Jessie again.

The wind stopped sometime in the night, and it was cold. Jessie was down in weight enough to be nice and was imploring me to take her hunting. I got every thing done at the house and Karen agreed to come along. Tami was helping at the ranch today as they were shipping cattle. There was snow falling a bit north of the pond.

I have been having trouble spotting where Jessie and her victims had been ending up as the pond at Appendix Point is quite large and the Sage at the far end is pretty big, so I decided to go up on the cliff to flush. There was quite a large bunch of ducks on the pond again.

Betsey likes these days when it is only Jessie that is hunted. It means that she can go along, and does she ever like that. She hyperventilates something terrible. There is nothing that one can do to stop it, so we have just learned to ignore it, mostly.

 I turned Jessie loose and Betsey and I started around the hill to get into position. Karen had included the walkie talkies today so I was able to ask where Jessie was. Karen informed me that she was sitting on one of the cliff rocks on her side of the pond. Betsey and I took a seat to wait her out. Soon Jess was taking a pitch over the pond. When she leveled out, we walked down towards the edge of the cliff. There was a whole flock of ducks and they busted out the other side. Jessie came sizzling down and smacked a Mallard into the ground. They however are a tough bird, and he floundered his way back into the water before she could get turned around to catch him. Jessie then changed course and flew towards the end of the pond at about twenty five feet. I lost sight of her and assumed that she had sat down on my side of the hill to rest. She didn't show and I couldn't see her, so I decided that I would just call her to the lure. Well, she wasn't there. I had the telemetry with me so I started trying to find her. The signal kept coming from the Sage at the end of the pond. Again I had trouble pinpointing her position. I tried every variation that I could try and I could not find her. Standing in the road the signal pointed out across the sage. Walk out there and it pointed back towards the hill. I spent at least a half an hour trying to find her. Finally I turned the damn thing up with all the elements out and stumbled on her, tucked under two Sage bushes.

She had eaten all the fat off the breast of the Gadwall that she had somehow caught. I guess she intimidated him badly enough that he just gave up. She shouldn't have caught anything with the way that the flight unfolded, but as I have said before- "The girl makes things happen".

I shouldn't have been able to pick her up at all, and if she had done anything other than pick fat, she would be sleeping under the stars. Probably pissed at me for not bringing her in the shop where it is warm.

I changed Satellite providers for my email today. A product of the "recovery act". I get monthly service for $39.99 rather than the $52.00 that I had been paying.