Mariaville Hawker
01-05-2010, 02:26 PM
Hey everybody
The name's Roy, I'm from the little village of Mariaville NY just a bit to the west of Schenectady and Albany. I was a falconer in Highschool back in 2000-2002 and now that I own a house I have finaly gotten back into the sport. My capture authorization was finaly approved on the 31st of december and my first chance to trap was on the 3rd.
Anyone who lives near here will rember that the weather was horrible that day with winds blowing steady at 15-20 mph and at times nearly white out conditions. But hey who cares about the weather when you only have 21 days to get a hawk.
So my sponsor and I go 160 miles out to the NYS DEC pheasant farm (http://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/7071.html)in Ithica. The place is a magnet to hawks during the winter and "feels like your cheating" when you go looking for hawks. Of course the weather was so bad that when we got there we saw litteraly no hawks. Anyone who's been there can tell you how strange that is.
When we did finaly find the hawks they were roosting in the trees to the west of the farm (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.446325,-76.448922&num=1&t=h&sll=42.440628,-76.496607&sspn=0.032942,0.06403&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=42.445422,-76.447399&spn=0.007775,0.013754&z=16). We spent two hours chasing after haggards and only one possible passage hawk. Finaly my sponsor remembered the large stand of pines to the south of the farm (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.440783,-76.443021&num=1&t=h&sll=42.445422,-76.447399&sspn=0.007775,0.013754&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=42.440846,-76.442614&spn=0.007775,0.013754&z=16) and as we made our first pass we flushed a big gracefull passage RT. She weeled deftly in the blowing wind and settled back on the branch she had left. I made a U-turn and slowed so my sponsor could drop the B/C out of the passenger window. we went up to the next intersection and litteraly seconds after I turned the car around I saw a hawk stooping towards the traps location.
I crept forward slowly until I could see the trap cleary with the RT pulling it up the road. The excitment ensued and we got her free of the nooses. the whole time commenting how big she was.
1417 grams and a 15.75 wingcord.!!!
Wow what a day and what a hawk.
After consulting with my wife later that night we decided to toss the name "Helen" and hence forth I shall be training the big beautiful girl...
"Tempest"
The name's Roy, I'm from the little village of Mariaville NY just a bit to the west of Schenectady and Albany. I was a falconer in Highschool back in 2000-2002 and now that I own a house I have finaly gotten back into the sport. My capture authorization was finaly approved on the 31st of december and my first chance to trap was on the 3rd.
Anyone who lives near here will rember that the weather was horrible that day with winds blowing steady at 15-20 mph and at times nearly white out conditions. But hey who cares about the weather when you only have 21 days to get a hawk.
So my sponsor and I go 160 miles out to the NYS DEC pheasant farm (http://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/7071.html)in Ithica. The place is a magnet to hawks during the winter and "feels like your cheating" when you go looking for hawks. Of course the weather was so bad that when we got there we saw litteraly no hawks. Anyone who's been there can tell you how strange that is.
When we did finaly find the hawks they were roosting in the trees to the west of the farm (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.446325,-76.448922&num=1&t=h&sll=42.440628,-76.496607&sspn=0.032942,0.06403&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=42.445422,-76.447399&spn=0.007775,0.013754&z=16). We spent two hours chasing after haggards and only one possible passage hawk. Finaly my sponsor remembered the large stand of pines to the south of the farm (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.440783,-76.443021&num=1&t=h&sll=42.445422,-76.447399&sspn=0.007775,0.013754&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=42.440846,-76.442614&spn=0.007775,0.013754&z=16) and as we made our first pass we flushed a big gracefull passage RT. She weeled deftly in the blowing wind and settled back on the branch she had left. I made a U-turn and slowed so my sponsor could drop the B/C out of the passenger window. we went up to the next intersection and litteraly seconds after I turned the car around I saw a hawk stooping towards the traps location.
I crept forward slowly until I could see the trap cleary with the RT pulling it up the road. The excitment ensued and we got her free of the nooses. the whole time commenting how big she was.
1417 grams and a 15.75 wingcord.!!!
Wow what a day and what a hawk.
After consulting with my wife later that night we decided to toss the name "Helen" and hence forth I shall be training the big beautiful girl...
"Tempest"