Hunting with Hawks... My Falconry Story

[ToasTerPoP14]

So some people here may or may not have seen my falconry and hawking post on thoughts and suggestions but what a lot of you didn't know was that I'm a lisenced falconer. Right now I have a male passage (immature) red tailed hawk named Hemlock. I trapped in late October and spent most of gun season training him. That might sound like a long time but here in MI that's only about a month and a half but it only took me a month to train him. So far he has caught 3 rabbits and 4 squirrels. Not a lot, but it's the coolest thing to watch. I fly him at about 780 grams so he's hungry enough to hunt. I hunt with him on the weekends, and feed him less and less as the week goes on so he will be ready to hunt on the weekends. I'll feed him his 3 mice on Sunday. Feed him 3 mice on Monday, feed him 2 and a half on Tuesday, feed 2 and 1/4 on Wednesday, feed him 1 and a half on Thursday and hunt him Friday-Sunday. I'll try and get pictures up but my computer hates me right now and refuses to download the pictures from my phone.
I plan on releasing Hemlock in June or July because that's when my family and I are going on vacation and we can't bring the hawk with us. Plus hunting season has been over for a while now and so far he's just making me spend money on mice well.. Not mice... We figured out how expensive they were so instead we turned to meat rabbits. We have a male and a female who produce the babies/hawk food... That's right, I feed my hawk baby rabbits... We use the simple vinegar and baking soda carbon monoxide poisoning and I know that sounds bad but it's quick and totally humane. It's better than spending $70 on mice per month. Anyways when I turned fourteen (the age you have to be to become a falconer in Michigan) I took my federal exam, built my mew (hawk house) and got a sponsor (another falconer to show me the ropes) great guy named Kory Koch. Anyways but he helped get passed inspections and trap Hemlock.

Anyways that's the story of Hemlock and me. Watch, as soon as I post this I'm going to remember something else I should have put in . But anyways, thank you to all the people who actually stuck through this boring mess and read the whole thing. Hats off to you my friend.

[Bosloe]

Great little story be really good to see some picks of him when you can get them.

[InstinctiveArcher]

Gun season only lasts 15 days in Michigan.
What part of Michigan are you from?

[ToasTerPoP14]

Gun season only lasts 15 days in Michigan.
What part of Michigan are you from?

Including muzzleloader and all, and I'm just estimating

[ToasTerPoP14]

It sure does feel like a month and a half if you hunted in southern Michigan this year you would understand that joke.

[InstinctiveArcher]

I guess so. I'm up in the northern lower and it seems to fly by.

[ToasTerPoP14]

I guess so. I'm up in the northern lower and it seems to fly by.

Well be glad you aren't down here. The deer disappear by the end of bowseason. It's pretty depressing.

[InstinctiveArcher]

They do that up here as well, you just have to learn to hunt pressured deer. Figure out what they're doing and adapt.