He's back!

It has taken 3 months, but Orion is back home now!

Back in mid-September, we had some friends over one weekend evening. Orion had just finished molting his feathers and I was going to start training again the following Monday. I got Orion out for some up-and-close time with the kids from both families. Kimberly adores Orion and had been desperate to hold him. (Kim has talked repeatedly of becoming a falconer when she turns 14.) She knows enough about falconry that I let her hold him.

How did he escape? Good question...we were outside the whole time. Since there is little interaction during "the molt," most falconry birds revert to near wild. As Kim gave Orion back to me to put in the mews, there was a brief moment where neither Kim nor I had a good hold on him, and he bolted for the nearest tree. We weren't paying close enough attention to what we were doing!

A couple weeks later, I found Orion again...one block south of where I originally trapped him in Farmington! This started a two-and-a-half month process of trying to recapture Orion. Most of the small farm owners in the area were very generous letting me roam their pastures to set my traps. The biggest problem was the abundance of prey; my two mice in the trap weren't appealing enough. It was the recent storms that made prey scarce and my two mice more appealing.

Two other falconers were helping the day I recaptured him. He had garnered some limited celebrity that caught the DWR's attention. We actually caught him three times in a 90 minute period. Obviously, he escaped the traps twice. The third time we caught him, we actually caught the falconry jesses; he nearly escaped a third time.

I haven't heard Kim squeal in excitement that loud in a long time! It's great to have him back. He's already flying on call and we should be ready to hunt together shortly.