moyehow
Member
Just thought I would share. This past weekend I went squirrel hunting with my cousin. He is a master falconer. He has two harris hawks. Each hawk was able to bring down a squirrel. This is the first kills of the season.
Hunting Squirrels with harris hawks
- Thread starter moyehow
- Start date
Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
Signed-In Members Don't See This Ad
rej19
Member
Very cool and nice photos also!
bkersten
Member
The bottom one on a photo lable and cast would be an interesting conversation piece.
TomW
Member
I would give anything for one of those, in the spring when the Starlings try to take over the Purple Martin houses...
Tom
Tom
ZanderPommo
Member
that is too cool, but i thought there would be picks of squirrels with tomahawks sticking out of their heads:biggrin:
Rick_G
Member
Great pictures. Have to agree with Tom.
Greg O'Sherwood
Member
Beautiful birds!
Out of curiosity, does a falconer use a whistle to train them? At my cabin in MN, I can often hear some very unique whistling and see a few beautiful hawks concurrently. It can't be a coincidence as often as I've heard it and I always wondered if I had a neighbor doing that. He's my nearest neighbor up there (Intl Falls area) about 1/2 mile away or so.
.
Out of curiosity, does a falconer use a whistle to train them? At my cabin in MN, I can often hear some very unique whistling and see a few beautiful hawks concurrently. It can't be a coincidence as often as I've heard it and I always wondered if I had a neighbor doing that. He's my nearest neighbor up there (Intl Falls area) about 1/2 mile away or so.
.
snyiper
Member
Beautiful Birds!!!!
Where's the pics of the Squirrels?
rjwolfe3
Member
Gorgeous pics. I love watching hawks.
nava1uni
Member
Amazing. I love hawks and watching them fly. I have a Red tail hawk that visits my backyard here in San Francisco. It lives nearby at Lake Merced and is one of a pair.
Must be really cool is see them so close Great pics.
Must be really cool is see them so close Great pics.
wolftat
Product Reviews Manager
If he does get a squirrel, is it true that they taste just like chicken?
Rifleman1776
Member
I know a fellow locally who has Harris hawks and hunts with them.
He will not allow photographs taken of them.
He says his life is pretty much devoted to caring for the hawks. Quite a bit overboard, IMHO.
He will not allow photographs taken of them.
He says his life is pretty much devoted to caring for the hawks. Quite a bit overboard, IMHO.
jasontg99
Member
Larry in Harrow
Member
I'm lucky enough to live on a major Red Tail migration fly way on the north shore of Lake Erie. Every fall we have hundreds of them around every day.
During the summer the sparrows take over everything and flock my feeders. In the fall I have a Sharp Shinned Hawk that moves in and knocks the sparrow population down leaving room for the cardinals, finchs, nuthatchs, and chickadees. That hawk stays all winter and likes to perch on the front porch railing. I can always tell when he's around by the seed consumption. Sure controls the aggressive sparrow herd. For some reason he seems to prefer the sparrows and I've never seen him hit anything else.
During the summer the sparrows take over everything and flock my feeders. In the fall I have a Sharp Shinned Hawk that moves in and knocks the sparrow population down leaving room for the cardinals, finchs, nuthatchs, and chickadees. That hawk stays all winter and likes to perch on the front porch railing. I can always tell when he's around by the seed consumption. Sure controls the aggressive sparrow herd. For some reason he seems to prefer the sparrows and I've never seen him hit anything else.
Daniel
Member
Beautiful Birds. I have done a lot of work with birds in the past but not Hawks. I have learned enough about it to know there is a lot more work in handling them than other birds and other birds are a handful as it is. Being a full time devotion is not a real stretch.
I had a friend that was looking into Falconry a coup0le of years ago. You first have to get licensed and that requires serving an apprenticeship, which requires finding someone who is licensed that will allow you to work with them and their birds. THen you have to locate a baby and collect it. This means going places that I no longer trust my grip to go to. After all that you will spend 24 hours a day rearing and training the bird only to have to release it after 2 years or so depending on what species of Hawk it is. We had what looked like a full grown Red tail running around in our yard last year. It turned out being a young bird that had left the nest and had not yet gotten the strength to fly well. I let USFW know about it but they allowed us to watch over the baby until it learned to fly. We where specifically and severely warned not to touch it with our bare hands at any time. Not completely sure what that was about as they had no problem with us caging it up to protect it if we thought we needed to. just couldn't touch it in the process of catching it. He got stronger in just a few days and we have not seen him since but it was an amazing few days to watch because the parents continued to bring it food and what not.
I had a friend that was looking into Falconry a coup0le of years ago. You first have to get licensed and that requires serving an apprenticeship, which requires finding someone who is licensed that will allow you to work with them and their birds. THen you have to locate a baby and collect it. This means going places that I no longer trust my grip to go to. After all that you will spend 24 hours a day rearing and training the bird only to have to release it after 2 years or so depending on what species of Hawk it is. We had what looked like a full grown Red tail running around in our yard last year. It turned out being a young bird that had left the nest and had not yet gotten the strength to fly well. I let USFW know about it but they allowed us to watch over the baby until it learned to fly. We where specifically and severely warned not to touch it with our bare hands at any time. Not completely sure what that was about as they had no problem with us caging it up to protect it if we thought we needed to. just couldn't touch it in the process of catching it. He got stronger in just a few days and we have not seen him since but it was an amazing few days to watch because the parents continued to bring it food and what not.