Falconry: Training a peregrine falcon to catch a pigeon #falconry — Transcript

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1. 0:03[Music]
2. 0:12thank you
3. 0:19[Music]
4. 0:33hello everybody Ben Woodruff here with
5. 0:35another Falconer video today's video I
6. 0:38thought it'd be kind of fun to go out in
7. 0:40the field and see the training process
8. 0:42of a peregrine falcon now a lot of my
9. 0:45videos are kind of very specific in
10. 0:48topic but this uh one of my dear friends
11. 0:50John Griggs is flying a peregrine falcon
12. 0:52that is a first year bird he got this
13. 0:55bird from the wild he's raised it from a
14. 0:57baby he's in the process of teaching it
15. 0:59to fly and hunt and to wait on now the
16. 1:01traditional waiting on flight of a
17. 1:03falcon is for the Falcon to be unhooded
18. 1:05the bird takes off circles up above and
19. 1:08then once it's high enough it Dives down
20. 1:10whatever you flush up you flush up a
21. 1:12pheasant or a duck or your dog's flush
22. 1:13up a sage Grouse and their Falcon Dives
23. 1:16down and catches it this is kind of a
24. 1:18difficult process even for a wild bird
25. 1:20that is not being utilized in falconry
26. 1:23for a falcon to learn how to fly and
27. 1:26Hunt they don't rely a lot on soaring
28. 1:27birds like for example red-tailed hawk
29. 1:31they have broad Wings they can soar they
30. 1:34can glide and they can they can just
31. 1:36kind of Glide around effortlessly
32. 1:37looking for food but they can also just
33. 1:39sit up on a phone pole or a tree and
34. 1:42just scan Fields until they see a rodent
35. 1:44and just dive down on it now even though
36. 1:47there's Nuance to that style of flight
37. 1:49for a while red-tailed hawk it's it's
38. 1:52not as much of a learning curve as it is
39. 1:54for a falcon for Falcons to build up the
40. 1:56muscle and learn how to go high learn
41. 1:58how to dive when a falcon is diving if
42. 2:00they're diving incredibly steep hitting
43. 2:02prey if they hit it full force going
44. 2:04over 100 miles an hour and slam into it
45. 2:07directly they can kill themselves uh
46. 2:10they um so if they're diving like this
47. 2:12they might grab on to pray but if
48. 2:14they're diving like this then they want
49. 2:16to just take the rear Talons and rake
50. 2:18the neck or head and try to you know
51. 2:20snap the neck of their prey and then
52. 2:22Circle back around and grab it they have
53. 2:24to learn that they have to learn and
54. 2:25judge that some of it's instinctive but
55. 2:27they have to have the actual practice
56. 2:28and the muscle memory to work with a
57. 2:31falconer uh you want to train a bird to
58. 2:33do that that when you're doing this in
59. 2:36the old days there's a lot of ways to do
60. 2:38this but uh growing up in Falconer one
61. 2:40of the things that we did a lot was we
62. 2:41would use a balloon or a kite and we'd
63. 2:44use a lure and have it go up with the
64. 2:46lure and then the Falcon would grab the
65. 2:48lure and take it back down to the ground
66. 2:49and that was a way to teach a falcon to
67. 2:51go higher and higher and higher but then
68. 2:53you had to transition that to hunting
69. 2:55prey uh today it's a lot easier we can
70. 2:57use drones and that is what John has
71. 2:59been doing he's been training this
72. 3:01Falcon to fly up to a drone and she's
73. 3:03been doing very good and now he's been
74. 3:05trying to introduce uh racing pigeons
75. 3:08thrown out for the Falcon to learn how
76. 3:10to Chase and catch to learn about the
77. 3:12hunting part of these flights so I met
78. 3:15up with John and he's been flying in the
79. 3:17evenings some people like to fly in the
80. 3:18mornings it's September here in Utah
81. 3:20it's still pretty hot he wanted to wait
82. 3:22till the temperatures were a little bit
83. 3:23cooler and he let his Bird go outside
84. 3:26and have a bath and we sat out there and
85. 3:28talked a bit as the bird took a bath and
86. 3:30shook off all the water and dried off
87. 3:32and just enjoyed herself and and as her
88. 3:34weight came down to the Flying weight
89. 3:36that John wanted then we went inside
90. 3:37John Wade his bird made sure that she
91. 3:40was up and ready to go and at the proper
92. 3:42weight he put on his radio transmitter
93. 3:44and and flight jesses and we drove out
94. 3:47to the field
95. 3:48um now when we're doing this it's good
96. 3:50to be aware of the direction of the wind
97. 3:52it's good to be aware to scan around for
98. 3:54any other potential Predators like other
99. 3:56Falcons or Eagles and also look for
100. 3:58Ravens that might mob your bird and
101. 3:59throw off a flight good to scan then you
102. 4:02can't be 100 sure of what's out there
103. 4:04but it's good to do your best to try to
104. 4:06see what's going on so John lettersburg
105. 4:08take off she began flying around
106. 4:10circling and doing really well and going
107. 4:12up but again this was a flight not about
108. 4:14Building height and muscle strength but
109. 4:16about making sure she had a positive
110. 4:18experience trying to catch a prey item
111. 4:21so we tossed and let loose a racing
112. 4:23pigeon that went up and we were happy to
113. 4:26see that she did recognize it as prey
114. 4:28she Dove down and made a pass and hit it
115. 4:31and then circled back around and caught
116. 4:34it and carried it to the ground this is
117. 4:36fantastic it's exactly what we wanted
118. 4:38because then she learned to hit
119. 4:40something and learn to go back to it
120. 4:43once she had hit it this is a crucial
121. 4:44lesson for large Falcons flown in the
122. 4:47traditional flight style now we went
123. 4:49over once the bird was on the ground uh
124. 4:52John uh said that his bird is uh prone
125. 4:55to carry on the ground is something that
126. 4:56he's training her through and so we
127. 4:59stayed back and he he knelt down and
128. 5:01came in and got her secure with his clip
129. 5:04and then he offered some food traded the
130. 5:08the bird off of the kill off of the
131. 5:09pigeon for the some pre-wade food that
132. 5:12he had brought with him and uh then he
133. 5:15walked back to the truck and had a we we
134. 5:19kind of debriefed on how the flight went
135. 5:21so everything went really good this is a
136. 5:24good training flight it's good stage
137. 5:25it's very important this is the same
138. 5:27thing that a wild bird has to do this
139. 5:29time of year a wild Falcon would still
140. 5:32be learning these same lessons uh and
141. 5:34It's tricky in nature 70 to 80 percent
142. 5:37of all first year Raptors die whether of
143. 5:40natural causes or being electrocuted or
144. 5:42shot by people it's a hard world it's
145. 5:44hard to learn to become a fully
146. 5:46effective Predator
147. 5:48um and she's off to a great start we're
148. 5:50really happy with how she did uh I'm
149. 5:52proud of John I'm proud of her as well
150. 5:54and we're gonna probably do some more
151. 5:56videos let you see her progress as she
152. 5:58goes but I thought you all might enjoy
153. 6:00seeing uh this stage of the process of
154. 6:02training a falcon to be a proper hunting
155. 6:05bird so I hope you enjoyed this video
156. 6:06let me know any questions you have or
157. 6:08any comments or other videos you would
158. 6:10like to see and as always happy Hocking
159. 6:23thank you
160. 6:27[Music]
161. 6:47foreign
162. 6:49[Music]
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