Thursday 22 October 2009

A touch of rain


Yesterday proved fair and sunny which was a surprise, today started off that way, but then deteriorated until after the last flying demonstration, when the rain went. Its uncanny how it rains smack on flying times without fail. But I have to say that Hare is still flying well, even in the damp weather of the last three days, he has not let me down once. The peregrine Fortina on the other hand says stuff demonstration work, lets go and find something to catch. First it was the pigeon, then a Jay coming in to get acorns, who had to do a very swift dive into Danny's Wood to get away. Yesterday she buggered off in the field next door, she missed whatever she was after and Simon and I found her two fields away, to be fair she came straight in which was good. And today, disappeared again, and all I could see was tons of Wood Pigeons all high tailing it in different directions, so I knew what she was doing! But this time at least she came back


Holly came up from the flying ground after flying Jodami, her young Lanner, with a grin as big as the one Adam has when Cool Ground (Snowy Owl) has flown well, so we knew he had done a good flight. Casper, the white bird on the other hand is still flying free, but not getting very far at this point. In fact he landed on my shoulder and I had to run to get him off, he was most offended. The new little Lugger falcon is also loose and did three stoops today, I have never seen a falcon be able to turn like he can, makes a Merlin look clumsy!!


And my Gymnogene is jumping to the fist in the aviary, he will do just about anything now for a hairless mouse, well who wouldn't! Pups are well although I draw the line at Sedge wandering around with the loo brush in his mouth............


I am constantly amazed and delighted by the Long-eared Owl, Eager, and Eager does suit him because when you go to his aviary to get him he stamps up and down from one foot to the other he gets so excited And fly - my goodness, he was above tree height and I was mentally saying - oh nuts - to myself, but he turns on the whistle and circles round and comes back, just wonderful to watch and very different from all the other owls I have flown.


A new Harris has arrived, a female from a friend, so we will train her up and see how she does, we now have five working, which is more than enough!! And all the males are chatty, but will I hope get quieter as time goes on. My young Steppe Eagle weighs a flipping ton, I don't know exactly what as I have not managed to get it to sit on the weighing machine yet, but my arm says its weighs a lot!


The injured Peregrine that came from Neil Forbes is now out and being trained so we can get it fit prior to release, he is a very dark and very beautiful bird and both Neil and us have managed to keep him feather perfect which is pleasing. We had a lovely adult female sparrowhawk in yesterday and she recovered very quickly and was showing no signs of problems so we just opened the door of the box and the door of the hospital and she did a sickle dive out of the door and away over the trees like a pro, it was lovely to see.


Had a great school party here today and tomorrow which is supposed to be OK weather wise we have a falcon day. It will be Dawn Run's first official teaching day, I hope she behaves. Picture is Ruby enjoying the rain, Linda's new camera is working well! Good Lord its nearly 10.30pm - past my bedtime!

0 comments:

Hello

I have to say that keeping a weblog can at times become compulsive and at other times a chore. Sometimes I am berrated for not keeping it up and sometimes I get wonderful comments from people who follow the news of the Centre.

It is fun to share the daily goings on here, some good and some bad, some funny and some sad, but all a part of our daily lives.
And as I said before its a pretty cool to be here and it is a great place to visit, you should try coming and watching the birds and meeting the staff and of course the dogs.

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An interesting video on Lead

An interesting video on Lead

I find it staggering that people who want to hunt don't see the value in changing their ammunition from lead to a safer product. We have stopped using lead in petrol, in paint, in our water pipes, but they still want to use lead - ah well, apparently eating it not only kills birds but leads to reduced intelligence in humans......................

NO ONE is asking you to stop legal and genuine hunting, they are just asking you to change your ammunition!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHZGQ8i8AwI

HC

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