The Off-Season 釣り

It's the off-season and despite the fact that I didn't even have a bird of my own to fly this past season this time of year leaves a bit of a void that needs to be filled. Thank goodness there's fishing!

I got my first fly rod around the age of 10. I don't really remember why I got into fly-fishing, it may have been because my Dad had gotten his rod out to practice for an upcoming business trip where the company was going to try and schmooze some clients and was practicing his casts in the front yard, or it might just have been destiny. Either way I remember convincing my Mom to buy me a cheap fly-fishing kit and subsequently accompanying my Father on the above mentioned company trip.

We headed to the Green River in Utah and after many hours and watching the adults around me catch numerous fish I finally hooked into a 17-inch cutthroat. You couldn't have found a happier boy at the time. Someone there had a camera and to this day my parents still have a picture of me holding that fish with the biggest smile you could imagine!

Fly-fishing became a regular activity for me after that. The summer between my freshman and sophomore year at high-school I was on the river near my house almost every day and a few years later a group of friends from work and I made fishing after work a weekly, and sometimes daily, occurrence. Good times.

College found me in Hawaii and while I didn't have a fly rod and it took me awhile to figure out the whole saltwater thing I eventually got my groove back. I'd run to the beach in between classes for a few casts and if I had a little bit more time I'd be in the water hunting fish another way: with a snorkel and spear gun. I found a fishing buddy there that was just as passionate about fishing and between the two of us we probably spent more time in the water than out! Again, good times.

This is actually a picture from Thailand but it's the only digital copy of me and my fishing buddy from Hawaii with fish that I could find!

Then I moved to Japan and things slowed waaaay down. We lived next to a large river but it was brackish water and I wasn't familiar with the kinds of fish that lived there or the methods the locals used. Up-river it became strictly freshwater and there were supposedly bass but I'd never fished for those before and didn't have much time to put much effort in to learning how to catch them. There were some ponds out by the falconry club that I spent a lot of time at and I did catch a few tiny bass and bluegill out of those but my fishing took a serious downturn for those three years.

"I caught you a delicious bass..."

But now I'm back in the States and my fly-fishing gear made the trip with me to Colorado. Moving half way across the world, starting grad school, and an infant son hasn't left me with many opportunities to get out on the water though. Such is life. But this past Monday a friend from Church invited me to spend the day on the Arkansas River. I dusted off the gear, tried to remember all my knots, and loaded the reel with new line, it's been awhile since I was that excited!

Three hours there, six hours and four spots on the river, and three hours back and between the two of us only one guppy was landed. But the weather was beautiful, the river was clean, and I had a fly-rod in my hand again after nearly eight years. I'M BACK!! Good times.

Louis and his monster from Monday.

Deer hawking?!

More Skytrials Pics 内村さんの写真

Better late than never, right?

やっと載せました！

Utah Skytrials ユタ州のスカイトライアル

From February 10th through February 17th a good friend of mine from Japan came to the United States to attend the Utah Skytrials. It was a week full of falconry and fun (and exhausting to say the least). We took him out pheasant hunting (with guns), up to the Marshall Telemetry Headquarters, over to a raptor breeders place, out hawking with a golden eagle and then a goshawk and then finally to the Skytrials. Unfortunately I forgot my camera in Colorado and didn't get a hold of another camera in Utah until the first day of the Skytrials. The pics below are from that camera but I'll post some more that my buddy took in the near future.

２月１１日から１７日まで内村さんがユタ州に訪問してきました。銃での雉狩り，マーシャル本社の訪問，ブリーダの見学，イヌワシとオオタカのウサギ狩り，そしてスカイトライアル　に行って来ました。凄く忙しかった！いった間野生のレッドテール，アメチョウ，白頭ワシ，イヌワシ，などを見ました。改めてアメリカは凄いなと僕も感じました。残念ながらオオタカの狩りとスカイトライルの時だけカメラを持ってましたのですべての写真はその二日間だけです。内村さんの写真を後ほど載せます。とりあえずスカイトリアル：

And a couple from our day out with Melissa and her goshawk "Sugar". Now I have to mention that I'm somewhat cursed. It seems that whenever I initially go out with someone and their birds we NEVER catch anything. Take the day we went out with the golden eagle. That eagle has taken 198 jacks this year and I've heard respectable falconers say that it is the best falconry bird of ANY species that they've ever seen. What happens when you throw me in to the mix? Right out of the hood the eagle goes wacky, we got a few flights here and there but in the end he went up over a ridge and we spent the next two hours trudging up and down hills through calf deep snow up looking for him. Honestly about par for the course when I head out with people. It usually takes awhile for the curse to be broken and I have to thank all the people who have invited me back out after a disasterous outing (I know that's not how your bird usually flies, honestly, its me!). But Melissa was a trouper and while it looked like things weren't going to work out in the beginning she stuck with it and Sugar finally nailed a cottontail. Thanks for hanging in there with us Melissa!





そしてオオタカの狩りの写真。ここで一つ言わなきゃいけないことですが私が呪われています。いつも誰かと一緒に狩りに行ったら必ずその日その人の鷹が良く飛べない。例えばイヌワシの狩りを見に行ったら色んな人からこのイヌワシはどんな鷹匠の鷹よりも凄いという話は聞きました。今年だけでウサギ１９８匹を捕ったイヌワシでした。しかし私が一緒に行くとフードを外したすぐ飛んで行ってしまった。”このイヌワシはこんな事するのは初めてよ！”と何回言われた。やっぱり私の呪いだ。とにかくオオタカと一緒に出たときは始めから良くない感じがしました。でも鷹匠が頑張ってウサギを探してくれて最後に一匹捕ることが出来ました。ありがとうございます！

Now I've actually received some pics from my friend in Japan but since this post has taken so long to get to where it is I figured I'd post what I have and do the rest of the pics in another post. He really took some good shots. So keep an eye on this space. More Skytrials pics to follow soon.

内村さんの写真も載せようと思っていますけどこのポストだけでもかなり時間かかったので次のポストにしょうと思っています。かなりいい写真を沢山撮ってくれたのでまた今度見たら載せます。とりあえず以上です。

A couple of great videos ビデオ

IMPRESSIVE! 凄い過ぎる！

I've never seen this goshawk fly and I've never met the falconer that flies her but I get to read her adventures on a couple of email lists I'm a member of and all I can say is WOW!! In this particular instance all that game was taken by that hawk in about 5 hours. What makes it even more amazing is that last year she had West Nile and lost vision in one eye. I don't know about anyone else but I'd take this one-eyed gos over a whole lot of two eyed birds! Earlier this year this bird took its 1000th head of game for her falconer in her 5th season with him. This is the level of falconry I hope to achieve one day! Thanks for the inspiration!

このオオタカは凄い過ぎる！５時間の狩りでキジ四羽，リス一匹，鴨一羽，獲物全部で六つを捕りました。しかも去年病気で方目が見えなくなった！それにしてもこう何捕れるなんって信じられない！残念ながらこのオオタカは実際に見た事がない。アメリカの北東にいるけど話は良く聞きます。今年は５年目で獲物１０００匹を超えました。いつかこういう鷹匠になりたいな。。。

One of those days. よくない狩り

I can't say it was a horrible day, but it certainly wasn't a good day. The birds just seemed off a bit. The red-tail went first and for the first few slips just didn't put forth much effort.

最悪という訳ではない。結局ウサギ８匹を捕ったけどまぁまぁの捕り方でした。鷹はただあんまりよく飛ばなかったしウサギは走らなかった。最初はレッドテールでした。何匹かだしても頑張って追いかけなかった。こんな感じでした：

Fortunately we finally did connect. The bird had flown up to a light post overlooking a parking lot and her falconer was poking around in some low brush around the entrance to a building. I didn't think there would be anything in such sparse cover so I didn't have the camera ready for video but suddenly a bunny popped out of nowhere and ran almost straight toward the light pole the bird was on. Sheila (the bird) took a short hop off the pole, pumped once, and power stooped into the fleeing bunny hitting it right on the edge of a snow bank covered in ice. The angle was just such that the snow bank acted like a skateboard ramp and both bird and bunny shot a few feet up in the air! When they landed Sheila had firm control.

数回追いかけってからやっと捕りました。鷹が電信柱の上に止まった時建物の周りの草をたたえたら急に一匹が出ました。電信柱のすぐ下に走っていたので鷹が飛んだよりも落ちって凄い力でドンとウサギを捕りました。

We tried one or two more slips but the bird just wasn't up to it so she got put up while we got the Sisters (two female Harris Hawks) out. It was really cold, and that might have had something to do with it, but we weren't finding many rabbits either. The ones we did catch were nothing to write home (or blog) about. The missed flights were better then the catches but even then they weren't all that exciting.

後も一匹頑張ろうと思ったけど鷹はも終わりという感じな飛び方だったので辞めました。次はハリス♀２羽を出しました。寒かったから影響があったかもしれないけどウサギもあんまり見つからなかった。見つかったのもあんまり走らなかった。捕ったけど面白くなかった。ミスした時の方が面白かったけどそれにしてもまぁまぁでした。

Once the girls were done we got out one more red-tail that flew in a way I've never seen a red-tail fly before. We walked out into a field, the hood came off and she went up just like a falcon! Not nearly as high as a falcon mind you, but she wasn't going to be flown off the fist. She was only about 50 feet up when this bunny got up. Interesting flight but not stellar.

ハリスの狩りが終わったらまた他のレッドテールを出しました。このレッドテールは面白かった。手から飛ぶのはしない。隼みたいにフッドを外したらすぐ上がる。隼ほど高くないけど面白かった。ウサギを出した時２０メテルぐらいから落ちました。

And that pretty much summed up the day. Like I said, not a horrible day but I've seen better. But what's that saying? The worst day hawking (which this wasn't) is better than the best day at work? Looking forward to the next time out.

それで狩りが終わりました。言った通り最悪ではなかったけどもっと楽しい時がある。今度は楽しみ！