have been unclipping her and she flies to the kitchen where I already have her portion for the day out for her on the table. After she is done eating I usually set out the bath pan and let her get a drink and bath. She then hops to the glove and I clip her back up on the perch. Still deciding on best plan when she is heavy and trying to molt. I will probably turn off light, set measured food on shelf with her, turn back on light.
http://i1360.photobucket.com/albums/...psd553981b.jpg
That's a nice looking setup Vincent, is that a doormat type rug around the perch?
The weather is beautiful again, sunny skies for the next several days and we will be out each afternoon. Last night we doubled again on sparrows, she would have probably been good for another one if there had been time. I'm still working on getting the redtails weight down with lots of vertical jumps, so that is putting a limit on how late I can keep Ruby out.
When we walked into the field she was a little vocal and kept squeezing, ouch (kind of). She has definitely gotten more selective in her flights, there were a couple refused flushes that surprised me.
One of her best flights was through and around a small tree before she lost it on the ground. Her first catch was basically a gift, it flew out into the open and she sucked it up. Her second flight was from a small mound, she caught it about 10 feet off the ground and dropped straight down with it. I was relieved she didn't carry to a nearby tree, it would have been very easy for her.
This is the typical "I got it" pose I find her in on the ground. If she misses or loses sight of it she almost always returns to my hand or head immediately. I really like this hawk, it's going to be hard to finally call it a season with her and begin the moult.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...AD2B41A8C9.jpg
Doubled again on sparrows. Nothing really different to report. The first was caught in the middle of a big blackberry bush. Here's another short video of that flight.
http://youtu.be/tfQdRQMfRmw
And a pic on the lure once I got her to the edge.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...B52533EBB3.jpg
Congratulations San Francisco Giants, they earned it!
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...282F8C21D6.jpg
Doubled on sparrows again today. A lot of the leaves are completely gone from small trees and some of the low bushes. Now when a sparrow dives for cover, she can still see it and follows it in, using her wings to pull, push and plow her way through cover along the ground. It works about half the time and I find her on a kill. It's starting to take a toll on her primaries, you can see in the pic after her first kill today.
The leaves are falling fast from the big trees also, and again we saw coopers around us and flying high overhead once. I will be putting her up for moult probably next weekend.
Most of her flights are within 40 feet but occasionally she keeps going or ends up around a corner of a brush line and it seems like Russian roulette that one of these times she will be chased or grabbed by a wild raptor. It's been an awesome season with this little rocket.
We hunted yesterday with no luck, just very few birds in the field.
Today we got to show off for my buddy Mike and his wife with a few nice flights and a single sparrow kill. Ruby rode around on his head for a while, and sat still long enough to get a couple pictures.
She is a much different hunter than she was just a few weeks ago. She has gotten selective in her slips which is really ok with me even though it's sometimes frustrating. If a sparrow flushes from short grass in the open she might make an attempt but doesn't go for the long distance flights that she used to do. I prefer her to stay close and break off a chase if she doesn't have an advantage. If something flushes in cover or around bushes she will turn herself inside out to get at it, and usually does. Also, she prefers to ride on our heads, not all the time but most of the time. I'm sure it looks really strange to anyone else, but she gets a better vantage point, including the unfortunate sparrows that try to sneak out behind me. If she was always on my hand she wouldn't see those, but many of our recent kills have been at birds I didn't see until after she was chasing. Like anything else in falconry, we do what works best, even if we have to make it up as we go.
Unfortunately these are only iphone pics and the sun was in the way, but we take what we can get.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...C3E6539850.jpg
Rear-view raptor:
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...9d58b22850.jpg
I think it's about time to hang it up for the season. I had planned to fly through the weekend. We still have warm weather and the redtail is hanging on to her summer weight despite all the jump ups over my head for washed cottontail. But... After Ruby had caught today's sparrow and I was feeding her up on the glove, I heard some noise in some nearby cattails. My first thought was that it was just another bunny, but I had walked through there no more than ten minutes earlier. Turns out it was an adult female coopers, less than 15 feet away from us! I can't decide if she was on a slip at some small birds, or on her way to Ruby and just a hadn't noticed me somehow until the last second. Either way it was too close for me and kind of shook me up.
This all went down in the cattails in this picture.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...361DF14992.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...904F13D1F8.jpg
Close call there Jeff! Congratulations on your season.clapp You've done a fine job with Ruby.haill
Thanks Lee, it's time for Jez and I to try to catch up with you and Kitt!
I've thought a little more about yesterday and it really doesn't matter to me if that coops was after Ruby or some other small birds nearby. If they are getting bold enough to hit the ground 15 feet away from me, that's well within the distance of 99% of our flights. Flying micro hawks always involves some measured risk anytime of year, but I'm pretty sure that if she hadn't been on my hand I would have lost her.
I guess I'll be putting together a table perch and lights this weekend.
Just a quick update on Ruby since we stopped hunting almost two months ago. She is on a table perch, dropping lots of down and belly feathers, but no flight feathers yet. There were a few days after she was on the new perch that she was jumpy and didn't want to be messed with so I just left her alone except to bring fresh food (skinned starling) and take away the old stuff.
Thankfully that period passed and I can easily handle her. She goes into the box once a week when I change the towels under her perch. Just for fun I put her on the scale an she is a little over 200 grams, about 50g over hunting weight!
Squirrel hawking with the redtail is fun, but I already miss the summer accipiter flights.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...55CFBB4FED.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...2C84690691.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...417CC27EAC.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...9B6B45C672.jpg
Backyard visitor. Support the wild bird population!
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...60D3E6BA8D.jpg
Thanks for sharing Jeff. One season safe always a good thing.
This molt is taking forever.
Most of her body and wing feathers have all dropped and are almost done growing in. It's her tail, she's only lost 7 tail feathers and hasn't dropped any more for at least three weeks. The lack of handling and high weight has her a bit more wary than I like, but I guess that's to be expected.
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...9C691570DA.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...BE2F23FCB6.jpg
http://i1012.photobucket.com/albums/...FD98B8F518.jpg
Jeff - Is she on any kind of Light?
Hi Keith, yep she's been under lights since early November. For most of Feb and March she was falling apart but it's since slowed down. Her last feather to drop was a #1 primary last weekend.
I'm stuck between wanting a complete molt, and wanting to get her going again. If I go with option B I'm sure we won't be able to keep a perfect tail this time around.
What do you think?