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Hawks And Pidgeons


caldrail

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Starting the day in a good mood I went about my business. Everyone seems to be in a good mood too. Happy smiling shop assistants, and warm if cloudy weather. It just feels like it's going to be a good day. Or at least, it would be if I hadn't cracked a rib during my collision with the supermarket car park. It only hurts when I laugh.

 

"Step into a recruitment office if you want to play soldiers" Growled a voice as I bounded joyfully up the stairs at the library. Oh great. Another clown. That's put a damper on my day. As it happens I know that voice and he ought to know better than advise members of the public in such a sneering manner.

 

Play soldiers? I haven't done that since I left the Air Cadets. That was way back in... Erm... Ages ago. Decades even. Oh, I see, another sanctimonious upstart doesn't like my habit of wearing military surplus trousers. I don't care. They're available tio anyone on the high street, they're comfortable, useful even, and well suited to my hikes in the countryside. Hiking is about getting out and enjoying the countryside. It doesn't involve special operations behind enemy lines.

 

As I waited for the woman on my booked computer to stop making her face up, I glanced out the window and spotted a guy in head to toe autumn tree bark cammo gear, driving a military surplus land rover equipped for an invasion of Normandy. I see him driving around now and then. I wonder if he gets any hassle?

 

Why on Earth would I want to step into a recruitment office anyway? According to the news, the British Army is getting rid of 19,000 troops over the next few years, plus I'm nearly fifty, suffering middle age health issues, and I discovered yesterday that I'm not as agile as a teenager.

 

As it happens I made a promise to someone as a child that I would never join the army. My grandfather had gone ashore at Gallipoli in World War One to assist in bayonet charges on turkish positions, and later went to the muddy hell of Verdun, France. I remember asking innocently what he'd done in the war, or something to that effect. He didn't relate any tales of derring do, or patriotic pride in doing his bit. Instead he made me aware of what war was. The simple fact was that he didn't want me to suffer the same experiences as he'd done in his younger days. He was a good man. I'll keep faith with him.

 

Worse still for my male ego is the realisation that I was never born to be a warrior anyway. My calling was elsewhere. What's the point of playing soldiers when you're never going to be any good at it? You have to be true to yourself and I see no good purpose in allowing myself to be forced into a life I will never be happy with. That was always the problemn with my father, who wanted me to be soldier, just like him. He was, is, and always will be a petty corporal. If I can blame anyone for lifelong interest in things military, I can lay it at his feet.

 

The army puts adverts on television to the effect that they spot talent and encourage it. Maybe so, but that message clearly never occurred to him, nor for that matter has it reached their casual recruiting agent at the library.

 

But all of that doesn't matter. As always happens when someone wants to apply peer pressure, he spoke to my back. In my book, that's not courageous, admirable, or worth my attention. You stupid, stupid man.

 

Oh the pain... The pain...

 

Birds To The Rescue!

The local newspaper tells me that eagle eyed shoppers have noticed birds of prey patrolling the library. I noticed them too this morning. A pair of handlers strolled around the building with a pair of very large Harris Hawks impatiently waiting for another chance to decimate the local pidgeon population.

 

It seems pidgeons are a big problem. Their droppings filled five large sacks during the clean up operation lately, and I understand they spread more diseaes than rats. Given the government are now tackling badgers for the same reasons, I wonder what birds they'll be using? Huge south american condors probably. That'll be a sight.

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Nah, I think the condors are endangered. Besides, they are some ugly buzzards...they don't exactly give an air of beauty or sophistication. No, what you need are some falcons...majestic birds, they. I love watching them cruise the skies around here, in search of a yummy morsel that dares to pop its little head out of its burrow.

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Migratory? Hey, now there's an idea. We could export our unwanted badgers to a country we don't like. The birds have no nationality and can't be traced. What a fantastic foreign policy idea! Doc, you've made my career as a politician.

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The Harris Hawks have almost no chance catching a pigeon, because pigeons are among the best flying birds while the Harris are more like a sort of ground attack bird, good for hunting squirrels and rabbits but I bet they would love to deal with badgers as well. Raptors can kill animals much bigger then themselves like these eagles prove:

 

WARNING - QUITE BRUTAL IMAGES

 

 

This video can give us an idea why Romans (and many others after them) have chosen the eagle as their symbol.

 

The purpose of the hawks is to chase away the pigeons from the library not to catch them. Indeed only peregrine falcons and a few other long wings can hope to catch a flying pigeon.

I have an interest in falconry but unfortunately in my country it is treated as a serious crime, the same thing about hunting with bows. The UK has one of the most permissive laws regarding falconry with captive bred birds so it has become an important exporter of selective bred raptors like the gorgeous gyrfalcons.The US requires that a falconer spends 2 years as an apprentice of an existing falconer and to catch your own wild raptor, a crime in most other countries. In the UK the most popular bird is the Harris hawk, originally from the american SW, the only social raptor while in the US the Redtail Hawk is the most common bird.

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