Over a year - a long story

I was in a funk.  Yes, it is true.  Losing Gonzo was the single biggest loss of my falconry career.  I got angry and sad, then determined.  I went out looking for new birds.  I was going to get Tess a possible mate.

No, she has never shown much interest in mating, I'll get two.

I don't have that kind of money.

Then I hear that for breeding, you should really just keep the birds together.

So then - what do I fly??

Will I fly Tess solo?  I have before.

... and I caved.

I acquired a mature male, and a female breeder from up north. In the process, I picked up another juvi male to fly with Tess.

Three birds over the course of a summer - very cool.

I reworked my weathering areas to be sure to minimize racoon impact, I covered all my "natural" perches in long leaf astroturf.

And my new female laid her first egg on the way home in the giant hood.  Crap. crap. crap

I didn't have an appropriate incubator yet, but I did have my cheap styrofoam chicken hatcher.  It would have to do. I didn't know anything. 
Was the egg fertile?  It was laid in the hood on the drive home from Pennsylvania, what are the chances it would hatch after rolling around on the car ride home.

The female was in a chamber full of its own offspring?  Would the parents have been breeding?  What are the chances it would hatch?  Shoot - it's the middle of summer, why is she laying now?.,,

I put the egg in the incubator with little hope.  I hand turned it multiple times a day.  Hoping - not hoping - scared to hope.

I tried to put a chicken egg out with the momma - to see if she would set.  She was in a new environment, and not interested.

The egg hatched.

This was last fall. 

The chick seemed happy and healthy - I hand fed it for the first few months.  I did not know at the time that she wasn't right.  I fostered her out to Jimmy in Georgia.  I still can't thank him enough for all he did for my first "baby".

Soon after returning too me she died.  Not being sure what happened, I had a necropsy done.  She hadn't grown right.  Her spine was curved and her hips were wrong.  Her lungs were underdeveloped, and her brain smaller than expected.

It could be traced back to poor incubation.

My year continued to suck. 

I trained my new male to hunt.  He flew at the same weight a Gonzo, 650 (plus or minus).  First on his own, then with Tess. His name is Boomer.

I compared hime to Gonzo ( I shouldn't have, not yet)

It was a rebuilding year.  I was shorter on time, and went away for two weeks in the middle of the season.  It was less than stellar.  Game was caught and flights were interesting.  We all learned a lot.

It was a rebuilding year.  This year should be interesting.

The newest egg hatched in June.  A female, it stormed for weeks and weeks after she was born.

So my daughter named her Rain.  She is 17 weeks and ready to start training.  Boomer is slowly starting to drop weight. Trapping season is just around the corner and there is so much to do. and everything is hitting at once.

I'll try and keep my writing caught up.

Hiatus

I took a break.

I haven't been reading blogs - or posting on my own. In the meantime, Spring has truly sprung here in eastern NC.

I kept waiting to post, hoping that I would have big news from the breeding chambers of the harris hawks.

Well....

We had the nest all made up for the birds, carefully intertwining vines and branches. I padded it well with pine needles in the bottom to keep any eggs from cracking. Then I watched, and waited.

Gonzo would go and move a stick here or there. Tess would take all of her food up to the ledge to eat at the nest.

The birds would perch shoulder to shoulder.

Gonzo's foot seemed to be healing well. even though it was partially immobilized, he would use both feet for perching and seemed very comfortable. I changed all the perching surfaces to long leaf astroturf to protect Gonzo's feet.

No eggs, no eggs, no eggs.

Then they tore the nest apart. Could be a good thing. They are acknowledging that it is there. I replaced the pine needles and made sure that there were plenty of sticks in the cage for building.

And I waited.

They messed around with it, bringing sticks in and removing more of the "bedding" material. Tess would settle into it while she tore at her breakfast.

But still, nothing.

I had to run to Raleigh for a teacher "thing" this last week, so I called up Arnaud to see if we could change Gonzo's bandages on his toe. The scheduling was perfect.

When we got the bandages off of the foot, the toe had healed perfectly! Well done Arnaud. The toe was straight and yellow. You could hardly even see where it hadn't been working.

Unfortunately, Gonzo was dead.

He had died sometime that day in his box. The necropsy (still waiting for some tests) showed that Gonzo had some signs consistent with West Nile Virus - but we're still unsure of the cause of death.

So

No babies this year. I am in the market for a new male harris hawk. I was hoping to pick one up that was of breeding age, but I may end up getting a young bird.

And Tess is all alone:(

If you hear of any birds for sale (preferably on the East coast) let me know.

I'll keep you posted.

Time to call it a season

Well - apparently Tess and Gonzo are not feeling the love. We are halfway through the summer, and even if they decided to feel the magic now, the chicks would be born pretty late in the hunting season. So I'm calling it quits for this year.

I cannot tell you how disappointed that I am, but there is always next year. There are plenty of good breeders out there that are selling their hawks if you are looking for one. I love my harris', they are great birds.

I don't know that many breeders personally, but there are a few that I can recommend.

Tess comes from Wes Collins project. She is a great calm bird, and I believe as of this writing he had a few males left. Wes is out in Texas, but he will ship.

American Falconer is a project on the east coast in South Carolina. I flown my birds with some of these birds and they preformed spectacularly, and they are fairly large. You can read about some of his birds in a previous post. Or here.

Gonzo came to me by way of Dave Mancini's breeding project. His birds were going to someone else for breeding and a quick check of his website shows that it has not been updated in a long time. The emails and numbers may be valid though. I don't know. If anyone can help out with the status of Mancini's birds, I would appreciate it.

Gonzo is a great bird that has taken all kind of game. He is a good medium sized male that will preform whatever is asked of him.

Of course the Coulsons are breeding their birds, and there are a bunch of other breeders as you work your way west. Personally, I like to go out a nd see where the birds are coming from. But I realize that it is not always possible to do that. best luck if you are searching.

Don't forget - You must be a licensed falconer to purchase or house any bird of prey int the Untied States.

Babies everywhere

Just an update on all the breeding going on here. The birds have been been very busy, but not the hawks.


We had another new hatch of pigeons. Only one of the eggs hatched, but this guy is growing fast. I still think pigeons are some of the ugliest babies around.


We've got baby chickens coming out our ears. Some were naturally hatched, others incubated. These guys were hatched by one of our half banties.


And then this little guy is hanging around near the cages.


I don't hold any animosity towards any snake, even black racers. They can be mean, but they are just doing what they do. I'll need to relocate this guy away from the chickens though.

I still have hope that the harris' will breed this year and I'll just have a later clutch. But it is getting late in the spring. I'll keep my fingers crossed. Maybe they'll have it together by the end of the weekend.

What now?

So here I am, my squirrel season over, the Harris' gorging themselves on squirrel and rabbit all day, and my blog is called Harris' Hawk blog. What do I write about?

I have built a nest for Tess, and have provided sticks and twigs so that the birds can supplement the structure that is already there.


Well, soon, I transfer the birds onto my propagation permit, open the door that connects the cages and hope for the "magic" to begin.

In the meantime, I'm going to start focusing more on Ulrich. I had him flying free outside today. He was a little hesitant, but I think that his weight is a tad high. I won't drop it until I check my scale, as I don't think that it is accurate.