Well, we had to go back to Sutton today. Rebel told me she wanted another crack at the fox squirrels. I, of course, had to try again at the rabbits. It was another picture perfect day with blue skies and moderate temperatures. The only problem was the wind. Gusty doesn’t begin to describe it. It was more of a steady gale force thing…
I was a little worried about Rebel getting blown back to North Carolina, but she wanted to fly and I am nothing if not a pushover for a pair of pretty eyes.
I put her up on the edge of a cornfield in the tree line. She was a little surprised by the wind and zipped off about two hundred yards away before she knew it. She turned into the wind and actually hovered as she selected her perch and actually floated down to it in slow motion. I do love watching her fly.
She was incredibly attentive today. She stayed very near me and came to the pole perch numerous times without me calling her to check things out. She would turn quick circles over the field to check things out. I did get a little video of some of these flights that were pretty cool. Addie of course was having a field day, no pun intended. Wait. Maybe that one actually was intended… Anyway, she absolutely loves bouncing through the grass that is over her head. I haven’t formally trained her on rabbits, but she knows the scent and does her best. We will work on it in the off season.
So after traversing several fields with no signs of rabbits seen, we headed into the trees looking for a few squirrels to chase. There was absolutely NOTHING moving in the trees. Rebel was getting frustrated and started lagging behind and wanting to hunt on her own so I called her down and we moved on to the Fox Squirrel spot. On our way, we once again spied the turkeys ghosting along about fifty yards deep in the woods. They didn’t seem to mind the truck at all, so I stopped ahead of them and got my critters out.
Rebel spotted them immediately and perked up. I made my way towards them and once again, Rebel streamed in after me. This time the turkeys were a little more skittish, getting up to fly much earlier. Rebel took a flight at them but didn’t really make the effort. She flared up at the end of her flight and took a perch, watching those big birds fly ungainly away. She looked back at me like, “What? You didn’t actually expect me to grab one of those did you?” Oh well. Probably better this way. I have heard of a few Red Tails getting mixed up with turkeys, and while they typically come out on top, there are some reports of injuries from those spurs. Probably not worth it.
We headed back to the fox squirrels and we were in luck. A grey faced fox squirrel with a raccoon tail was halfway up a tree waiting for us. He hid as I pulled Rebel out but it didn’t take long for Rebel to get him moving. She almost had the squirrel five different times but just barely missed, allowing the squirrel to duck into a nest at the top of a pine tree. Rebel did not see the squirrel go in and no amount of banging or yelling would get the squirrel to come out. Just when I thought she was going to come and attack the nest, she winged of for another tree where a HUGE solid black fox squirrel was hanging out. I hadn’t seen this guy. He looked like a small bear with his thick black fur. Rebel took a cautious flight at him but pulled up, clearly disturbed by his coloring. He ran, which is a bit atypical for the bigger fox squirrels, and I thought Rebel would give chase but apparently she thought better of this. Usually, it is the squirrels who do not run and behave like normal prey that seem to put these birds off of the hunt. When they run, the prey drive usually kicks in and the hawk will follow.
Not this time, that squirrel ran out on every long limb, ripe for the picking but Rebel just watched him. The damned thing actually almost fell out of the tree about eight feet above my head at one point. It had made a slight miscalculation and grasped for a very small branch after it jumped from one small gum tree. It lost its footing and was literally dangling just above me for like twenty seconds. That may not seem like that long to you, but that is precisely the kind of mistake that these birds take advantage of with these squirrels. Actually, that was way worse than most of the mistakes I see these critters make.
Oh well, it didn’t matter because Rebel just sat up and watched him crawl to freedom. I was terribly disappointed, but there is always tomorrow. In the confusion, Rebel had clearly forgotten about the other squirrel. She was clearly frustrated so I called her down to the lure and called it a day. Nothing in the bag but some exquisite flights in the memory banks.
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