Gun Dog Forum

I have on a couple of occassion seen raptors shadow my dogs as we work a tree line, I assume looking for bunnies or mice the dogs stir up. I've admired the birds adaptiveness and reasoning and enjoyed hunting together. Today as my dog Gus and I worked into the wind along a small creek, a rooster got up and flew straight away low to the ground. I got on him and fired rolling him into the cattails along the opposite bank of the creek. Due to the high cover my spaniel did not mark the bird. I gave Gus an over command and let him work up the wind toward the spot the bird fell. He crossed the creek and immediately caught the ground scent of the rooster, which turned out to be a runner. As Gus worked the scent back to my left, out of the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of gray. A Goshawk had swooped out of the sky and had our bird pinned on the creek bank. About the time I realized the hawk had caught our bird, Gus saw the hawk and bee lined for the retrieve. The Hawk tried to take off with the rooster but quickly gave up with the dog closing fast and mere feet away. If the hawk had not caught the running rooster we may have lost him as the cattails are trouble with wounded birds.

I guess it is sights and expriences like this that keep me buying a hunting license every year. Hope everyone else is having a season to remember.

I had a Snowy Owl take out a pheasant my dog had pointed. I was moving in for the flush, the bird jumped up and started running down the hedge on the snow and I heard a faint rustle as the own missed my head by a few inches coming over me from behind and took out the pheasant. He tried to fly off with it but couldn't, tried to stay with it and decided the dog and I were too much and flew away. Saved me a shell.

Have lots of Red tailed in my hunting area, never had one go after my game but I believe them to be evenly responsible as the fox and coyotes for the missing birds come spring. I wonder if a controlled hunting season would do any real harm to some of those birds of prey, because I hear a lot of complaints from fellow hunters? My only problem with opening a hunt on them would be mistaken identification and mistake kills on some more endangered species and the fact that you really cant make a meal of them.

I've seen a pheasant taken down by a hawk in mid-air.

Just another reason to be outside observing nature. Great experience. Thanks for sharing.

Cool!!!!

Nitrex

SpringerDude wrote:Just another reason to be outside observing nature. Great experience. Thanks for sharing.

+1

That is so awesome! Thanks for posting!

We've had a redtail hawk one year that would follow the neighbors game farm 4 wheelers as he planted birds. No sooner would he plant them than the hawk would swoop down and grab one off the ground or out of the air if the bird was semi--smart. Saw it for myself a number of times.
I have also watched a redtail pick apart a covey of quail over a period of a week. One by one he grab then and finally that covey disappeared.

Seen Sharpshinned hawks get quail too.

The best one I ever saw was a feral cat leap about 4 feet and catch a bobwhite in mid-air from a covey I had flushed. I did end up retrieving that bird....

We have a pair of redtailed that nest by our house. I haven't seen them bother the wild quail that we feed. Mainly feed on mice and other four legged critters. Last week I had a goshawk follow the pup. Perching above her. It chased every quail she got up. It dove down after one that I shot. Almost caught it. I'd.never seen anything like that before.

Awesome story and pic birdshot How has Gus' season been going?

I have seen 2 Red Tails in an aerial "dog fight" with a Golden Eagle outside of Flagstaff. I have also had a Bald Eagle take out a tethered training pigeon.

I've had raptors involved in my waterfowl hunting experiences. The first is when I had a prairie falcon come down and hit on of my duck decoys. The other was a red-tail get to a pintail on an opposite bank from my blind before my dog got there. It bummed me out because it was a fully feather drake sprig and the hawk already pulled out a bunch of feathers and a chunk of breast meat. I've hunted alot of areas with 1-5 bald eagle perched around my blind but have never seen them go after ducks I've shot and floating down the river. The other thing is the "don't care" about shooting around their perches or them leaving the decoys alone.

I had a peregrine falcon take a planted pigeon - dog wa son point and I hadn't hot there yet. The dog was not impressed.