Season's end

Officially, this is the last day of the hawking season, but I wrapped things up a couple of weeks ago as the weather got warm. (Not that it stayed warm...) The season ended well: instead of degenerating into a mouse hawk, as often happens this time of year, Stekoa remained focused on rabbits to the end. All we caught late in the season were bucks, no pregnant does, so no harm done to next season's population.

The last flight of the year was memorable, if not entirely visible. Stekoa took off in his "daddy was a goshawk" flight mode—he's very fast for a redtail—and disappeared, weaving into some fairly thick woods. Instead of the expected crash or squealing rabbit, though, there followed an unusual silence. When we caught up to him, he was in the creek, trying to drag his soaking wet, very dead rabbit up the steep, muddy bank. That cottontail went home on the roof rack instead of in my vest.

Below, a few "leftover" pictures from the season just past. The first two were taken by Pat Stull, the rest by me on a visit with Art Graves out in the Sandhills:

Maxine, Anya, and Stekoa

Stekoa on the fist


Jimi (gyr x peregrine hybrid)


Flint (gyr x saker hybrid)


Brody


Flint waits in the truck for a training flight to the kite


Readying the kite


Closeup of the reel


Sunrise on the grouse lek


Jimi on the wing


Jimi on a prairie-chicken

"La 2da Oracion" ("The 2nd Prayer")

Music from Cielo y Tierra (Earth and Sky) and Jon Anderson (the voice of Yes). Call it fusion, or world music, or whatever you like, it's the best thing I've heard all week.



HT Donna.

The big chill

Chas Clifton over at Southern Rockies Nature Blog dug up an old (1997) Outside magazine article, written by Peter Stark, on hypothermia. As Chas notes, "Cheery stuff." For me, it brought back memories of what could have been a fatal incident—one that took place south of the Mason-Dixon line, incidentally.

About twenty years ago, I was working in the Baltimore area and my fiancée, Susan, was still an undergraduate at W&L. I made the roughly four-hour trip down to Lexington every second or third weekend, usually traveling light. One particular weekend started off warm, so I brought only the usual jeans (32" waist; I was skinny then, which was about to work against me) and short-sleeved T-shirts, but I stayed an extra night and a cold front moved in Sunday evening. When I departed early Monday morning, it was in the 20s; I scraped ice off the windows of my poorly-maintained '77 Nova, shivering in my T-shirt, and set out on the road.

I forget whether the heater itself was on the fritz, or whether the fan had stopped working, but whichever component had failed left me with no means to counteract the ambient temperature, the frigid vinyl of the seats, and the drafts coming in around the door seals. My shivering grew worse and worse, but I stubbornly kept driving—I had to get to work, and surely it would warm up as the sun got higher.

By the time I reached the exit for Stuarts Draft, maybe half an hour down the road (north is down the Valley), my teeth were chattering violently and I could barely hold the steering wheel steady. I finally figured out that I was hypothermic when, despite the shivering, I started to fall asleep at the wheel. Not good. And yet there was a part of me that wanted to give in, to close my eyes and relax, just for a few moments...but of course I was still driving 65 or 70 miles an hour and that would have been the last nap I ever took. I convinced myself to be afraid, turned around at Staunton, and drove back to Lexington talking to myself in order to stay awake.

I arrived back at Susan's apartment pale, nearly incoherent, and still shaking like a leaf on a tree. She and her roommates put me to bed, gave me hot tea, and called me in sick. By that afternoon, both the weather and I had warmed up, and I was able to make it back to Baltimore.

Still, that wasn't necessarily the end of it. Having had hypothermia once renders one more susceptible to the cold—and even knowing this, I still slip up on occasion. A few weeks ago, for example, I made the mistake of going to lacrosse practice dressed for current conditions and not foreseeable conditions. There was snow on the ground, but when practice started at five o'clock I was fine in shorts and a fleece pullover layered over a T-shirt. By 6:30 it was nearly dark, the temperature had dropped, and I was in bad shape: my cleats offered little protection in the snow, my lacrosse gloves (heavily padded on the back as a defense against opponents' checks but with no thermal insulation) were completely inadequate for the situation, and even the fleece was not enough to keep my core temperature up. I ducked out as soon as practice was over, turned on the Subaru's seat warmers and blasted the heat all the way home, took a hot shower that fogged the mirrors but still left me shivering, then bundled up in multiple layers before going to bed under three Pendleton blankets—but I didn't feel warm again until I woke up the next morning.

The moral of the story, if there is one, is this: Hypothermia can be sneaky. Northern climes, high altitude, and the dead of winter are easy enough to prepare for. It's the mid-latitude Marches and Octobers—the sudden cold snap, the unexpected soaking rain—that are likely to get you.

Daylight Saving Time and the tyranny of tradition

Ask any falconer about Daylight Saving Time and the response is likely to be a groan. It's not the concept, necessarily, but the implementation—it's applied to the wrong part of the year.

Blame it on Ben−or maybe not

The concept of Daylight Saving Time (DST for short) is often attributed to American publisher, inventor, and statesman Benjamin Franklin. (See, for example, this recent piece in Scientific American.) According to this version of the story, Franklin (himself a wealthy man) originated the concept as a thrift measure: by setting clocks forward, an hour of early-morning darkness could essentially be traded for an extra hour of daylight at the end of the day, thereby reducing demand for beeswax and other candle materials. In Franklin's own words, "A penny saved is a penny earned."

In reality, however, the operative proverb is "Early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise"—what Franklin actually advocated, while on a diplomatic mission to France, was that Parisians should get more accomplished during daylight hours by rising earlier in the day, firing cannons and ringing church bells if necessary to implement his plan. The suggestion may have been tongue-in-cheek, but even so it's a poor diplomat who accuses the local inhabitants of laziness—which probably accounts for Franklin's publishing his comments anonymously.

The actual inventor and foremost advocate for DST was an Englishman named William Willett. He lobbied unsuccessfully for the adoption of DST from 1907 until his death in 1915. In the end, the First World War accomplished what Willett could not: British lawmakers enacted DST in 1916, but not until the Germans and their allies had beat them to it.

The United States, late arrivals to the war, were late in adopting DST as well: DST went into effect in 1918, and was dropped the following year. The Second World War saw a revival of DST, but once again it was discontinued at the end of the war. DST was observed sporadically on a local basis until 1966, when the Uniform Time Act made DST more or less standard; since then, there have been minor tweaks to the system as states have chosen to opt out (or back in) and various localities have changed time zones, but American society has come to accept DST as routine.


An answer in search of a problem

Several justifications are typically given for implementing DST, many of them easy to discredit. It is often claimed, for example, that DST is beneficial to agriculture, but in fact most farmers work by the sun and not by the clock. Health and safety benefits are also claimed, but in most cases the evidence is ambiguous—or benefits at one time of year are counterbalanced by deleterious effects at another time, resulting in an overall wash. For example, a recent (2008) study in Sweden found that the incidence of heart attacks rose immediately after the "spring forward" but fell by a comparable amount after the "fall back".

The strongest argument for DST, dating back to Franklin and Willett, has traditionally been energy savings. But, as Charles Q. Choi notes in the Scientific American article, recent analyses indicate that changing patterns in energy usage, including increased use of personal electronic devices (this means you, bloggers!), may have rendered this argument obsolete. When Indiana implemented statewide DST for the first time in 2006, the result was "a 1 percent overall rise in residential electricity use, costing the state an extra $9 million."

The enemy wears plaid

Not all of the economic arguments have to do with energy. Quoting Choi again, "Retailers, especially those involved with sports and recreation, have historically argued hardest for extending daylight time." Chief among these, it seems, are purveyors of golfing equipment: The National Golf Foundation estimated that an extension of DST could result in a $200-300 million increase in equipment sales and greens fees. (Choi quotes the figure as $400 million, but who's counting?)

Even my friends, it seems, are out to get me. Greg McManus, with whom I coach high-school lacrosse, e-mailed me a practice plan for this coming Monday: "Wow! We'll actually have an hour and a half practice from now on. Daylight savings rocks!" It's true that our first few practices have been cut short as dusk falls, but the days are rapidly getting longer even without the help of DST. Which leads us to...

A modest proposal

Instead of applying DST to spring and summer, when daylight is naturally longer, how about applying it to the winter months instead, when it might actually do some good?

The sports retailers lobbying for DST to start earlier in the spring and end later in the fall represent warm-weather sports, golf being the prime example. But surely falconers aren't the only field-sports enthusiasts who find weekday afternoons too fleeting during the depths of winter—couldn't gunners (and their lobbyists) make a case for DST reversal?

There are economic and public-health arguments to be made as well. For example, many people, particularly in northern latitudes, suffer from seasonal-affective disorder (SAD) as a result of light deprivation: For a good part of the year, they commute to work before the sun comes up, toil inside all day, then drive home again after dark. If DST were instituted in the winter months, they would have the benefit of afternoon sun. A decrease in SAD could save millions in mental-health care—enough to offset golf's losses?—and perhaps even save lives.

Someone is sure to ask, as someone always does, "What about the children?" Wintertime DST would mean darker mornings, and yes, the poor kiddies might have to wait for the school bus in the dark. I have no answer to this, other than to say that I always enjoyed waiting for the bus in the dark: that's when we were likeliest to see white-tailed deer, or red fox, or owls headed off to roost. Sometimes I suspect that my affinity for wildlife stems, in part, from these early-morning encounters when the world was quiet and dark—imagination and wonder flourish under those conditions.

I'm not going to tilt too hard at this particular windmill—for one thing, I don't have William Willett's energy or enthusiasm—but I thought I'd toss the idea out there for discussion. Ultimately, I think the mnemonic "Spring forward, fall back" is too powerfully ingrained to withstand reversal. Ah, well...another good idea undone by a slogan.

Don't forget to set your clocks forward tonight.

Maybe they're Camel Lights

Clearly, I'm not getting as much use from my Subaru as I might. My '98 Outback hauls, at most, a couple of hawks and a few dogs—miniature dachshunds, at that. But an unnamed Bedouin from the Negev Desert got two camels in his much smaller Subaru:

According to the article from Ynet News, the camels were being smuggled to the West Bank for slaughter as food. Photographer Amir Abu Jamma noted that "It is less expensive than lamb. For the price of four sheep, you can buy one camel." The real money quote, though, is this: "Once, goods used to be smuggled on camels. Now we are smuggling the camels themselves."

HT remchick, previously cited as "my best source for strange news out of North Carolina" (see previous posts here and here) but now apparently covering the Middle East as well.

NFA field meet, February '09—more photos

Just in: Some more pictures from the meet, this time courtesy of Pat Stull.

Stekoa on a rabbit.

This was a tough spot to reach for me...

...but not for Anya, who gets a sharp look for wandering too close.

That noise in the chimney isn't Santa Claus...

...or even the Grinch. It took a concerted team effort as well as a bit of trial and error, but Elaine Bachel from Raptor Recovery Nebraska, Steve & Kim from Country Sweep Chimney Service, and I finally extracted this barred owl (Strix varia) from a residential chimney down in Beatrice. [Photo by Elaine.]

A falling limb knocked the cap off the chimney several days ago, and the owl evidently fell in while exploring the new cavity that had suddenly appeared in her territory. (The damaged tree itself is a potential nesting location.) Elaine and the homeowners had tried last night to pull the bird up with a rope, but couldn't get her past a narrowing of the flue six or seven feet from the top. Today we tried to push her up using the sweeps' brush, but again failed to get her past the chokepoint. Fortunately, she took a good hold on the brush and Steve was finally able to pull her down far enough so we could grab her legs and guide her out past the damper.

Despite being worked up and down the narrow confines of the chimney like a bottle brush, she emerged without feather damage (most cavity-nesting birds have very flexible feathers) or other injury. And despite having been inside for several days, she was in remarkably good condition—a bit thirsty, but nowhere near starving. She did some bill-popping, but otherwise handled the ordeal with equanimity.

Nothing in the world could be as soft as the body plumage of a barred owl...

NFA field meet, February '09

The Nebraska Falconers' Association field meet was held this past weekend in Grand Island. Plenty of falconers attended the business/policy meeting, but (for reasons ranging from perfectly legitimate to highly dubious) most of them left their hawks at home. No accipiters, no falcons, just three bunny hawks. So in the absence of any real story arc—we caught five rabbits over two days and then went home—I'll just post a few photos (taken by me unless otherwise noted).

Bob Noble flushing birds for Hannibal, a Harris' hawk trained by Mike Cox, in an unsuccessful flight out of the hood.


Hannibal flying off a rail car.


Hannibal cruises overhead in search of quarry.


Happy Bob, with Hannibal on the fist and a bunny in the bag.


Reunion: Mike checking Hannibal's keel after the flight.


Hannibal's sister, Clarice, atop a brushpile. (Yes, the names are from The Silence of the Lambs.)


Clarice, still with a footful of grass and fur from a previous flight, launches again from Karl Linderholm's fist.


Flight photos.


Go time!


"Which one is not like the others?"—Stekoa in flight. [Photo by Mitchell Renteria.]

Cryptozoology

Spotted at a farm pond west of Syracuse, Nebraska:

Around the blogosphere

Observant readers will have noticed a couple of recent additions to the blogroll. Rebecca has apparently discontinued Operation Desert Dove (but I highly recommend reading her final entries there) in favor of the new Operation Delta Duck. I'm flattered that Flyover Country is a charter member of the Delta Duck blogroll, and looking forward to more California adventures as only Rebecca can tell them.

Another new blog is Trevor Herriot's Grass Notes, a prairie blog from a Canadian perspective. (HT John at Prairie Ice.)

Excellent new post at Accipitrarius Sordatus, as well as from both Dan and Gervase at Cheyenne River Updates here and here. Also new tazi puppies at Querencia, so congratulations Steve & Libby.

Here in Lincoln they're making a big deal about the upcoming 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth; less so about Charles Darwin's, which of course falls on the same day. Patrick has a great collection of Darwinian cartoons at Terrierman's Daily Dose, missing out only the Northwoods t-shirt that depicts the final step as a falconer with a peregrine on his fist.

I'm highlighting my neighbours' work largely because I've not been writing much at all lately, but maybe I can at least post a picture later on.

Hawai'ian falconry? Not holding my breath

Catching up on the Internet after at least a week's absence, I see that the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service is considering delisting the Hawai'ian hawk or 'io (Buteo solitarius). [HT Terrierman.] The 'io breeds on the Big Island of Hawai'i, where as the island's only resident raptor it preys on a wide variety of avian, mammalian (mostly introduced rodents) and invertebrate prey, and is occasionally found as a vagrant on other islands in the archipelago. On Hawai'i it can be found in agricultural areas and secondary (largely non-native) forest as well as its historical habitat of native forest. Apparently its willingness to utilize such secondary habitats has contributed to its relatively secure (for an island endemic species) status, as populations have remained stable over a twenty-year period.


Over the last few years, as states like Delaware and Connecticut finally put falconry regulations into place, the North American Falconers' Association (NAFA) finally achieved its goal of legal falconry in 49 states. Hawai'i had always been considered a non-starter because the 'io was listed as an endangered species, and the state was understandably opposed to the use of non-native raptors. If the 'io is in fact delisted, it will be interesting to see if Hawai'ian falconry with the 'io might someday become a possibility. Of course, any efforts in that direction will be need to be extremely sensitive not only to the usual opposition from opponents of field sports, but also to the bird's significance as an 'amakua or (roughly translated) totem animal in traditional Hawai'ian culture.

Andrew Wyeth: Ripples on a pond

When I heard that the artist Andrew Wyeth (see official website, Wikipedia biography) had passed away on Friday at the age of 91, it was not unlike hearing that a distant relative had died: my Uncle David has always considered Wyeth a major artistic influence. Just as a stone tossed to water causes ripples that radiate long after the stone's disappearance, Andrew Wyeth's work continues to affect David's painting and my own artistic sensibilities, and likely will for some time.

Like Wyeth, David is considered a "regionalist" painter, depicting rural scenes mostly in Maryland and Pennsylvania. Also like Wyeth, David works in watercolour and egg tempera. (I personally prefer his watercolours, with their more subdued tones.) He's had numerous shows and exhibitions, but I suspect his favorite was the one in Andrew Wyeth's hometown of Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania.

Here are a few snapshots of David's work from my dad's collection, though I suppose one day I will have to start thinking of it as my collection. (These small photos don't begin to do justice to the paintings, but will have to suffice.)

Annapolis boat yard, pen and ink, 1971. Good drawing is the basis for great painting.


Onion shed, watercolour, 1973.


One way in which David's work differs from Andrew Wyeth's is that while David's landscapes almost always include man-made elements (houses, barns, etc.), the human form rarely if ever makes a direct appearance. Some critics, I assume, would draw psychological conclusions about this aspect of David's art, but I also suspect that most of those conclusions would be completely off-base. My uncle, like most in the family, could hardly be classified as an extrovert, but a gentler, more personable man you're not likely to meet.

Pump house, watercolour, 1973.


I have always admired, perhaps because it comes with great difficulty for me, the way artists like David can suggest detail that isn't necessarily there, as for example in the leaves and textured bark of the tree behind and to the left of the pump house. Robert Bateman, another artist both David and I admire, is a master of this.

Burkittsville, watercolour, 1984.


Watercolour is a difficult medium for a number of reasons, but one has to do with its transparency. Unlike with oils or acrylics, for example, there is no white paint. White comes from the paper itself, so the white areas in a painting like this (the snow, the fences, the sunlit sides of the house) are not painted but painted around. The unforgiving nature of the medium therefore requires a good deal of planning as well as meticulous technique; David typically "scouts" a painting with several visits to explore various points of view and study the changing of the light, but paints at home using photographs for reference. He does not consider himself bound by the physical realities of a location, however, often rearranging various elements for artistic effect.

On my last visit home in November, with the painting itself in the back seat of the Outback and a Maryland highway map pointing me toward Burkittsville, I set out to locate this scene. It wasn't difficult to find: Needwood Farms, established circa 1795, is located perhaps a mile outside the town of Burkittsville, right off Highway 17. Once there, I could see that David had flattened out the field in the foreground; from the point of view he used, the house is actually half-hidden behind a rise in the field. (Also, as you can see in the photo below, the evergreens around the house have grown much bigger since '84.)


The ridge behind the farm is the low backbone of South Mountain, where on September 14, 1862 Major General George B. McClellan's Union troops attacked General Robert E. Lee's scattered Confederate forces, which ten days earlier had advanced into Maryland for the first time. McClellan took the three gaps held by the Confederates, achieving a significant Union victory at this stage of the war, but failed to press his advantage. The Battle of South Mountain was consigned to obscurity through McClellan's delay, which gave Lee time to gather his army near Sharpsburg, on the west bank of Antietam Creek. The ensuing battle there, on September 17, marked the single bloodiest day of the American Civil War.

David's personal website (like the gallery site here) is definitely worth checking out despite being a bit out of date, which is a reflection of the fact that health issues threatened to put an end to his painting career. Happily, he has made a remarkable recovery from what can be an utterly debilitating condition, and is painting once again. I hope to be able to post more later. Meanwhile, condolences from our family to Andrew Wyeth's. His was a remarkable talent.

Twenty-seven 8x10 color glossy pictures...

...with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one was, to be used as evidence against us.

Well, not really, but these were taken by a cop.


Conservation officer Dina Barta from the Nebraska Game & Parks Commission did my facilities re-inspection (part of the falconry permitting process) when I moved a couple of years ago, and expressed an interest in coming afield with me. A few months ago we bumped into each other while we were both stocking up on dog supplies, and traded contact info. Yesterday, we finally got around to hawking together.

Dina and her friend Keith met me at a State Recreation Area that holds a good population of cottontails as well as fox squirrels, a species I enjoy hunting but for which Stekoa harbors less enthusiasm. Temperatures were in the single digits, but bundled up against the cold, we ventured into the woods along with Maxine and Anya. Almost immediately, Stekoa changed direction, going at right angles to our intended route—a good indication of game on the move. Sure enough, when we caught up to him, a rabbit flushed from the undergrowth and was immediately taken. Total elapsed time: about three minutes.

[Making in.]


I rarely try for more than one rabbit in a day, but all the conditions were right: a quick first kill, company along (they had planned on seeing more flying than this), and an absence of pressing responsibilities elsewhere. So I rewarded Stekoa lightly, put the rabbit in my vest, and we set out again.


Weather like this often drives cottontails underground, so I was not at all surprised that flushes thereafter were few and far between. Dina and Keith didn't seem to mind at all; they were clearly enamored of the hawk (Dina noted that "If redtails were rare, everyone would agree they're the most beautiful bird alive") and also impressed with the way Max and Anya worked cover. I have to admit I was impressed with the dogs, too, unfazed as they were by the cold. They also showed off their athleticism—at one point we ventured into unfamiliar territory, and I was surprised to arrive at the edge of a bluff overlooking the creek. Forty or fifty feet down, with a path (made by what, I wonder?) going straight down an incline of at least 60 degrees. But Stekoa was flying ahead of us and Maxine, intent on her mission of staying with the hawk, barrelled straight down, crossed the frozen creek like nothing extraordinary had happened, and continued hunting. The less-confident Anya followed her before, I think, she knew what she'd gotten herself into, and got stuck three-quarters of the way down. I tried to "ski" down sideways, leaning hard into the hill, but traversed the lower half of the hill on the seat of my brush jeans—where there isn't a layer of tough Cordura nylon. (Fortunately, Dina didn't capture this episode with her camera.) Anya then scrambled back up the steep slope and followed Dina and Keith around to an easier crossing.

[The dogs investigate the site of a "wild" rabbit kill. The predator could have been any of several: hawk, owl, fox, coyote, or bobcat. I had to stash the frozen gutpile on a nearby branch to keep Max and Anya from chowing down.]


We ended up hunting for about two hours before Stekoa got another shot at a rabbit. This was an unusual flight, not especially exciting from a visual standpoint but tactically interesting: He glided most of the way, easing up, over, and around the flank of a small stand of sumacs to take a cottontail hiding in the grass on the far edge. Until Stekoa pitched down and the rabbit started squealing, I hadn't thought it was a hunting flight at all, just a routine glide to a new perch, and I wonder if the bunny was likewise lulled into a false sense of security by the casual approach. In any case, the rabbit was put in the bag, and we were done for the afternoon.

[Stekoa eats while Anya looks on. The dogs got rewarded, too: rabbit legs with a bit of meat left on, what falconers call a "tyring".]


On our way out of the woods, we encountered a deer hunter just entering—it was the last day of the firearms season. Dina checked his permit, and even though Keith and I hung back we could hear the man spoke with a pronounced accent. Dina later told us that all the deer hunters she'd checked lately had been Russians—apparently they're the only ones hardy enough to sit still for hours in this late-season weather. We at least got to walk around, climbing in and out of the creekbed, keeping ourselves warm through exertion.

[I like this shot; you can almost tell by looking how the sun offers light but little warmth on a day like this.]

All in all, another good day. Stekoa certainly enjoyed himself—just don't get too close with that camera!

A new icon

Cool new widget, courtesy of Paste magazine: Obamicon.me

"Weather Channel"

That kind of day.

In the city

Journal Star outdoors writer Joe Duggan had a nice column in yesterday's paper (link here) about a sharp-shinned hawk at his house. Coincidentally, just a few hours after I read the article, Julie T. called to tell me about a hawk (it turned out to be a Cooper's hawk) she had seen perched in a bush in her front yard. "The sparrows were in a state of panic," she said, as indeed they would be with an accipiter in the neighborhood.

All of which got me thinking (again) how fortunate we are to have such a plethora of urban wildlife here in Lincoln. The last few mornings, in between irritated slaps at the snooze button, I've been hearing a pair of great-horned owls in the trees behind the house. Karl Linderholm recently sent me this picture, probably taken by Mitchell, of a screech-owl at their back deck.


Then, of course, there are the redtails (one of whom I occasionally find perched on the fence just outside Stekoa's mews, prompting me to wonder what sort of communication might be transpiring between these normally asocial birds), merlins (easier to find in town, where they enjoy a concentration of European starlings, than out in the boonies), and the Capitol peregrines (previous posts here and here). City living definitely has its ups and downs, but seeing all these raptors on at least a semi-regular basis certainly helps to make it tolerable for me.