10 Glade 4622,
After a few days of meeting with the other farmers and doing walk throughs of their properties as well, it was time to move on. Swift and Sam had spent a lot of time in fields. The pair established their territory so to speak as they both patrolled the fields. Swift flying high above and looking to the ground for prey, Sam watching her and looking out for hazards as he occasionally signaled her to return or to take off.
Swift was a master hunter; she also took great pride in her catches. She always waited for Sam to show up, as her way of showing off what she did. He would call her up to his glove and secure her before bending down to scoop the catch up with his free hand. They would keep, sell, or even give away everything she caught, although Sam would always keep enough meat to last a day or two.
These early days in the season were always busy, sure Sam kept Swift in top shape throughout the winter, but it was something about the warmer sun and longer days that really got her in a good mood. Together, work was fun, individually Sam could not imagine the possibility.
Today however, Sam had a goal in mind. He wanted to investigate the Sutherlands and Winsors rabbit issue that was probably brewing just outside their fields. With a cool morning breeze staving off the warm rays of the sun for the moment, it was a beautiful morning to look into things.
“Swift, look for foxes while you are up there.” He said, never sure if she ever fully understood him, but her calm expression and attention to him whenever on his glove gave him the impression that she was at least hearing him. He undid the leash and swivel from her jesses. “Swift, go!” He commanded, lifting his arm a bit and letting her take flight. He let go of her jesses as he felt her take flight. She was beautiful and massive with her 7ft wingspan as she took flight into the morning, blue sky.
Sam set to work inspecting the irrigation ditch again, it did look like there was some travel through here recently but it was hard to tell what travelled through. It didn’t look like any new burrows were being dug out and but old ones looked like some spring cleaning had taken place.
Once reaching the end he looked up to the meadow and light forest ahead that expanded out into the hills and then the forest at large. He could even see a rabbit now, poking out of a bush before darting back under cover. After having a few days to think on the issue, Sam had deduced that the promise of easy food was outweighing any potential risk and hazard to getting killed that the farmers, dogs, cats, native wildlife, and indeed Swift posed to the rabbits. There were simply too many of them during the peak of the problem that while the risk to the whole group of rabbits was high, individual risk was diluted and therefore much less.
To him it was a push and pull problem, food, easy water, and dug out shelters pulled the rabbits in, predators and other risks pushed them away. Somehow, Sam needed to increase the pushing power that he and the farmers had at their disposal. Enough push that new rabbits wouldn’t join the bunch here and resident rabbits would be better off going elsewhere.
Of the pull factors he could manage, shelter for the rabbits was the only one. There would always be water and food here. Sam knelt down at the burrows and examined it all again, normal dug out burrows in an uneven slope that has traditionally been overgrown with grasses and shrubs. So far this year there were already grasses coming in and the shrubs were already replacing some leaves.
Sam had an idea, not one he generally really liked but it would be a way of clearing and filling in the burrows. He crouched down amongst the burrows and placed his hand on the ground and concentrated. Casting entangle he could sense a vast network under him as he channeled ether into the roots around him. He commanded them to expand laterally. He could feel them spread, stretch, and grow around him, right under his hooves. His ear flicked as he heard the scared grunts of a few rabbits who were hunkering down, dart out and make a break for it across back to the forest and in the fields. He tried to shut out the distraction as he then willed the roots to rise. He could feel the roots tickle his hand and hooves as the rose. He then released the spell and ended it. He let out a deep sigh and looked around at the burrows. Where empty holes used to be, a thick plug of roots was now covering and braced by the ground they grew in. This was a temporary measure, one that the rabbits could easily beat he knew, but this might buy him time to get the biggest part of his plan together.
He flicked on ear towards the farm field a few rabbits scurried into. He heard Swift make a short call. When Sam looked over, he caught sight of a streak of brown and gold diving out of the sky and swooping down to the ground. Swift had her wings out to slow and balance her as she landed and speared into the unfortunate rabbit with her sharp talons. She would keep it pinned and peck at it as her dagger-like talons sunk in deep, puncturing organs, ripping flesh, and crushing fragile bones until the rabbit died.
The rathor chuckled and shook his head as he started over towards the scene. “It’s like you read my mind.” He put on his glove as he caught sight of the full scene. Bloodied talons and beak, Swift had what could only be described as a smug look on her face as she looked over at the elk-rathor approaching. She gave a proud, full call as she stood over the life-less rabbit. “What did you do? What did you get? What a good girl you are!” He praised her, pausing after each statement to which she inserted another call each time. He laughed and smiled, holding up his glove and tapping it, “Swift, glove.” He commanded and she flapped up to perch on it. Grabbing her jesses with the gloved hand he knelt down carefully and pulled out a knife to cut a section of lacerated meat from the rabbit. He put that piece into his gloves hand so Swift could eat and get her reward, while scooping the rest of the carcass up and putting it into his ‘dead things satchel’ “You are such a funny girl when you get all excited. And you really did a number on this one, no one is going to want this fur, you silly girl!” he commented with another laugh.
The rest of the rabbits in the field had disappeared with Swift’s display of predatory prowess. He walked over towards the meadow now at the end of the irrigation ditch, careful to keep Swift as steady as he could. She was pretty good about staying calm when he was on the move, occasionally extending her wings to rebalance herself. Dodging his head out of the way of the extended wings from time-to-time Sam surveyed the meadow and started looking around for signs. It was not super successful as he tried to not bend over much with Swift on the glove but he did find a couple tell tale signs of a fox or other canine in the area. He waited for the eagle to finish her bite.
When she had and Sam had found some shade, he set to work checking over Swift after her hunt. “Swift, wings.” He asked, spreading his free hand to extend all his fingers and signal her to spread her wings. She chirped and slowly spread her wings. He gently took his free hand and spread out the flight feathers on each wing, avoiding her beak when she would lean in to inspect him back! Her wings were in great condition but one of her tail feathers was damaged, probably from her fast landing. Not a big deal but he knew that her next molt was going to be a bit away. “I’ll imp your feather when we get home tonight, can’t have you flying around without the best possible feathers!” He told her before offering a second bite of food as a reward.
He stepped up to the edge of the meadow, finding a good tree with shade and a strong branch within reach. He held up Swift to it so the branch was directly behind her. “Swift, step back.” She would carefully step back with a slight glance at her feet. Once she fully and safely is perched on the branch, Sam lowers his arm and releases her jesses from his grasp. “Stay out of trouble, I’m going to do a little more looking around.” He told her as she set to work preening and cleaning herself.
