All of My Feather Books Are

After eating some soup and a sandwich, they went out onto the back porch. Jimmy and Mary grabbed the basket, the field glasses, some cloth gloves, and a small blanket. Placing everything in the basket they hurried out the screen door and headed for the creek. Capturing baby hawks would be another one of those great learning experiences they'd been talking about, and it should be a lot of fun, too.

When they reached the base of the large cottonwood tree, they stopped. Setting the basket on the ground, Jimmy started up the ladder steps he'd nailed to the tree. Mary followed as they climbed up to the limb where they could look down on the nest. Sure enough, the three white babies were now brown. Their fuzzy down had disappeared, and new feathers had begun taking the down's place. The time had come for them to be taken from their nest before they got too wild.

Back down the tree they climbed. They left the basket at the base of the tree and ran back to the house. A few seconds later they emerged from the garage with a wooden ladder and headed towards the creek. Getting across the creek with the ladder slowed them down a little, as they had to find rocks to step on so they wouldn't get their feet wet. Then up the other bank they went and over to their climbing tree. Jimmy picked up the basket and carried it and the ladder over to the dead tree.

They now had everything they needed to get the chicks. The only problem would be the papa hawk. Setting everything down next to the trunk of the dead tree, they scanned the skies looking for papa hawk. Then Jimmy saw a slight movement off to his right.

"There he is" he said, pointing to his right. "We'll have to wait until he makes a dives for something. Then, when he is busy, we will have to get the ladder up quickly. I'll go first and you bring the basket. When I get to the top, give me the cloth gloves so the chicks won't be able to peck me when I pick them up. I'll hand the chicks to you, and you put them in the basket. I don't think we should take all three of them. Just two. One for you and one for me. That way we'll both have our own hawk to train."

"Okay," she replied getting excited, as they stood there waiting for the papa hawk to dive.

It was a long wait, but finally he dove and went out of sight behind one of the nearby hills. Hurriedly they placed the ladder up against the dead tree and climbed it as fast as they could. The ladder wobbled back and forth with the two of them on it. With a lot of gasping and holding tight, Jimmy reached the first limb and climbed onto it. Mary stopped at the top of the ladder. It stopped wobbling when Jimmy got off. She opened the basket and handed him the gloves. Sticking them in his back pants pocket, he climbed on up to the top of the tree where the nest was located. Carefully peeking over the top, he could see that everything was okay. Pulling the gloves out of his pocket, he put them on.

Reaching into the nest, he picked up the largest baby hawk. He then climbed down the tree to where Mary was waiting. She quickly opened the lid so he could place the baby hawk inside. Releasing it, he quickly pulled his hand out and she closed the lid.

This wasn't hard at all, Jimmy thought, as he climbed back up to the top. Grabbing the next largest baby hawk, he headed back down the tree to where Mary was waiting for him.

Mary opened the lid just enough for him stick the baby inside, then closed it again. As he removed his hand from the basket he heard Mary gasp. "Here comes the papa hawk," she cried, pointing. She latched the lid on the basket and started down the ladder.

Jimmy swung around the tree just in time as the hawk went sailing by with its talons spread. It made an ear-piercing shrieking sound as it flew by, then swooped upward flapping its wings to gain altitude.

When Mary reached the ground, she quickly ran over to their climbing tree and stood under it watching the hawk gain altitude.

Jimmy swung back around the tree and scrambled down the ladder. Upon reaching the bottom, he looked up and saw the hawk diving at him again. Pulling the ladder away from the tree, he stepped behind it and ducked down as the hawk came straight at him.

The hawk’s claws struck one of the rungs of the ladder above his head, and splinters flew. The hawk was stunned from the impact and fell to the ground a short distance away from the tree. Standing up, Jimmy stepped out from behind the ladder. He felt badly about the hawk hurting itself, but as he watched, it started hopping along the ground flapping its wings until it was airborne again. Grabbing the ladder in the middle, he carried it over to where Mary was standing.

They stood next to the tall cottonwood tree and watched as the papa hawk landed on top of the dead tree. They could hear him making all kinds of noises up there. He knew that two of his chicks were gone, and it was time for them to get out of there. Jimmy took the basket from Mary. Picking up the ends of the ladder, they walked as fast as they could back to the creek. There were a lot of quick glances over their shoulders before they reached the creek.

The hawk wasn't following them, which was a relief. "I sure hope he's glad we left him one of his babies," Jimmy said, as they made their way across the creek.

"It sure was a good idea not to take all three of them," Mary replied, breathing hard.

When they reached the house, Jimmy sat the basket down beside the hawk pen. They quickly carried the ladder around the house and put it back in the garage. When they returned, they were excited about what they had done. "That was kind of close," Jimmy said as they walked up to the basket. "Let's take the basket in and show our prize catch to Grandma. I'm sure she'll want to see them."