New falconry laws

[rt]

I just dont see alot of apprentices going out there and spending alot of money on a bird when you can go out and catch one for free that way if you dont like it you dont lose anything. Frootdog I dont agree with the 5 year sponser thing either since most of our sponsers are generals thats why we need to vote on the things that will have bad effects on our sport. The harrris for apprentices seems to bother falconers the most but again I HAVE TO STRESS its up to your sponser what you fly. All sponsers have to do is say (hey Ill sponser you but you are going to fly what I say) problem solved. I cant see the market flooded with bad harris hawks if your sponser walks you thru them and helps they arent that hard from what Ive seen, we arent talking about accipiters or falcons here. Iam curious as to what the fail rate of falconers is? I dont hear from MANY people saying I tried my first year and failed so I quit falconery. I think its safe to say most falconers keep trying till they succeed in this sport. Ok worse case a apprentice goes out and buys a harris and f@#*! it up bad, the soulution transfer, or breeding project I dont see alot of free harris hawks out there some one will give them a home. We have to look at it on the big scale and ask ourselves theses questions. How many people will fly a harris as their first bird? How many people will sponser someone planning on flying a harris as their first bird? How many people will fail at flying a harris? How will the market be effected by failures? How will this effect the falconry community? I may be dead wrong on this whole matter but when I weigh in all these questions I find that it most likely wont add up to nothing that will effect our community major. There is just to many what ifs to determine what will happen I just feel the falconry community can handle the problems we dont need to be babysitted.

[Yarak]

Most of the falconers I know that make good sponsors do not tell their apprentices what to fly. Harris make great falconry birds due to their social nature. Not much there to prepare you for another species. Harris are unique. Not everyone can go out and trap one for free, you can only do that if you live where their are passagers. Or plan to make a road trip and those can get expensive also. A twelve year old with a Harris...I do not think so! Transfering or breeding projects? What a crappy solution! Dont screw it up to begin with should be the mantra. The reason you don't hear much about failed falconers is because they remove themselves. I know of too many. The laws protect the birds. I do not feel the Govt. is babysitting me.
Yarak

[Weasel]

RT, You have the problem in your statement...."It's up to the sponsor". There are alot of falconers out there that will not care unfortunatly. What happens to those birds? Are they expendable? The populations of wild Harris's are dropping so the majority of apprentices will be limited to CB as I cannot picture Texas allowing that many folks into Texas to trap the birds(plus it is several hundred dollars just for the trapping permit)....So, what happens to these CB birds when some wanabee in Montana decides after bastardizing this Harris for a year, that he doesn't like it anymore? Does he euthenize it? I cannot picure many falconers that want to spend their time re training a misguided Harris.
Even if the apprentice has the money to come down to a state to trap a harris from say New York state, do you think he will drive all the way back down here to release it?.....Heck, I had a hard time driving half an hour south of the metro to release my RT never mind a three day trip to do it. This is the beauty of the RT as it can be released anywhere in the US and be successful. Same with a Kestrel as long as the time of year is right. Red shoulder I won't mention as they are not a popular bird to fly under any circumstance.
Considering the popularity of a Harris's hawk these days, I can see quite alot of falconers allowing their apprentices to fly them as they are truly great birds......but, so are RT's!......and RT's can be trapped anywhere, be trained by the most misguided apprentice and recover from mistakes that would ruin another species. Red tails rock! They are the B-52 bombers of the avian world. They can take a beating and still make it back to base to fly another day....I have seem them do it on MANY occations. They resist sickness, injury and feather damage better that and other birds and this is exactly what the apprentice needs in my opinion. I am certainly against Harris's for the apprentice.

Now, as for the 12 year olds into the sport......I think this law was proposed for the many falconers out there that want to teach there children to fly a bird. I would NEVER take on a young apprentice unless he met numerous basic requirements besides the normal issues. He must live VERY close to me so I have easy access. He must have a reliable method of getting to a hunting area no less than 3+ days a week at the minimum. His parents must be on board with the program and understand the commitment he has undertaken......Even if he/she met all of these, I would still more than likely say no. First of all I would have to sponsor a twelve year old for 6 years until he was off my permit!
I think their should be a stipulation regarding this aged apprentice. They should be allowed only if the parents of the apprentice are falconers and are wanting to apprentice their child. Even fourteen years of age is too young in my book, so twelve is way out. I do, however, understand that there are some individuals out there that can cope with this sort of commitment at that age.....this is an exception, not the rule......
I am quite happy with the way things are with regard to the birds we fly as apprentices and I hope to see them stay this way. The age set know is fine in my book as well. There are more pressing issues at hand in the newly proposed regs that to sit here and bicker about what bird and what age. Issues with the removal of the fed permits, the many changes to the propogation permits, the experience of a falconer before he can take on an apprentice etc... are of much more interest to me and I anxiously await the outcome.
I am a NAFA member and will, no matter the outcome, stand behind their vote on these matters so hopefully soon we will hear what the consensus will be.
Cheers,
Weasel

[rt]

I think you got the wrong idea I dont mean its cheap and easy to go out ant trap a harris I apologize if you got that impression. I meant it is easy to go out and trap a rt so that is what most apprentices will do anyway. I wouldnt even think of trapping a harris I feel the cb birds are better anyway. I dont wont everyone to think Iam knocking off rt or anything I love them they are truely the ultimate hunting partner too me but outher people feel the same way towards harris hawks. Some people fly kbirds as their first its simply a matter of choice shouldnt we have it? I bet a dollar to a donut that most apprentices wont even fly one to start with most people like to feel the water before they jump in. I personally just dont see the big deal.

[Ooby]

99 times out of 100 passage birds are better then captive bred birds.

[rt]

In all birds or in just harris hawks ooby?

[Falcon (I)]

Wow I wish I had the chance to partake in such a discussion. The reg proposed are pretty drastic and I think I am inclined to agree with what Weasel has written. An apprentaship should be aimed at equiping the apprentice with the tools and knowledge necessary to be able to fly different types of bird after he/she becomes a general falconer. Like Yarak said Harris hawks are unlike other raptors so after training and manning one the knowledge gained might only be true for Harris Hawks and nothing else. I think that might be another wisdom in having an RT (Hawk) and Kestrel (Falcon) as apprentaship birds it enables the apprentice to learn tecniques that will help him train other birds of the same species later down the track.

Just my thoughts on the matter, none the less they are substantial reg proposels and if I lived in the US I would surely take the time to vote and voice my opinions on the matter.

[Ooby]

rt said:

In all birds or in just harris hawks ooby?

In all birds.

[Jay]

Not nessicarly true. If trained corectly a CB can take a larger variety of game than its wild counterpart. Let me explain... In the wild young birds will take a shot at just about anything once, if they get beaten up or dont catch after multipe tries they wont bother looking at this game anymore. Such as many wild birds wont even look at geese, why cuz they probly got beaten on as a young bird. But if a falconer takes a CB and gets it fitter than when a wild bird makes its first kill it can be sucessful at more kinds of game. So where as a wild bird may be to weak at its first introduction to geese a falconer could get a CB into the shape required to do this, its first time out. If 99% of passage birds were better why would we bother taking nestlings. A CB is just the same as one that another faloner takes from the wild at a young age. But when imprinting comes into play it gets harder. If done corectly and you like imprint birds it is a god send. If you mess up you will be left pulling your hair out. Note im not saying fly your birds on geese im just using them as an example.

This is part of the problem with apprentices with CB, even though they are not allowed to be imprinted for apprentices one could easly mess this up. Even if not fully imprinted imagine all the screamers. If you want to know what will happen if HH are allowd just look at any British falonry site that sells used birds. It is loaded with first year HH, people say the birds are fine but it makes you wonder when there are that many HH up for sale. And no one wants a used HH that some fool messed up.

[Ooby]

Then why are people pushing so hard to get a wild take on peregrins? Why do all the old timers have fond memories of the beach birds they used to trap that were almost tame once trained? Why do people drive through multiple states just so they can trap passage harris'?

The reason is, passage birds are already hunting. They have gone through natures school of hard knocks that humans can't even begin to duplicate.

Think about it this way. Captive bred birds, the only things they know are what falconers teach them. Passage birds know stuff that falconers CAN'T teach, and we probably don't even know about. Passage birds have that hidden knowlege that we can't teach, and thats what makes them stand out.

[Weasel]

While this is getting off topic a bit, I will add my two cents in. I will sit somewhere inbetween both parties and say that they both have their ups and downs. As Ooby stated, wild birds have gone throught the learning stages of hunting and survival and therfore have gained valuable techniqes into quarry catching. But, on the bad side, they can and do pick up bad habits that are non conductive to falconry along the way. These can be things such as not wanting a certain quarry or only taking quarry under previously learned techniqes. A captive bred bird can be taught to go after many more prey species as we more than often give them the upper hand. With this, it causes the CB birds to beleive they can take just about anything. I know a well respected and very competant falconer who traped a tiercel harris and it turned out to be less than desireable for this sport. He turned it loose and was given a CB female. She has one heck of a head count this season and is well behaved. Now, before anything is said, I fully understand that every bird is different and this could be why this occured. Basicly it can go either way with a CB or wild bird, but with no practical experience in the matter, all I can do is speculate from what information I have gathered over the past two years.
Cheers,
The Weasel

[rt]

Soo ooby your telling me a passage accipiter is better then an imprint?

[Ooby]

As was stated there are some variables, but basically yes.

If they weren't, why would people go through the hardships they do in order to trap passage birds? I know the CHC and im assuming all other state clubs and NAFA are lobbying hard to get a passage peregrin take.

I can't count how many times ive been told of the old school falconers making the yearly trip to South Padre Island in order to trap the migrating peregrins that (according to them) were almost tame, would ring up to 1500 feet, and hunted with a ferocity never seen before in a captive bred bird.

I am only going off of what ive been told, but the sources that told me have been in falconry for longer than ive been alive, and know what they are talking about.

[Austin]

I think the art of falconry should stick to the basic traditions of ancient times, catch your bird, man it and hunt it. Use the basic technics of falconry and quite trying to make it easy and turn it into a science based on all the novels and exsperiences of others. Come on it's an ejoyable sport and a working bond between nature and man dating back to when man depended on birds of prey to survive. All these ideas generated by the Federal Wildlife law makers came from other falconers input, face it I have seen 12 year olds that are much more responsible then some thirty year old people who won't even take care of their poor dog tied in the back yard.

[Yarak]

It is not a question of "better than or worse than". Just differences in our preferences. Imprints are less likely to fly away. They have NO fear...that can be a good thing or a bad thing. Once grown they require less manning. Some skills however they will never master.
Passagers are more wild, they have fear and tend to require more constant attention. They have the potential of being PEERLESS hunters. This is the value of a wild education. Now much of this education can take place by hacking out the young raptor. Few do this today.
The parents contribution will never be fully understood in the development of the offspring. For most people's busy schedules imprints are reliable and require less constant reinforcement. They are the way to go for many. Time and expense makes trapping sometimes too difficult. So it is more economical for others as well.
I really feel strongly about our falconry traditions. I will not buy a bird. I will not fly an imprint. Not that I can forsee anyway. This is where our individuality comes in.
To each their own. So in the end its not about better or worse its about the right choice for you.
Yarak