When to start ???

[Fox]

My red has allmost finished his moult he has just the last primary on each wing to go. He is allso very fat you cant hardly feel his keel bone.

The question i have is should i take him up now and start his refresher course ? or wait till those 2 primarys are dropped and grown??

Any help would be welcome!

[Dude]

U can pick up it and start to manning, but dont drop its weight util the remaining feathers dropped and fully grown out.

regards,
Dan. :)

[Hawkmaster]

I stat when there is about an inch or two to go.

[KenHawker1970]

Wait till his feathers are hard-down.

[OhMyGod]

surely this depends on the type of hawk and the quarry you are hunting.

For instance I wouldn't take a gos out and fly it at rabbits with a tail nearly down, but this could be beneficial to people flying longwings on a grouse moor or even partridge, most second season birds in this situation would be out flying before the feathers are hard penned.

[Moet]

hi there, in my opinion I would wait till the feathers are fully grown, don't think its worth risking for the sake of waiting maybe a couple more weeks, im in the same position as you, but im gonna wait until the feathers are fully finished, if the bird was to break one of the growing feathers you could have serious problems as these feathers are blood feathers whilst growing and could result in bleeding if damaged, I maybe wrong and am sure someone will correct me if I am as there are a few very knowledgable people on this forum.
hope this helps

[Wightwings]

its not justa matter of breaking new feathers....if they are still coming down and you start with the weight control etc they can end up with fret marks too. hang on a few more weeks the bird and you will be happier.

The missus took up her HH at the weekend but we found two new tail feathers just sprouting so put him back........he dropped two matching primaries the day after......