Old business and Rabbit hawking

Yesterday was a rest day and winterizing day all in one. I was able to get almost all of my winterizing chores completed, draining hoses, last lawn mowing, draining lines to the pool, etc. One of the things that I was able to do was to repair the Havahart trap. Karen set the trap in the cat house before we quit for the night.

This morning as I was getting every thing ready to go hawking, Karen came out of the cat house carrying a sprung trap. I looked in and our little buddy was in there. I got the Shotgun and the Quad and went up the hill towards the Hwy, out of the wind channel for the house. I long ago cut the end out of a railroad spike can and put a handle on the top of it, so that a critter in the trap could not see you and it could be carried to a suitable location. I released the locks for the trap and turned it upside down so that the Skunk could walk out. The @^$#*& wouldn't leave. After waiting for a long time, ( I am not very patient) I rolled it over again. Nothing! I threw rocks at it and elicited a minor squirt, which was the last thing I wanted, so I went up and rolled the can a couple of turns, still nothing. Finally I started kicking it down the hill and the SOB still wouldn't come out. I have never seen such a contrary Skunk, he, it, will not do anything at all. I thought Horned Owls were stupid, but they have nothing on this Skunk. I mean, he has been squirted with Wasp Spray and ran out of the cat house for three days. Comes back, get drowned with Clorox, thumped with a PVC Pipe, shot with a BB gun, ran out again, and comes back for a third try. (Bleach does not affect Skunk fur apparently ) I finally pulled the trap completely out of the can, and after quite a bit of indecision it walked out of the trap.    I shot him twice, just to make sure.

We took the Harris's back to the same field to try for Rabbits. We had quite a few good chases and Sylvester finally caught a Bunny by making a Kamikazi dive as it was disappearing down a hole.

The bunny is down in the hole, and as you can tell, Sly is pretty far down in there himself.

I gave each bird a front leg and we went on with our hunt. Unfortunately they were not able to make a catch on any more, but Sly made a hard shot at a Rooster Pheasant, which managed to side step him, Peg went after another and missed, Sly again tried to catch another one but missed again. Peg took off again and made a hard shot at another bird which turned out to be a Sage Grouse that was hanging with the Pheasants. Karen got to see that one and said that the Grouse barely managed to escape being grabbed. We walked a total of 3 hours and finally was forced to give in to exhaustion. Sly and Peg are starting to share the same Tee Perch. Peg went from Butter fly to hard charging by the end of the day, so I am still hopeful that she will get her act together. She is also starting to flare up in the sky when the rabbit stops. If she will just go higher and wait longer, she will start to see some real success. As it was, there was still improvement.