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officers "at" texashawking.org
(please use the @ sign where you see "at")
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Roger Crandall, Officer, Apprentice Coordinator/ Outreach Coordinator (Con't)
apprentcoord "at" texashawking.org

A female redtail hawk introduced me to hawking black-tailed jacks. Early in 1980, I served four months on an Air Force BASH Team in the Nevada dessert, working with passage Prairie falcons to control horned larks on a remote runway. Later that year, I was transferred to Eielson AFB near Fairbanks, Alaska. There, I trapped my first passage goshawk, caught snowshoe hare with one of the first legal redtail hawks in Alaska. I had an amazing summer and fall hacking, and then later hunted a cast of imprint female Merlins.

Returning to Colorado in 1984, I flew a captive-bred female Harris’ hawk at jacks for a few years before embarking on a longwing tour that was to last 15 years and included Peregrines, prairies, and a hybrid to two. My main quarry was ducks, although we did get slips on pheasant and sometimes grouse. At the same time my ex-wife flew imprint goshawks, concentrating on pheasant hawking. My favorite flights with a goshawk were at waterfowl. She kept one female for three seasons that averaged 30 to 40 ducks a winter.

In the mid 90s my interests turned to tiercel Harris’ hawks, and that fascination has continued to the present. I fly three captive-bred tiercel Harris' hawks with an emphasis on bird control.

I currently serve THA as Outreach Coordinator, Apprentice Coordinator and Coordinator of THA’s annual Sky Trials.