Lures

Today I started working Isabeau on the lure. I get asked a lot "How do you get them to come back?" Well, the lure is one of our tools for this. With a red tail, pretty much anything will do, including an old shoe. I made mine out of leather with a long cord attached to swing it.

My lure.

The lure is a guaranteed meal and plays to their lazy, opportunistic nature. It is their favorite thing in the entire world. If the bird is in a dangerous situation, the lure is a go-to virtual guarantee of bringing the bird in.
Today, I made our lures and put her entire daily ration of food on it. I kept the introduction simple and  just tossed it on the ground below her perch while blowing hard on the whistle. She had a moment of confusion when she didn't see the glove raised until she noticed the meat. She figured it out quickly after that. The best thing about it was that she didn't mantle--spreading the wings to guard the meal--showing that she's comfortable with me being near her food. I let her take her time eating and reached in with the glove to touch her and touch the lure to show that I wouldn't take it from her, which will be helpful if she's got a squirrel trying to bite her toes off (it can happen!) and I need to help with the dispatch. When she was finished, I let her play with it until she got bored before covering it with my skirt while she got back up on the perch. Tomorrow I'll have her come to it from a greater distance and we'll keep this up until she's willing to stop whatever she's doing to get it.

Venturing Out

Since she had flown across my kitchen to me the day before, yesterday we went outside into the backyard on the creance--a long, slim line that attaches to the jesses on one end and to a weighted point on the other that acts like a long leash does for a dog or a longe line for a horse--for the first time.  We've been doing walks around the neighborhood for the past few days to get her accustomed to being outside in her gear and staying with me, so I was hopeful that the transition would go smoothly. 

Isabeau on the creance.

I started close in like I had done in the house to give her the idea that it was the same thing.  She didn't hesitate, so I doubled the distance and tried again.  She did wonderfully until I got even with the house.  She flew toward me and then at the last moment soared up above my head and landed on the roof!  As much as I didn't want to reward her behavior, I had to get her down, so I called her to the glove with a tidbit and went back to try again.  The second time, she came to me at the same distance without a problem, so I increased the distance again and the same thing happened.  I stayed in one spot until she came straight to me and then would move back again.  The last time, rather than landing on the roof on the first attempt, she flew past me to land on the gate.  Since I was able to reach her, I simply picked her up and carried her back to her perch without giving her the tidbit and made her try again.  It was like the proverbial light clicked on and she came to me.  It was amazing! Watching this wild animal willingly fly toward me and land on my glove with no fear is beyond explanation.  
Today, we went to the ball field near my house to fly.  She went double the length of the creance and didn't skip a beat. It was awesome! We'll do this again to get it set into her head and then we'll start working on the lure, which I'll go into next time. 

Walking back to the perch after a 300' flight.

Small Steps and Giant Leaps

Once Isabeau had overcome her fears and eaten on the glove, the real training began. Now that she had figured out that I wasn't going to eat her, she had another fear to overcome. It's one thing for her to tolerate sitting with me. It's another thing entirely to have her come toward the big scary predator. Thus, I needed to teach her to come to the glove.
I placed her on the bow perch and presented her with a good sized chunk of meat. She stretched and stretched her head out trying to reach it. When that didn't work, she reached out with her foot. Eventually, after bobbing and weaving and making adorable chirping noises, she gathered herself and hopped! I gave her the meat and placed her back on the perch to try again. Unfortunately, the dog chose that moment to walk out of the room and she wouldn't try again. I put the remainder of her food aside to wait for the next day.
The next day, after she cast the pellet of undigested fur and bone they bring up like a cat with a fur ball, I tried again. I misjudged the distance, though, and she grabbed the first piece with her foot. The second time, though, she jumped and it was like a light bulb went on. She got it. Today, I cut her food into smaller pieces and had her fly the length of her leash to me (a few feet). She did it about seven times with little to no hesitation. It was amazing. She had to put forth effort and come toward me in order to get her meal and she did it repeatedly. It was a big milestone for us. 

Flying to the fist.

After that, we took her outside for a walk to let her get used to being out in the open while tethered. She did really well and only bated a handful of times. My fiancé still hadn't gotten his bird, so after we had all cooled down from the walk, we went out trapping. We have driven 1400 miles in six days trying to find one for him and had had no luck. We were on the verge of giving up on our area and waiting for more to migrate in, but wanted to try one more time, so we went out. We saw a red tail high up on a post and couldn't see its tail so decided to try. We threw the trap and after about 30 minutes, it came down. We were really excited until we saw the bright red tail of an adult. We approached to release it and it pulled loose and flew away. We moved on. The light was beginning to fade from the sky when we saw one on a pole. It was clearly a juvenile male, which was what he had been hoping for so we threw the trap. Within minutes, he flew down to it. We started to approach, but he wasn't caught and he flew up to a low power line. We knew we didn't have time to find another, so we decided to wait and see if he'd try again. He did, but again didn't get snagged and flew back to the line. He kept looking at it, so we waited. When he came down again, I was astonished. This time, he did get caught. We rushed over to get him off of the trap.

My fiancé and his bird.

We taped his feet for the ride home and put his gear on, then rushed to get him home. We weighed him and confirmed that he's a male and sprayed him with parakeet spray for parasites and checked him over to ensure that he's healthy. My fiancé is a huge fan of Breaking Bad, so he named him Heisenberg. They're now sitting together with Heisenberg hooded while he waits for him to rouse and show that he's comfortable. In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out how to acclimate Isabeau to him without undue stress as they will need to be able to be calm around each other so we don't have to keep them constantly hooded. 

I'm Not Going To Eat You

Day One

I brought Isabeau home at 7:30 the evening of September 1. She had removed her hood while in the traveling box, so taking her out without either of us getting injured took some creativity. She had thrown herself to the back of the box where she sat glaring at me with murder in her glowing golden eyes. My fiancé wrapped her up in a towel and we were able to remove her without damaging her wings or feathers and put a better-fitting hood on her head to calm her down.
Hawks are extremely visual creatures. The vast majority of their sensory input comes from the eyes. When you remove that visual stimulus, they calm down and are able to relax their vigilance. We use the hood to do this. Hoods are custom fitted to each bird for maximum comfort. Many birds love their hood and some will even put their head into it themselves when it's presented to them. Isabeau doesn't seek hers out yet, but she doesn't make any attempt to avoid it, either.
When I got her hooded and sitting on the glove, I took some time to absorb the fact that I had a wild red tail hawk sitting on my hand in my living room. A couple of my falconer friends had brought over their hawks before and that had been amazing, but having my own hawk here was astounding. In a way, it was both an end and a beginning. My long journey to this point was over, but the journey of training and hunting with my own bird had only begun.
The first step was to begin what we call manning. When a hawk is taken from the wild and put into a domestic setting, they have no idea what is really a threat to them and what isn't so everything is scary to them. They have to learn that they are safe and that they can trust us--that we aren't going to eat them! There are as many ways to do this as there are falconers, but my sponsor wanted me to use an immersion type technique with her and expose her to everyday life from day one. So while I took my time to settle myself down and answer phone calls and texts from fellow falconers and eat dinner, I left the hood on her and turned on the television and allowed the dogs into the room (they've been exposed to hawks for quite some time now and know to leave them alone) and let the normal noises of the house go on while she was hooded so that she could begin to get accustomed to them. Shortly after dinner, she roused. Rousing is when the bird fluffs out its feathers and shakes and then slicks down again and is a sign of a content bird. When I saw this, I knew she was ready.
I turned the lights off and removed her hood. I had expected explosive rage. Instead, she spread her wings and lifted one foot and then put her foot down and brought her wings in and simply looked around. She remained calm throughout the evening. Though she did lose her balance and fall off a few times, I was able to use her jesses to keep her from falling and would lift her back up onto the glove and help her regain her balance. 

Learning to stand on the glove is like  learning to walk a tightrope.

During the first evening, I kept the light dim and kept things quiet. She stayed on my glove until I was ready to go to bed. When she was sufficiently settled in, I began to lightly touch her wings and her back and worked my way to the back of her head and down her legs. When she accepted me touching her everywhere else, I finally (carefully!) started on her feet. She allowed me to touch her feet and talons and pick them up without protest. As a reward, I put her hood back on and placed her in the travel box for some well-earned rest.

Day Two

In the morning, I removed her from the box and weighed her to get an idea of how much energy she was burning and then attempted to feed her. The first meal for a freshly-trapped hawk is a big deal. They have a ridge of bone over their eyes that prevents them from being able to see in front of them when they lower their head to eat which makes them vulnerable when they do so. Therefore, they generally will not eat until they're convinced that you won't eat them when they do. Lowering the head is a sign of trust. It was also one that she wasn't prepared to give just yet. 

I spent the day with her unhooded on the glove allowing her to get accustomed to her surroundings and letting her continue learning how to stand on it and how to get back up when she fell. She still was having some trouble with that so I spent a lot of time with her falling, hanging upside down looking helpless, and gently lifting her back up. A falconer friend of ours came over and he showed me how to give a little swing of her jesses to get her to fly back up herself and the process went much quicker after that. Eventually she began to learn how to begin flapping as soon as she started to fall and either prevent herself from falling or fly back up to the glove. During that time, I made my first two apprentice errors. The first was putting my bare arm too close to her feet which could lead to talons being embedded in my skin. The second was holding her jesses too tightly which was making it harder to balance. I had to learn how to judge how much slack to give her while preventing her from being able to grab out with her feet. 

Learning to stand on the bow perch.

During that day, I taught her to step from my glove to my fiancé's and back and from the glove to the perch and back. She got used to the dogs pretty quickly as well. That evening, she roused on the glove without her hood on and tucked a foot up into her feathers, showing that she was comfortable.

Day Three

I weighed her again in the morning and tried again to get her to eat. She still showed no interest in it, so after a little while, I replaced her hood and put her back in the travel box. My fiancé and I spent the morning trying to trap a hawk for him without success. However, we did get to see a bald eagle. It was up on a transmission line and we were able to get right under it only about 30 feet away. It was an amazing experience! 

Bald eagle. Look but don't touch!

When we got back home, I took Isabeau back out and when the hood came off, she gave me a look that I recognized from my friends' birds that seems to say, "Feed me, Seymour!" I took a tidbit of rat in a pair of tongs and, when she didn't react, I rubbed it against the side of her beak. She caught the piece and I held onto it. She let go and I could see in her eyes that the lightbulb had gone on, so I placed it on the glove. No sooner had I removed the tongs than she dropped her head and gulped it down! She ate! I fed her the rest of the meal and when she settled, I put the hood back on and used a toothbrush and spray bottle to clean her feet and cleaned the tips of her tail and wing feathers with water. The remainder of the day was spent with her learning to stand on the bow perch (translation:jumping off of the bow perch and running around on the floor like a chicken). 

We'll see what tomorrow holds!

Finding Isabeau

September 1st is the first day of trapping season in Alabama. Apprentices are required to trap their own birds. I had decided to trap a female red tail because that is what I was most familiar with and had wanted since I was a little girl. My fiancé decided that he wanted a male because he preferred their flying style. Males are fighter jets. Females are flying tanks. In order to increase our chances of trapping what we were looking for we split up and each went with another experienced falconer. 

6:30am, no sleep the night before, ready to go.

My group set out at 6:30 in the morning. We had already spent some time scouting the area looking for suitable birds (we're only allowed to trap birds that are under a year old and don't yet have their red tail, called passage birds). We saw many adults, called haggards, along with a slew of kestrels (which are allowed in some states but not here because they are very difficult to keep healthy due to their small size), vultures, Cooper's hawks, a broad wing, and an osprey, but very few passage red tails. The first time that I threw the trap out, I did it too hard and it landed upside down. After that, we scared several off. By 3, my fiancé came to join us as his trapping partner had had to go home and they hadn't had any more luck than we did. 

Over ten hours and hundreds of miles later, starting to lose hope.

Around 5:30 that evening, I had all but lost hope that we would trap anything that day and began to resign myself to going home empty-handed. Then our trapping partner saw a female red tail high on a pole. We saw from her tail that she was a passage bird and so I threw the trap. It landed upside down again and I was sure that was the end of it. However, to our surprise, she stayed on the pole. My partner got out and flipped the trap right side up and, amazingly, she still stayed. We drove far enough away that she couldn't see us and, after getting my fiancé to back up to where we were, she came swooping down on it! 

Straight off of the trap and thinking she's dinner.

We hurried to take her off of the trap and get her secured. It was incredibly exciting to see! When trapped, they go into a state of shock where they throw their wings out wide and basically freeze in place. It makes them fairly easy to handle, but it also means that the hardest part of our job is to convince them that we aren't about to eat them! That, however, is another post entirely. She had almost perfect feathers, razor sharp talons and beak, and had food in her crop. Her weight, however, was much lower than we expected and she was much thinner than she should have been. She was hunting and successful enough to stay alive but most likely not enough that she would have survived the winter when she would have been burning more energy to stay warm. 
We took her to my trapping partner's house to spray her down for parasites, look her over more thoroughly, check for signs of illness, and get her settled on the glove. It only took three tries before she learned how to stand up on the fist. When we were satisfied that she was healthy and good to go, I loaded her up in the traveling box (called a giant hood) and took her home.

Standing on the glove for the first time.

Unfortunately, we never did get a male to come down for my fiancé. We're not giving up, though! He's been wonderfully supportive and I can't wait until he gets to experience this for himself.

Beginnings

I had a lot of people ask me how I got into falconry. It's been a long journey, that's for sure. 
When I was five or six, my mother showed me the movie Ladyhawke. The main characters are cursed and the man is a wolf by night while the woman is a hawk by day. Her name was Isabeau. It was my favorite movie as a child and I swore that I would one day have a red tail hawk named Isabeau. 
When I was fifteen, my father dated a woman who was friends with a falconer. She took me to his house and he showed me his mews (the house for a hawk) and his birds. I was entranced! I began to do research but my parents weren't really enthused, so I had to wait. As I grew up and real life began to happen, I maintained my interest in it, but the time was never right and I finally accepted that it wasn't meant to be and moved on to other hobbies. 

Natty, adult female red tail hawk.

Then, in the late spring/early summer of 2013, I met a woman who was a falconer and she allowed me to meet her bird, Natty, and invited me hunting once the season started. I spent the entire summer sitting on her porch talking about falconry, learning about falconry, and dreaming about falconry. I was obsessed. She introduced me to the other falconers in the area and I realized that I was finally in a place where I had the means, the space, and the time to pursue my lifelong dream. Thus began the long search for a sponsor.
My friend didn't yet have the four years' experience required in order to sponsor an apprentice and so I had to find someone who was available. It took over a year. In the meantime, I spent the fall and winter traipsing through the woods with falconers and their birds, learning everything that I could, and studying for the exam. Once the season was over, my fiancé (who is also an apprentice now) and I set about preparing for our permits. We built a mews, made most of our equipment, and bought what we couldn't make. 
When the time came to take our test, we thought we were prepared. By page two, I was almost in tears! We went home convinced that we failed. Three long days later, we got the news that not only did we pass, we did it with flying colors! Our inspection came the next week and a few days later our permits arrived in the mail. Finally, my dream of 25 years was coming true!

The Basics

What is falconry?
Falconry is defined as the sport of taking game with trained raptors and the keeping and training of such birds. Commonly referred to as the sport of kings (along with horse racing), the art of falconry has been around for around 4,000 years and has changed very little since that time.
Falconry birds are not pets. They are wild animals that have been accustomed to humans and trained to hunt in tandem with us. They are illegal to own without the proper permits and can be dangerous if trained incorrectly.

How do you do it?
In a nutshell:  operant conditioning, positive reinforcement, and weight management. Raptors tend to be lazy and opportunistic hunters. They hunt when they are hungry. We use that tendency in their training and in hunting them. We reward desired behavior with food. We never, ever punish the bird. Weight management is done through regular weighing of the bird and measured amounts of food. There has to be a balance. A bird that is too heavy won't have the motivation to hunt. A bird that is too hungry won't have the energy. There is a sweet spot wherein the bird is just hungry enough to seek out food but not underweight. We never starve our birds. 

How do you become a falconer?
In order to become a falconer, one must find a sponsor, pass a written exam, have facilities to house them and equipment for them, and pass an inspection to get the required permit. All falconers begin as apprentices and remain in that status for at least two years. During that time, you are restricted to one bird at a time and can only possess specific types of raptors. In Alabama, we are allowed red tailed hawks or red shouldered hawks. Other states vary. If you're interested in becoming a falconer, contact the club in your state, the Department of Conservation for your state, or a licensed falconer if you know one. Do research and learn on your own. The Modern Apprentice is an excellent resource to get started. 
When you talk to a falconer, don't immediately ask them to sponsor you. They may not be able to or may want to ensure that you are serious and know what you're getting into before considering it. Instead, ask to go hunting with them and, if they agree, go! Don't wait for them to call you. Show initiative. Call and ask if they're hunting today or this weekend or whenever and if they would mind you tagging along. Don't get offended if they say no. Some falconers prefer to hunt alone. Some birds can only be hunted alone. Instead, ask if they know anyone who would be willing to let you go with them. In addition, don't get any preconceived ideas of how long it will take to get a sponsor. There are more would-be apprentices than there are available sponsors in many areas and it may be a year or two before someone is available and most will want you to hunt with them for a season before they will sponsor you. Even then, this person will be making a two-year commitment to you and they are under no obligation to do so. Don't just accept the first person who offers. Get opinions from others on the quality of the falconer and his or her skill, evaluate their birds, ensure that their teaching style is one that you can learn from, and it helps if you like each other as individuals as you'll be spending a lot of time together. 
It took me a year and a half of active involvement before I was able to get my permit. During that time, I hunted with everyone I could, learned about the birds, read tons of books and websites, attended events with my state club, prepared, and waited. It was difficult to be patient sometimes and I remember spending opening day of last trapping season watching others trap birds and wondering if my turn would ever come. Be patient!

Why do you do it?
For love of the animal! Falconry is conservation and the ultimate in communing with nature. Up to 80% of red tail hawks do not survive their first year. The reasons include predation, disease, collisions, electrocution, and starvation. As falconers, we can prevent most of these things. We provide the bird with safe shelter and protection from other predators while on the ground with their prey, we protect them from exposure to disease and get them veterinary treatment when they are ill, we fly them in areas where the risk of collision with vehicles and aircraft are minimized and out of areas where they could be electrocuted. We also help in teaching them to hunt successfully so that when they are released back into the wild, they are able to provide for themselves efficiently. 
When we hunt with a raptor, we assist them in finding game but don't give them an unfair advantage over the prey. We also ensure that the prey once caught is dispatched cleanly and as painlessly as possible rather than having to struggle against the bird. We are part of the hunt, but we are simply helping them do what they do in the wild.
The feeling when a bird flies free and chooses to return to the falconer is one of the most amazing experiences!