Falcon Fever

Well, I guess I just can't get enough. Here I am back again for another season, and of course for your entertainment.

Our flight in the morning went by pretty smoothly form Bradley to Atlanta, then I woke up on our trip to El Paso looking at lightning through the plane's windows. We were greeted by Paul at the airport and started heading off to our site, or what we thought was going to be our site. After some small talk, Paul brought up, "So, did you hear about the site situation?" Our answer, "Um, no?" Paul began telling us that Brian had gone over to the Miller Ranch to finish setting up everything and saw an adult nesting pair; the site therefore had to be closed. I kept my composure as much as I could but I felt like a loony toons character, my jaw plummeting to the floor. Paul continued on, "So you're going to be back at your old spot." "What the $*&%^?" That actually didn't come out, but it was definitely what I was thinking. I could imagine what Halley was thinking, as we both were receiving this startling news, because she had been my number one pen pal the previous summer. I attempted to provide her with some reassuring words, but I could tell by her nervous smiles it wasn't working much. The Peregrine Fund is definitely a master of surprise!

We continued our ride down the oh so familiar roads of the past until we came to the non-existent town of Van Horn where another surprise awaited us. We were there to pick up a hack site attendant who would be staying with us for a week until her site opened on the Baeza Ranch. Her site was initially supposed to have been the Means but her partner decided to quit right before coming out. Anyone see a trend here? I wonder why no one wants to be at the Means site? Hm... So, we met Charlene, or otherwise known as Charlie, and headed off to the ranch.

We met Brian at Clay and Barbie Miller's house to pick up our pick up, then headed off in a caravan of trucks down the familiar 20 miles of dirt road to our hack site. Once we turned a sharp corner hugging the bottom of a rocky hill protruding out of the goldish grasslands, the "tree of life" and the little tin shack came into view, and a warm feeling filled by heart; how could I have wanted to be anywhere else? We stopped by our hack site to drop off our first group of five Aplomados, three males and two females: PD, HV, AU, 6C and 7E. The moment was just as heart throbbing as the rest. Seeing them for the first time just never gets old.

After heading down the road and dropping off our luggage, we drove out to the ranch house to say a quick hello to the Means. It was great to greet them with warm embraces; neither of us could have guessed we would see one another again but both parties I believe were pleasantly pleased to see a familiar face. After a few cold drinks and some catching up, we bid our farewells. As we were headed out, they asked if we had ever seen a rodeo because there was one in town (in "town" as in Pecos, two hours away). We all said nope and then the next thing we knew we had box tickets for the next day! I had forgotten how immensely kind and generous the Means family is. If you ever want to know where that phrase "Southern hospitality" comes from, they're it.

The next day we woke up to feed our falcons bright and early and then decided to go for a walk. I had remembered a small loop from the year before, but I guess I didn't realize how long it was until Charlie and Halley were wondering when it would ever end. The rocky five miles took us three hours and only Charlie had brought water. Oops!

After taking a few naps during the day and introducing the girls to Artemeo who was passing by to check the water tanks, we were eager to head off to the rodeo. We fed our falcons a little early so we could start the long hall. Before heading into what looked like an already chaotic even, we pulled in across the street from the stadium to grab a bite to eat. Now I'll tell you, a freshly made tortilla makes all the difference; it can make a simple bean and cheese burrito just mouth-watering.

So after our scrumptious meals we headed on back across the street; little did we know we were crossing into a different world. Surrounding the stadium area were booths selling clothes and food; a mix of banners reading, "I Rope for Jesus" and "Lemonada." Finding our seats was a doosey, after embarrassingly walking around aimlessly for a bit, we had toask for help.

The rodeo opened up to some praising of America and Jesus, in which Halley and I had to flip our sun glasses down over our eyes and hold back our smirks. Then the rodeo began! The first event was kind of like bull riding but instead with maniac horses. The next event was lassoing some small steers. Two riders would shoot out of the gates; the first would lasso the steer's horns and then the second would somehow get its back legs. After that it was more crazy horse riding but this time with a saddle, I don't know which hurt worse with or without but I definitely know it hurt us to watch the cowboys being tossed back and forth like rag dolls. Next was more steer roping but this time it was just one rider who would lasso the horns but at the perfect angle so the steer would flip over, landing on its side so the cowboy could hop off his horse and tie up three legs of this concussed steer.

By this time I asked Halley what time it was and we were all surprised to find out that it was already ten, so we decided to just stay for one more event. This one was the most absurd yet. A steer was let out of the gate and then a cowboy soon followed; we were wondering what was going to happen next because he had no lasso. So the cowboy then suddenly flung himself into the air grabbing the horns of the steer and flipped him over. Why in the world would anyone want to do this? I felt like I was watching a really bad MTV show where they do really stupid and painful things for entertainment. Well, I guess they pulled it off because it was entertaining.

We couldn't believe that we were going to miss the infamous bull riding, but it was the last event on the roster and we had to head back to the ranch for another early morning. All in all, it was quite the experience.

We returned to the house late that night to be greeted by a few old friends; a couple black widows made their homes right next to our door. They are gorgeous spiders so killing them wasn't exactly what I wanted to do but I figured it was a good idea to do it now before they had egg sacs. So, I bid them ado and smashed them with a shovel.

We had a difficult time getting up the next morning, but somehow forced our way out of bed. We returned home from our morning feeding to find a calf in our fenced off yard. There must've been a hole in the fencing or this cow was one amazing magician. we didn't know what else to do but corrale him out through the gate. If you had already guessed, it didn't work so we lazily gave up.

A little while later we heard a truck driving up to the gate. It was Jose and he had brought a horse! We went out to say hello and pointed to the calf. Jose nodded and said something long and wordy in Spanish; then he mounted his horse and began corralling the little calf. We watched him as he struggled to get the calf to realize that the gate was open and gave him a standing ovation when the calf finally exited the premises.

After another night of sleep was cut short due to a bird perched right outside our house deciding to sing like clockwork at around four or five each morning, we fed the falcons and were off to Fort Davis to have the truck worked on. The drive was a bit sketchy, but beautiful. A long, straight and then windy road with absolutely no shoulder brought us through the rocky, cactus and tee-covered (yer, trees!) Davis Mountains. Arriving in Fort Davis after an hour and a half drive, which is what seems to be a rather short trip around here, we dropped off the truck and began walking around the quaint, little Texas town.

There wasn't too much to do in Fort Davis, and I believe we managed to hit all the little shops; both the ridiculously over priced tourist traps and the thrift shops, or what I would refer to as "want some crap?" shops. After unpleasantly biting into a bacon-filled bean and cheese burrito and capping off our tummies with expensive but delicious milkshakes, our truck was finally ready to be picked up. Everything's slower here in Texas, that's for sure; and to boot they hadn't even fixed what we had brought it in for (our four wheel drive). Note to self, "everything has to be ordered in Texas." The story doesn't end just yet...

The truck still needed a new sticker saying that it had it's check up. Next was another long wait at the gas station finding out that we needed a new horn; I guess they can't let you drive around honking something that sounds like a clown's nose. We had wondered why the cows had been looking, almost to laugh at us, as we tooted at them to move on out of the way. After another hour and a half dive home, with the birds still needing to be fed, we were delighted to have some good propane cookin', a tasty glass of wine and a gorgeous view of captivating mountains off in the distance.

Another day with lots of sleep, sweltering heat, and little to eat rolled along. Still no rain since we arrived. Out for a stroll and a little gem hunting we thought might do us some good, so we headed off with water bottles at hand. Out in the early sun for hours, water bottles empty but the shack close in sight, we saw a golf cart pulling up to the house. "Oh no!" Halley and I said out loud thinking about our currently "barely there" wardrobe. "Who could it be? As long as it's not John Means, that would be awful." As the golf cart turned from the shack, realizing its residents' absences, it continued on up the dusty path towards us. as it got closer I thought to myself, " I think I rather it had been John Means."

The cart pulled up with five attractive young men with shotguns casually resting on their knees. They hopped on out of the golf cart and the first one to introduce himself was John Means' nephew. These were his friends from the Marines and they had driven down for the weekend to get in some huntin'. He and the others were very sweet and I apologized for our dress code, although I'm sure they enjoyed it. What they must think of New England girls now?! Well, we took part in a little awkward small talk, which hopefully overshadowed how mortified we were, and bid them farewell.

After all that excitement I passed right out, but was woken abruptly from a nice deep sleep when Halley began screaming, "Angie! Come here! Snake!" A snake had snuck behind them as they were lounging on the perch and was making itself a comfortable little spot right up against the house, between the front two doors. Having both heard stories of rattle snakes, I think they were both a bit hyped up at the sight of a snake. So hyped up that they were calling me out of bed for a tiny, harmless little bull snake (which I would normally say looked more terrified of us, than us of him). Soon after, we watched as it made its way up and under our window pane. We ran inside to see assuming to see it there, but nothing. Poisonous or not, we didn't really want it slithering on us in the middle of the night., but we tried to put the thought out of our minds.

Speaking of night; Halley and I were resting in our bed having a quick read before gently drifting away to dream land, when Charlie walks in saying in a very stressed out and loud voice, "Oh crap guys!" Halley and I, so abruptly awaken from our slumbers said, "What?" with a grumpy/groggy aer in our tones. "I've locked my keys, all of them, in my car!"

Now Charlie, having done this before had made several copies of keys in hopes to not repeat the unlucky move out in the middle of nowhere, but I guess it doesn't help when you keep all of those five copies in the vehicle itself. See everyone! I'm not the only one who makes these imbasile mistakes!

Well, the sotry goes as such that we spent a few dark hours of the night attepting to open it by prying the door open with a few pairs of scissors and manuevering an old piece of wire down through to hit the unlock button. As you might have guessed, our method of maddness didn't end up working (the wire was just too weak to push the button), so Charlie ended up smashing a windo in the next morning (concidering everything she had was in that car).

Another day or so went by and Brian showed up with another group of falcons. This time it was four; one female and three males: 9S, KB, AP, and RZ. This group seemed to be a bit more roudy than the previous one possibly because they were a few days older than the others.

The placement of these birds at this point in time was a bit awkward becasue we were about to have the release for the first group. Usually during the release period the towers are not approached in order to not force fledge the young falcons, but in this case we would have to sneak up somehow to feed this new group that was still in the box.

Well, the problem of feedin gropu two didn't end up being too difficult. We got cackled at from a few members of group one on a nearby bush and the young falcons from gorup two vocalized back seeming to say, "They're coming; the aliens are here! Help us!" Besides our unwanted welcome it went by rather smoothly.

I believe that's all I have for this week; I hope to keep this up again throughout the summer. I send my love back home to everyone! Miss you all.