dirtwinger
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Everything posted by dirtwinger
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Hi Terence, The hare shown is a black-tailed jack (correct?), an animal US male Harris hawks will indeed take. However, asking or expecting a male to take our adult European brown hares is quite a different matter. All the best, Martin I quite agree Martin, the blacktail is very different to handle compared to a very large brown hare which I have taken with a female harris back in the day. Although most brown hares are still going to be mostly in the 6 to 7lb range with only a minority going over 9lbs or more. The key physical difference between a brown hare and blacktail is in muscle
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My mate Mike with his hare killing male harris, this bird kills at least fifty hares a season. all the best Terence
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Are you refering to the pics I put up because you are dead wrong, the dog lost the chase and was actually nowhere near the hare for most of the chase. he is just standing there like he did something useful. This falcon often kills hares with a single headshot and prefers to do that to anything else. yes sometimes the dogs do catch a hare but mostly there job is to keep the hare moving and prevent it hiding in cover. They also help the falcon dispatch a hare when he binds which helps prevent injury to the bird and also provide some degree of protection at the kill from other raptors and coyote
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Hi John, Yes very ancient. The hare, in one form or another, has been pursued with longwings since the sport’s earliest days. Historically, many of the hares pursued have not been as big and tough as the brown hare of central and northern Europe (flights to the small Arabian hare being a good example). But big hares were flow – like the brown hares taken here in the UK at Elveden in around 1870. The current European interest in this type of falconry certainly encompasses some of the toughest targets ever flown. Some very big brown hares have fallen to pure gyrs and gyr hybrids. In the St
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how many of you are summer hunters ???
dirtwinger replied to mick c's topic in Lurchers & Running Dogs
Too hot for me, it around a 100degrees right now and I wont risk the dogs. Plus the hares are breeding and I want to save them for the winter. The other added concern I have right now is plague breaking out in rabbits close to me and I dont wont me or the dogs to get bubonic plague it would not be fun. All the best Terence -
My old dog was catching hares until ten then went downhill in about two weeks and stopped chasing completely he has had a good career but all his injuries caught up with him all at once now he just finds hares and lets his son run them. but a 5yr old dog with no major injuries should be good to go for a while yet.
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Growing up in the Seventies in Scotland I had a whippet that took hares singlehanded all the time taking two to three hares with her was not unusual at all. She had a special move she employed more often than not with great success, she would push a hare into a turn and as it turned throw herself sideways across the angle of the turn. She would slide on her side across the ground and snap the hare up unless it was quick enough to jump over her. she was a hell of a dog and lived to be 18 and i still miss her after all this time she was my first dog and a real character. All the best Terence
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Yeah its grown a lot, I have lost a bunch of good coursing fields to that growth. Albuquerque still has its issues they dug up a bunch of murdered prostitutes in one my hunting fields a few years back which was kind of creepy. Blue one New Mexico is not a bad place to live particularly if you like to hunt the state is pretty good for running dogs on hare and coyote and there is some fair pig hunting along the Texas border plus all kinds of stuff you can point a gun at if thats your thing including people. lol i like it here and it is nice to have legal coursing and 100's of square miles
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Wish I could have your rain it hasnt rained here for 4 months We really need it we have forest fires everywhere one still burning has burnt 800 square miles so far, rain would be a very good thing! all the best Terence
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A couple of pics of Australian Shepherdxgrey two litter brothers bred by me. The dog in the middle is a first cross the other two are collie/grey x tazi My old guy 11 now and retired last year although he caught a hare last week his sons were chasing I guess experience beats youth sometimes. He is a first cross Aussie x grey As to some of the other questions I do run the dogs without the falcon sometimes and other times the bird and dogs end up running different hares. My young dogs have both done quite a few hares including one dog one hare but usually the falcon is there doing
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chris get a photobucket account you will find it is piss easy to download pics to THL from photobucket.
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I am leaning more and more in favour of saluki cross dogs, but i course hares in a desert so it makes sense for me. They do bring toughness especially in the feet and have great stamina and heat resistance. But for trainability you have to get it from somewhere else. For me collie/grey x saluki is a perfect mix when you get a dog that has all the good traits of the various breeds and none of there faults. Worst case scenario is a dog that is very nervous, doesnt listen has greyhound feet and overheats. Best case is a dog that is very smart and easy to train, is tough as nails, fast and doesnt
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I catch a very few desert cottontail rabbits they are very small 1 to 1 1/2lb and always close to a hole so not many go in the bag. Antelope and deer are big no no's. I have hunted coyote a little in the past but not for a few years. One of the dogs i bred a few years back and owned by a mate did take a coyote last season which was chasing a small bitch i bred. The yote didnt see her big mean uncle who came in from the side and killed his ass. Not a good pic but my mate took it with his phone. The dog is half greyhound, half Australian shepherd. All the best terence
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Better take plenty of water then, it hasnt rained in 4months and we have 3% humidity at the moment. That spot is actually a 10 minute drive from my house which is in the middle of Albuquerque so no need to stay out for days although camping out in the desert is fun just check your boots for scorpions in the morning. all the best Terence
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It gives the falcon a high perch to spot hares from, i dont find them sitting in a form on winter wheat sticking out like a sore thumb they are hard to spot and every bit helps. all the best Terence
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New Mexico Basil? Too hot to do much right now and the hares are breeding cant wait for the cooler weather have to be real careful with the black and white dog he ran his back off last year spent three days at the vets on a morphine drip as he was cramping so bad. If they can find a hare they will run it and damn the consequences and it is hard to find a field that doesnt have at least one hare waiting to run the dogs to death on a hot day. all the best Terence
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I really like that pic too, my friends niece took that pic and actually won two photo contests with it. Here are a couple more from that day. Me and my merle lurcher Loki My buddy Warren and his two Tazy pups Loki my lurcher a nice portrait. All the best Terence
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No ban where I live and I course blacktailed jackrabbits on very large open desert areas with some sagebrush and mostly thin grassland some flat and some pretty hilly country. All the best Terence
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Just a few random pics from last seasons hunting 20degrees below freezing back in February had two great chases and two kills My mates pups learning their way around a falcon on a kill. The brother to my merle dog with the falcon, he didnt do much on this chase as he got lost but acts like he killed it instead of his brother Loki doing his usual goofy roll around in the dirt after a course
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Must be trying to recreate the extinct Arabian Alaunt.lol You just strap eplosives to it and if it gets close enough to the rabbit, BOOM!
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Well brought Slim home today and he is doing a lot better, seems to have been a combination of overheating, taking a bad fall and being unfit when it all happened. Slim should recover completly and only cost me $900
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The vet will be taking Slim off the morphine today as he is doing much better just some pain at the top of his neck. He will spend another night at the vets with just oral pain meds, if he does well he should come home tomorrow. All the best Terence
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his spine is the only thing that doesnt hurt. The vet was pushing down on each vertabrea really hard and got no reaction at all but if you touch his muscles he screams! Massage would be hard right now he is way too sensitive for that, we will see once he is through the worst of the pain. Never had to put a injured dog on morphine before, even when he broke his leg earlier this year he didnt need it. I take it the weather was very warm? Sounds as though it could be a case of azoturia. Old fashioned name for what is often called cramp, but its not an instant cramp like when your calf
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He is doing a little better this afternoon, he is getting up and down on his own which he couldnt do and finally getting some sleep. The heavy duty muscle relaxants he is on seems to be helping him. i will update tomorrow, he is staying at the vets tonight again. I dont have vet insurance but my vet is a mate so he just charges me cost for treatment which is a great help with my idiot kamikaze dogs and their self destructive antics. It has probably saved me $10,000 in the last ten years. Thanks for all your kind words Terence
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his spine is the only thing that doesnt hurt. The vet was pushing down on each vertabrea really hard and got no reaction at all but if you touch his muscles he screams! Massage would be hard right now he is way too sensitive for that, we will see once he is through the worst of the pain. Never had to put a injured dog on morphine before, even when he broke his leg earlier this year he didnt need it.
