Catch up!

I have been a bit lax with the blog lately. Some of it is the weather and some of it is of course the Holiday blues.

We, most of the time, miss most of the nasty weather that hits SE Oregon. Due to the configuration of the Mountains to the north and south, most of the storms go around us. Not always however, and this year was the "not always" part.

We got about 4 or 5 inches of snow and the temps just dropped and has not gone back up enough to melt anything. We have had night temps in the low teen's for at least two weeks, so nothing is melting. Right now it seems as if we might just be getting a Chinook today, but its going to have to last a long time to get rid of the stuff that we have.

Before the storm hit, Karen and I went to the Valley, (Western Oregon) and picked up a new Brittney puppy. I have quite shamelessly spoiled her, and the cold and snowy weather makes for some serious nap time.

  She is 6 months old, and shows promise, but she has a lot to learn. Betsey has been my main dog since losing Curly. Of course she doesn't mind being the only dog on a hunt.

The Quail are ganged up and while gun season is over, there is nothing wrong with pointing them.

The Harris Hawks just do not do snow, so that aspect of hawking is gone, leaving only Jessie to carry the load. Tami and I took her out after the first snow fell. She went up nicely, but refused to fight a duck in the snow and never got within 200 feet of one, no matter how many we flushed. She did come down to the lure, but she didn't like it much. Bruce Haak has been coming over to hunt with me as his opportunities in Boise are almost non existent. I keep forgetting to take a camera with me, so there is not much to write about. The ducks have snookered us since the 16th. with the exception of his passage Tundra. Of course I didn't have a camera with me. It wasn't very pretty, but dead is dead, and nothing succeeds like success. Finesse will come later.

There are so many ducks on the ditches that the hawks seem to be confused by the numbers and rather come to where we are and get the best opportunity, they are drawn by the large numbers of ducks where there is more chance that the ducks will fly right down the ditch ready to splash in at the first sign of danger. Then another factor that is working against us is that both Jinx and Jessie are flying so high that they can't get to the ducks before they get into the water. Now this is a bit of a contradiction, as the main goal is to get your falcon flying as high as you can as they can thus cover more ground and have more options.

I have flown Jessie seven days in a row, and she hasn't killed anything at all. The closest was yesterday at the Lake. She stayed right over the lake, and knocked one into the reeds below the lake. That one was lost, so she went back up again. Then she chased a bunch of them down the Creek, with them splashing in every time she got in pursuit. Finally she came back to the lake and a Gadwall tried to make it back to the lake. She flew right through the trees hitting the duck into the Lake right in the trees, floundering out the other side. That one was hurt, but he was in the water, and dove rather than fly again.

We went out again today on the creek above the barn. I have only been feeding Jessie enough to have her slowly lose a little weight each day. Today she showed the signs that she was as low as I was willing to take her. She still flew, but not with the snap to her wings that she normally has. I turned her loose, and as she was getting some altitude, Rosie and Sam drove by in her truck to feed the cattle. For what ever reason Jessie shadowed her. Perhaps it was the Geese that were flushing or there were some ducks that flushed when they forded the creek. In any case she wore her self out down there and never came over us at all. We finally went her way and I swung the lure to see if she was just sitting or had somehow managed to catch something. She came back but at 25 feet ready to get the lure and some food. I ignored her in the hopes that we could make something happen. She stayed with us, but at such a low altitude that she could not catch up with the ducks that we flushed for her. I finally called her down to the lure and fed her enough food to get her back on the fist. I took her home and only then gave her a Starling to eat. I will take her out again tomorrow, hopefully she will make the connection that only kills will give you all you can eat.