Advices how to train my peretiercel to wait on...

[Dude]

Hello guys,

I will pick up my tiercel peregrine after 2-3weeks from now, when he get hard penned.(parent raised)


I never use a lure to call the falcons down, I call to the fist...If it dont work I call them to the lure and than if the falcon dont comes I can try a live pigeon...so I have 2 chanses if something is going to be wrong...


I wanna try to toss him race pigeons when he leave me or dont fly around me, he never catch a race pigeon in the early stages...when he is in good position I wanna toss out a ruffed pigeon(when u pull out the secondary wing feather of a pigeon) for him to catch it...

what do u think? If I toss out a sealed(not totally sealed, the half-1/4 the eye is left opened on the top) pigeon it will fly slower than a normal one or it dont affect the speed of the selaed pigeon?

I hope u guys post some training methods to see how others do it, and comments on how I wanna do with my tiercel...

ohh and sorry about my engish...


rgds,
Dan. :)

ps: tell me how can I make a pic smaller to get it in the comment...can I do it with winXP or I need a program to do it?

[Hawkmaster]

You need Paint shop Pro www.jasc.com for a demo copy

[Dude]

ok, thx hawkmaster :)

[Shaun Byrne]

Hi Dude, let me get this right, you want to call a waiting on Tiercel Pere back to the fist? Good luck mate!!

Bagged pigeons are not legal over here mate so I dont think anyone will have enough experience of using them to give you any advice. We would also face other charges if found to be sealing the pigeon and I personally think this subject should be left there.

[OutFlying]

what's happening with the imprint peregrine falcon (to be flown out the hood) - its seems you'll have your hands full this season.

[Dude]

nope outflying, that perefemale go to my friend coz he needed a female and I get a male but luckily not an imprinted one.

h4wka: I do that with my lanner female, and she was fly in very great highs(just pleasure flying....), I cannot see that bird when she is up...I just offer my fist and she stooped near me and take on her airbrakes and landed on my fist.....

here just sealing is illegal, to toss a pigeon out 4 a hawk is legal

rgds,
Dan :)

[Dude]

ps: sorry if its not good to speak about pigeon tossing here.....I donno what is the law there.....

[Finnish]

We are not allowed to use any sort of bagged game here in the Uk Dude.

[Hawkmaster]

It is OK to speak about bagged game on this forum as we are an International forum.

Just give advice as to how it would be done overseas.

[Dude]

okay, thx 4 the advice m8. :)

[Pedro Af]

Hello

Well, I´ve never done it whit a peregrine...only whit a male lanner! Im from Portugal, and we can use bagged game here! The use of bagged game is a tricky issue, and it can do more harm that good to a bird if you don't do it correctly and you will need a good number of pigeons too!

In theory you should make a strong pigeon when the bird is low, and a easy one when it have gain pitch..but is you miss the time the bird is actually going up, or if you just keep realizing it strong pigeons the bird could get confuse in your intensions or uninterested (I have never flown a peregrine so I don't know how persistent are they)

I recommend you read Dr. Nick Fox book: Understanding the bird of prey and some articles in the web like: http://www.americanfalconry.com/FirstLongwing.html

They will give you some theory in waiting-on falcons.
A word of advice...today, we have many ways of wait on a falcon (like kites, balloons, the use of wind lift) but none of them are easy or lack of failures..you should read about them and then try to figure what would be better to your bird, field ad for you self.

You have wrote: I never use a lure to call the falcons down, I call to the fist...If it dont work I call them to the lure and than if the falcon dont comes I can try a live pigeon...so I have 2 chanses if something is going to be wrong... ....generaly we don´t do things in this way..so I don´t how if it would work..read a bit about this too, it will help you undestanding more about the basic train of a falcon

Best regards
Pedro Afonso

Sorry for my lousy English

[Dude]

I was red this article before but anyway thx 4 the link.... :) and the advices....

regards,
Dan. :)

[MitchellBrad]

Dan,

All my falcons are trained to the fist and the lure. Even the passage gyr. Most of the falcons here my buddys fly will drop from excellent pitches to the fist. The lure is good but a bird that will respond immediately to the fist is well trained. Plus is the lure is lost there is no problem retreiving the bird.

Brad Mitchell
South Dakota, US

[Jack Merlin]

Good to see you here, Brad!

And there was me relaying your words of wisdom by private mail. Now Dan can get it from source.

BTW, for those who don't know, Brad must be one of the top flyers of long-wings in the USA as well as being a very generous guy with his time and knowledge. Even though I have never met him, I count him as one of my personal friends and one I would look to for advice. The guy is a perfectionist!

[Dude]

:)

[MitchellBrad]

Thanks Jack,

:oops:

Just one other thing if Dan doesn't mind a little advise. I Train to the fist and the lure. Keep the pigeon in your bag for dire emergencies only. Any bird should come to the lure instantly. Anyway calling to the fist sort of a parlor trick but can be useful from time to time.

Brad

[Hawkmaster]

Welcome to the forum Brad, really good to see you here. What will you be flying this coming season?

Paul :lol:

[MitchellBrad]

Thanks Hawkmaster.

I have a passage gyr and an eyeas peregrine. It looks a captive bred gyr will be added to the mix this year. My passage was trapped Jan 2nd west of here in Stanley county SD. Not very far from where some British guests were in on trapping a haggard gyr we banded and released a few years ago. Incidentally that haggard gyr still comes back almost every year. By the time I got the passage trained the season was coming to an end. Unfortunately her training was speeded up when my little peregrine, Clara, was killed by a horned owl. Anyway Stanley was by far one of the easiest birds I've trained in my life, goes up naturally but does cause receivers to be turned on the instant she goes into the hunt mode at quarry no one knew was around. Other than that I'm more than pleased with her.

So my long winded answer is a peregrine and 2 gyrs.

Brad

[Hawkmaster]

Do falconry birds get killed often by other raptors?

[MitchellBrad]

We lost 3 in the state this year. A hybrid to an eagle, a prairie to an owl and my peregrine to another owl. Both falcons killed by the owls were killed around 3:30 pm. The flights didn't start near owl habitat but the prairie was so high she killed the pheasant almost 1/2 mile away. My peregrine was out of position at a decent pitch. She caught the pheasant a over 1/4 mile away in some trees. In case your wondering these are SD wild pheasants and will fly quite a distance. They are smaller than the pheasants I saw in the UK.

Brad

[MitchellBrad]

Paul,

I have a really dumb question. Are you a Paul I know? Maybe even a Paul that visited here?? If you are did you get the pictures of Stanley when we caught her?

Brad

[Hawkmaster]

Unfortunately not Brad, I am orginally from South Africa.

[OutFlying]

Paul,

I have a really dumb question. Are you a Paul I know? Maybe even a Paul that visited here?? If you are did you get the pictures of Stanley when we caught her?

Brad

Brad,
Don't think Paul (the postman) is on this list, this is the Paul your thinking about.
Jim.

[MitchellBrad]

Brad,
Don't think Paul (the postman) is on this list, this is the Paul your thinking about.
Jim.

Thanks. Yep, that's the Paul I was thinking of.

Brad

[MitchellBrad]

Dan,

What have you decided to do with the new bird? For starters, there is no wrong technique provided it works. If it doesn't work you'll have to try something else. Though I think tiercels are generally easier to get to take a pitch than their sisters. Here I can use pigeons to train the peregrines. One thing I guess I should stress with what your planning is two things can happen when using racing pigeons the way you described. First off, when the bird leaves and you toss a pigeon he can't catch in essence your training him to leave you if you don't give one he can catch when he is higher than he has been before and coming in your direction. Secondly, in time the bird will eventually quit chasing pigeons. Won't even look at them unless one is directly underneath it. Much of this is hard to explain because of all the variations among individual birds even siblings. I don't consider a full flighted, conditioned racing pigeon a bag. Rather it is nothing more than a training aid. Older, experienced pigeons will actually play with a young falcon but release them under an experienced falcon they are out of Dodge in a hurry. Pigeons can also be used in a negative manner. If a pigeon trained peregrine has her back to me flying away and I toss a pigeon she'll consider it a punishment. Lets say she is coming to me from a decent pitch but lowers it as she goes by me, a pigeon tossed in the opposite direction will require her to turn and by then the pigeon is in the heavens.

I often hawk with an older gent. His old hybrid is 15 this summer and, in her prime, would have been a bird every falconer wants. The bird was hacked at his place for months. He had to quit the hack after a call from a duck hunter/falconer. He was pass shooting scaup when the falcon went by him chasing a duck. Had it been someone else the bird would have been shot. By her third season she was as good as any falcon I've seen. What reminded me was you mentioning calling to the fist. My friend did something with that falcon I've never seen before. Before I go any further I have to mention she was trained to follow the truck. He'd release a dog then release the falcon and drive his surburban. The dog would point a pheasant and he'd get a flight. If it got away he'd hop back in the truck and continue on hoping for another flight. Often he'd stop the truck, stick his gloved hand out the window and call her to the fist. This year one day we couldn't get a point so he tossed her a pigeon. For a 15 yr old bird she amazed us by chasing it for 5 minutes or so. She'd gotten a foot on it and wasn't going to let that pigeon go. In time she came back and landed on her favorite perch, a pile of gravel in his gravel pit. The guy said, "Watch this." He took a white hankerchief and waved it out the window of the truck. In she came! That was a new one on me. In short most of these falcons are versitile. In fact they are a lot more versitile than most think. And yes, she is also lure trained.

Incidentally my friend conditions that old bird by doing jump ups. Again, if I hadn't seen it I might not have believed it. He has a perch at the bottom of the bannister going to the second story of his house. There is another on the top. The "Old Bird" is placed on the bottom and begins the jump ups. Every once in a while she gets a tid bit. Up and down, up and down. If she sees no piece of meat she goes down. It isn't unusual for her to go up very nicely and kill a pheasant on his property her first free flight of the season.

Now it looks like I've written a book. Sorry.

Brad

[OhMyGod]

Dude

the sealed pigeon will travel along as fast as it can gaining height. The reasons behind this is that the falconer can release a sealed pigeon for the unentered bird to catch, without the pigeon being able to see the falcon and trying to out manouver it, resulting in a kill, so I would say fully sealed. you would release this bird if your falcon is high in pitch. You can pull feathers instead on a non sealed pigeon but they don't always fly properly and can cause you trouble.

If you bird is being lazy and not gaining height or is wondering too far out of position you can release a fully fit and healthy racing pigeon instead.

You will need birds that will come back to you after the flight or else you will need to trap quite a few

[Jack Merlin]

Brad,

You should write the book. Period.

To everyone else: Brad is to peregrines what Edmund Bert was to goshawks. And if you don't know who Bert was, read the sig.

[Mary Quite Contrary]

handy harry

[Jack Merlin]

handy harry

My young friend, Brad is the man. He IS a peregrine!!!<vbg>

[MitchellBrad]

Whoa, lets not carry this too far. It is true I mantle a bit over my food and my kids scream when I withhold money but all in all I'm as normal as the next person. :roll:

[OutFlying]

Brad,

You should write the book. Period.

To everyone else: Brad is to peregrines what Edmund Bert was to goshawks. And if you don't know who Bert was, read the sig.

Brad is better, you can ask him questions. :wink:

[MitchellBrad]

Jack,

Concerning writing books. In this falconry world I find falconers the world over have so many different ways to do things as to boggle the mind. On my little piece of turf with 3 falconers locally we all use the same method and have the same results. Pigeons. One guy flys hybrids, one a prairie and a peregrine and yours truly peregrines. The prairie was the imprint killed by an owl this year. She often would go up and out of sight. In other parts of the world the use of pigeons is illegal. The passage gyr was trained rather easily with baggies. It seemed everytime I tossed her a fake pheasant she went higher the next time. If she didn't she didn't get much of a reward. There was nothing to it. She was easier to deal with than the imprinted gyrs I've had in the past probably because she didnt' take offense at my blunders where as the imprint would have had an opinion on everything done wrong<G> No pigeons were used with her for vaious reasons though I know several falconers who used them with good success on passagers. The biggest problem with her is she knows exactly what she can and can't do. Also gyrs are incredibly impatient unlike a peregrine so one has to take that into account when handling them.

There are a multitude of ways to get peregrines to go up. Some use the lure, some kites and balloons, others soar and still others use pigeons. I suspect if you lived in a game rich environment and could get a flight everytime you released the bird that would suffice with a peregrine. Flights aren't particularly hard to control in such an environment provided your not dealing with these blasted wild pheasants we have over here. And you need a good dog if your not doing it with ducks.

Anyway to author a reasonable book on peregrines it would take several people to write it. Probably from several different countries with experience in the use of several subspecies of peregrines. In fact the peales and the anatums almost act as if they are two different types of falcons. Peales tiercels aren't particularly hard to train but many of the falcons are so stinking fast it takes some doing to get them to realize the advantage of height. Emma was much like that but in time pitch was not an issue with her.

In my case I've not tried to man a peregrine in close to 20 yrs. Well I did one of my copulating tiercels when he was a baby. Big mistake!! They eventually do it themselves. Not only that I want the bird independent from me initially. I like a bird with fire and, in the beginning, want it to take shots all over the country. There will be time to tighten it up later. That isn't many people's cup of tea which I realize.

Well, I gone and written too much again. Sorry

[Jack Merlin]

Yeah. But I've been on here longer so I have the credibility!<g>

[Dude]

thx 4 the story brad, I will keep them in mind :)