New to site

[Richard F, Hoyer]

My first experience in falconry began in the late 1940's in Oakland, Calif.
Presently fly a 7 year old female Harris' Hawk (Conchita) and a recently acquired (9/4/07) chamber raised female HH (Yuma).

Richard F. Hoyer Corvallis, Oregon

[everetkhorton]

My first experience in falconry began in the late 1940's in Oakland, Calif.
Presently fly a 7 year old female Harris' Hawk (Conchita) and a recently acquired (9/4/07) chamber raised female HH (Yuma).

Richard F. Hoyer Corvallis, Oregon

Richard:
Welcome to the site. Are you hunting Jack with your HH? CA. is going through a lot of change lately. Do you do any other type of hunting?

[Richard F, Hoyer]

Ev.,
Corvallis is located in the Willamette Valley and western 1/3rd of Oregon (west of the crest of the Cascade Range). Although the Black-tailed Jackrabbit is native to this region, they are not particularly abundant in W. Oregon due to the fact that most of the valley has been converted to agriculture. The species is far more abundant in the more arid, sage brush type habitats found east of the Cascade Range in central and eastern Oregon.

To find jackrabbits locally, we sometimes hunt Christmas Tree plantations where jacks occur with reasonable regularity. Otherwise, we sometime travel to central Oregon to hunt Mt. Cottontails and Black-tailed Jackrabbits Such an occasion will take place at the end of this month when the Oregon Falconers Assn. fall meet takes place in Madras, Oregon.

Locally, our primary quarry is the introduced Eastern Cottontail. We sometime encounter the Brush Rabbit which is our native species of cottontail in W. Oregon. I also purposely hunt the Dusky-footed Wood Rat (pack-rat) locally. My former female Harris' Hawk Moon, took a few quail, pheasants, and ducks. At a little over 15 years of age, she had to be euthanize in 2001 due to acute liver failure.

Richard F. Hoyer

[chamokane]

Hi Richard,
Welcome. Maybe you should come hunt at my house - or actually - in my house. I have to keep a live trap set most of the time to keep the Bushy Tailed Wood Rats out.

I take them down the road to an old clear cut where there are some old slash piles they can shelter in until they can build nests. Maybe it would be more fun to just set a Harris Hawk loose in the house. It has to beat watching TV. :)

[Richard F, Hoyer]

Dave,
The Bushy-tailed Wood Rat has a huge distribution in Western NA. Although it occurs in all Oregon counties, I have seen just one locally west of the Cascades. The HH female I flew for 10 1/2 years (Moon) took only about 2 - 3 Bushy-tails in central Oregon over the years as finding the type of cover where one can flush them from their stick nests is somewhat difficult to find in central Oregon.

I believe Steve Seibert of Yakima, Washington takes them with some regularity with his male Harris' Hawk along the Columbia River on both the Wash. and Oregon sides where he can flush them from their nests in the introduced Lombardi Poplars that occur in that area.

Coming back from Idaho last spring at night, I stopped and turned around for a road kill I thought was small bunny. Turned out to be an large adult male Bushy-tailed Wood Rat at over 500 grams (454 grams = 1 lb.)

For falconers not familiar with the various species wood rats, also known as pack rats, they are excellent food for Red-tails, Harris' Hawks, Red-shouldered Hawks and produce some nice flights not too dissimilar to hunting squirrels.

Today I took my new female HH Yuma out for a training, conditioning, hunting session. Flushed four Dusky-footed Wood Rats from their nests. Yuma saw and went after 3 of them. But due to the dense cover, she didn't even come close. This has been one of my methods for having a new hawk gain the association between my flushing efforts and quarry, that is, to flush and expose pack rats as well as rabbits.

Again for those not familiar with this type of quarry, pack rats make large stick nests. Locally, pack rat nests are often on the ground but can be in brush, briars, or even well up in trees. Permanent nests are often very large being somewhere from 3 to 5 feet across at the base consisting twigs to small branches. I use a long flushing stick to poke the nests starting at the base and working up hoping the pack rat will flush into the trees where the hawk has some chance of snagging them.

We didn't go home empty handed as Yuma snagged a Deer Mouse during our 1 hr. 20 minute session.

Richard F. Hoyer (Corvallis, Oregon)

[chamokane]

The Bushy-tail is a big, beautiful rat, alright, and they do like the trees. My hounds used to tree one once in a while when I was coon hunting. If a dog caught one on the ground, he usually got his ear pierced. I remember Steve talking about hunting them with his HH.

Congratulations on catching the Deer Mouse. [smilie=eusa_clap.gif] [smilie=eusa_clap.gif] [smilie=eusa_clap.gif]

[wesleyc6]

I caught some kind of exotic rats in GA last year. They had a huge stick nest. It was like the size of a half built eagle nest! They had the nicest fur. Its fur was kind of like flying squirrel fur. Big eyes! They could SCAT in a a tree top almost as well as a squirrel.

[Richard F, Hoyer]

Dave,
I agree and in fact, all of the different species of native rats in the genus Neotoma (Woodrats) are very nice looking animals in comparison to the introduced Norway and Back Rats. The latter species have mostly bare, scaly tails whereas our Woodrats or pack rats have haired tails some of which are bi-colored being dark dorsally and white or cream ventrally. And of course, the Bushy-tailed Woodrat has a squirrel-like tail. I believe all species of Woodrats also have bi-colored pelage being some form of white or cream ventrally and gray to brown or buff red dorsally.

The Deer Mouse was actually Yuma's second quarry having taken a 3/4 grown E. Cottontail on October 2nd before she has even begun to follow or go up in tress to gain height advantage. But that was somewhat of a fluke and she is a long way from gaining field experience necessary to become a consistent game hawk.

Richard F. Hoyer

[Richard F, Hoyer]

Wes,
All native Woodrats build stick nests and your comparison to eagles nest is on target. Some older nests probably weighing 200 - 300 lbs or more of dead sticks and other materials they use for their 'homes'. I suggest that the species you have in George is the Eastern Woodrat (Neotoma floridana).

I know that some other falconers tend to avoid having their hawks chase a lowly rat but I suspect that most of that position is ego driven. I have never had such a problem and take full advantage of whatever is available as quarry for my hawks. Admittedly though, sometimes when there occurs large vole (meadow mouse) populations, the hawks can be distracted from our principle target which mainly are cottontail rabbits here in western Oregon.

Richard F. Hoyer

[wesleyc6]

I will have to look that up on the net and see if they look the same. I admit I am pretty ignorant about rat species. I know they differ from what is found in the briars. Those in the briars are a nuisance to me, but I know a well known falconer that doesn't mind catching them.

I enjoyed catching those pretty rats in the trees though. They were large and although I saw them often where I recently lived, I had never seen them around my home area and that was only about 20 minutes away. I assumed they were exotic for that reason. I was probably wrong though. My friend from FLA caught one or two when he was here too and he had never seen anything like them either.

[Tiercel78]

They where darker than the wood rats that I have seen in Texas (where I'm originaly from).

[chris kimble]

I've never hunted rats on purpose, but I did take a pack rat a few years ago with a female HH. It wasnt very big, but after seeing the flight from a distance I was sure she had caught a rabbit til I got to her. Being as it was the first pack rat I'd taken with a hawk, I had a photo taken! LOL.......good times.
Im much prettier now than I was in this photo of course.
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y231/chriskimble/heradogs.jpg

Richard, if you run into Danny Ertsgaard in Madras, tell him I said hello.
Welcome to the forum.

[everetkhorton]

I've never hunted rats on purpose, but I did take a pack rat a few years ago with a female HH. It wasnt very big, but after seeing the flight from a distance I was sure she had caught a rabbit til I got to her. Being as it was the first pack rat I'd taken with a hawk, I had a photo taken! LOL.......good times.
Im much prettier now than I was in this photo of course.
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y231/chriskimble/heradogs.jpg

Richard, if you run into Danny Ertsgaard in Madras, tell him I said hello.
Welcome to the forum.

Chris:
How about laying the rat out so we can see what they look like? or are you calling a squirrel a rat?

[chris kimble]

Ev,
Wish I could show ya another shot, but thats the only one I have. It is indeed a rat, and not a squirrel. We only have fox squirrels here anyway. Not sure what kind of pack rats we have here in OK, but I recall seeing some in OR and AZ that to the best of my recollection were much larger than the ones I've seen around here.....but I've only ever seen a hand full of them so I dont have much knowledge on the subject. I know they can stash away a 50 pound sack of cattle cubes in a short amount of time [smilie=angry5.gif]
Just saw the direction the thread was taking and it all reminded me of this photo and I thought I'd share!

[wesleyc6]

Chris,
What are you flying this year? I would like for us to hook up when it gets cold and do a little hawking.

[everetkhorton]

Ev,
Wish I could show ya another shot, but thats the only one I have. It is indeed a rat, and not a squirrel. We only have fox squirrels here anyway. Not sure what kind of pack rats we have here in OK, but I recall seeing some in OR and AZ that to the best of my recollection were much larger than the ones I've seen around here.....but I've only ever seen a hand full of them so I dont have much knowledge on the subject. I know they can stash away a 50 pound sack of cattle cubes in a short amount of time [smilie=angry5.gif]
Just saw the direction the thread was taking and it all reminded me of this photo and I thought I'd share!

Chris:
Thanks anyway!

[chris kimble]

Wes, Id like that. Im actually not flying anything right now though. I had some plans, they didnt work, other stuff happened....etc etc. But Im heading up to the panhandle in a couple weeks for the OFA meet and I have a feeling I may be inspired by all the fun and end up trapping something while Im there...most likely a RT or a coop!

Stay in touch, and we'll get together sometime soon.

[Richard F, Hoyer]

Ev., in the photo, note the small hind and front feet of the pack rat whereas in relation to body mass, squirrels have much larger feet with longer toe claws. However, pack rats are good climbers and do well in trees.

Chris K.,
I have an old field guide to the mammals of N. America which indicates that the distribution of the Eastern Wood Rat (Neotoma floridana) occurs in the eastern half of Oklahoma. So I suspect that is the species you are holding in the photo.

Dan Ertsgaard is probably the most accomplished falconer in Oregon that flies falcons. He is also the largest breeder of falcons in the state. This year the Oregon Falconers Asso. meet will be taking place in Madras, Oregon on Oct. 26, 27, and 28. If Dan attends, I will mention your name.

This afternoon, we returned from a two day trip to Madras. The past couple of years, I have gone over a week or two early to assess the rabbit populations in advance of the meet and get in some hunting since during the meet, I am often helping others hunt their hawks.

After arriving at 11:30 and arranging a motel room, we got out at my usual hunting site at 12:30. Found the populations of Mt. Cottontails and Black-tailed Jack Rabbits to be at reasonable levels having flushed about 6 jacks and as many or more Mt. Cottontails in about 3 hours yesterday and two jacks and about 6 - 8 cottontails in 1:35 minutes this morning.

Richard F. Hoyer

[sharptail]

Hey it's Tiercel 78, good to see you on here Zach!