Rebel's first official hunt outside our neighborhood was this morning out in Kingstree at a good buddy's farm. I went to the mews before dawn to find my bird all roused up and happy. He stepped gently to the glove and just looked at me like "Not sure what you are doing but I'm in..." The early morning silence and the full moon made it a pretty memorable moment.
We finally found Ernie's farm and got everything ready. Rebel was the first bird to fly, which suited him just fine. As for me, I was a bit nervous flying him in front of others especially given the recent trauma and the fact that he hadn't had a kill in one week. In addition, he was a bit heavy at 38.4 but given that I was planning to bring his weight up, I figured that he was still good to go.
He walked on the glove as we set out just getting used to the crowd. He hadn't hunted with this many people before and we had nine people out there with us. He took off and began following high immediately looking perfect. He very quickly took to the game. He stayed high and watched us shaking vines and beating on trees. I only called him to the fist once early on just to test his responsiveness. He was making me look a lot better than I felt.
Ernie's farm is an old one, covered in old hardwoods. There are still a few of the big pines that survived Hugo, but most of the trees where we walked were old hickory, pecan, and live oaks with plenty of room for a hawk to maneuver. The first squirrel was a big buck squirrel that we ran high in the tree. Rebel took pursuit immediately and missed the first few stoops. He finally started laddering up a tall oak chasing the squirrel higher and higher. he looked like a pro. He caught that big squirrel at the top and tried to carry him off. He went a few hundred feet into the woods and we took off in pursuit.
Rebel was quietly putting the squeeze on but we couldn't find him anywhere. Finally, I pulled out the radio receiver and looked up to find him hung up with his prize about eight feet over head in some vines. We helped him to the ground and dispatched his prey and with Mitch and Rich's help, traded him off on tidbits slipping the huge buck squirrel into the bag. I couldn’t believe that he could carry a squirrel that big as far as he did. I weighed the thing later and it was all of 1 pound four ounces.
I was so proud. He looked like a total pro. Rebel tried to go back once and find his prey, but finally gave up and back to hunting. His next squirrel he chased beautifully through three trees before it found a large hole in a live oak in which it hunkered down, unreachable.
As much as I wanted Rebel's first double, it was time to let someone else have a turn so we headed back and flew Rich's Cooper's hawk, Storm on quail. For release birds, these were the best flying quail I had ever seen! Fast flights and long distances made for a bit of running. The first two got away, one over the lake the other into the woods. The third was chased halfway to town but nailed by Storm. Right as she landed with her prize though, a haggard Red Shoulder came down and hit Storm! No injury thank goodness, but freaky nonetheless. If we hadn't been running right behind her, it could have ended much differently. The fourth quail was nailed right in front of us. These were amazing flights to watch and Ernie was hooked.
We then took Max, the three year intermewed RT pro out hunting. He got two and would have gotten more but a late season passage RT that was still with both his parents (in late Oct.??!!) made several passes trying to run Max out of their territory. It was a bit frightening and again, I wonder what would have happened if we were not right underneath Max, yelling and trying to frighten the hags off. We tried to keep hunting, but they wouldn't leave Max alone so we headed back.
After a big late breakfast, we decided to try Rebel on quail. Those buggers are just too fast for a RT, even one as gamey and motivated as my bird. He stooped out of a perfect position on the first one and missed by a few feet as the thing accelerated. Very similar action on the second bird but barely missed. As we walked up to try to reflush the second bird, Rebel swooped in and caught a sparrow in the air! This was his second bird from the air! He ate the whole thing thirty feet up in the tree and didn't drop a feather.
On the way back, Rebel flew to our host and each of his kids which was pretty cool. We decided to try one more quail. This time Ernie cheated and pulled a couple of primaries out and the result was a slower bird that Rebel caught right off the stoop. He plucked like he had done this a few times before and ate the WHOLE THING! This bird is a pig. His crop was jutting out three feet.
Three kills on the day bringing our tally so far to four squirrels, one blackbird, one sparrow, and one field mouse. I love this bird.
No comments:
Post a Comment