Falconing experience - Part 1

On the first Saturday in November, Frau A cashed in part of her birthday present:  a "Fotoshooting with Greifvogel" experience (Photoshooting with Falcons).  She's a real nature/animal lover, and it's getting harder to find things that make really good gifts, so this seemed like an idea with potential.  (It was a success, as you'll see below.)

The event is run by Erlebnisfalknerei.com ("Experience Falconry"), which offers different "experiences" such as photo shooting/workshops, intensive falconry training, childrens' or corporate events (e.g., birthdays, team-building), TV/film (stunt birds?), and even nature research.  Our host was Herr Schmidt and one of his associates.  We met them at a house/farm out in the country, near a town called Irschenberg, about 45 minutes from Munich:

 

Of course this experinece was not going to be real falconry (like going hunting, etc.), but it was the opportnuity for direct interaction with a bird, learning about the sport, and scaled-down versions of the activities.  Herr Schmidt would lead and take photos during the ~2 hours, and I was allowed to tag along and take photos & video too.

So we ran some errands that Saturday morning and then headed south on the autobahn (A8 towards Salzburg):

One nice thing about this route is that you start to see the Alps looming ahead if the weather is clear:

In fact, the weather was fantastic.  When we arrived at the farm we got fall colors in the Alpine foothills:

Herr Schmidt had two cages in his trunk:  one with a friendly dog, and the other with TWO falcons inside:

The first thing, of course, was to outfit Frau A with equipment - protection from the falcons' talons.  The clip on the glove is used to connect a falcon's rope (tied to one of its legs) if the trainer needs to make sure it can't fly away:

Herr Schmidt began with a short introduction, but soon his colleague brought out the first falcon.  This bird pictured below is female and quite young -- in fact, this day was its first time interacting/training with a stranger.

Here's a close crop:  lovely bird:

The trainer passed the falcon over to Frau A, and we continued to get background info from Herr Schmidt:

The falcon took a minute to flap its wings about and get adjusted...

... but was soon relaxed and sitting on Frau A.  Once the bird was comfortable, Frau A could stroke its feathers.
She loved that.  Afterwards, she remarked that it's quite light, but still tiring to hold your arm out so long.

  

Here's another close crop of the falcon:

Honestly, Herr Schmidt is fortunate that Frau A didn't run off with the handsome falcon!  Smiles say it all.

Note: in the pics above & below you can see the glove tethered to the bird's left leg, as described earlier.

Every once in a while the falcon would get "itchy" and reposition itself, but then go back to being relaxed:

(I was happy as well:  the Alps in the background were a bonus... I must have taken 300 photos that day.)

The falcon had no problem letting me get pretty close and take photos too.

We continued to get instructions and info, and clearly these two were getting along very well together:

So then it was time to see if the young falcon would interact with Frau A a bit.

The falcon's leg clip was changed from Frau A's glove to a grounded safety rope, so the bird could fly from one person to another (over very short distances) but still be secure.  The trainers also brought out fresh, raw chicken as reward for when the bird performs as desired - an entire satchel full of falcon treats.

First, the trainer tried tempting the bird from a REALLY close distance to jump over.  Again, this was the first time the bird was flying with strangers, and it did not have a lot of training experience in any event...

...it didn't work.  So Frau A handed the falcon to the trainer, took the food, and they tried it the other way.  Yes!

(Above:  you can see Frau A holding a small piece of raw meat in her glove to tempt the falcon into flight.
Even Herr Schmidt had to whistle and try to attract the falcon as well - you'll see this in the videos below.
Also, we see the safety rope attached - as described earlier, just a precaution with the inexperienced bird.) 

It downed the "treat" and relaxed on Frau A's glove:

Here's a video of the next (very short) flight, almost identical to the one from the above photos:

Took quite a bit of coaxing, huh?  Frau A and the trainer contined trying this, stepping back a little each time:

  

Here's another close crop from the photo above right, as the falcon is landing on Frau A:

And another action shot plus a close crop of the bird finishing its landing on Frau A's glove:

Next, a video of a flight the other way - from Frau A over to the trainer.  The rope seemed a bit tricky here:

Many times it took quite a bit of convincing, but in the end I guess the food won the falcon over.  I think I can relate a bit -- it's a little like my experiences training young (and distracted or disinterested) puppies.  Patience is key.

I also captured a few frames of the feeding - you can see the feathers still on the young chicken meat.  Yum:

  

For fans of the Discovery Channel, here is a video of the falcon feeding on a treat (with info in German):

In these last two videos, the falcon finishes the prior treat and takes off again soon - she really gets it now:

(Note:  from the post so far, you may have noticed something about technique.  If the bird is leaving from your hand, you face the other person.  When receiving the bird, your back should be turned to both of them.)

We paused briefly for a few more photos:

The short training flights continued just a bit longer - both the bird and Frau seemed totally at ease now:

The trainers were pleased at the young falcon's work that day.  After a number of flights and resulting treats, the bird was getting full.  Therefore, the trainers called it a day for this falcon and Frau A said goodbye for now...

That was fun, but Part 2 is coming with a second, more experienced falcon.  Stay tuned.

Comments

[Wendi]

Absolutely gorgeous pictures...and what a fun birthday present!

[Frau A]

@Wendi: Thank you! Fortunately, I got to use Frau A's nice DSLR and that made a huge difference. It cranks out 5 shots per second, so I could capture a LOT of images and pick the best. Just wouldn't have been the same with my smaller camera. Cheers, Herr J.

[German Gems]

I bet you can't do that in the US. An interesting and unique adventure and a very thoughtful gift.

[Frau A]

Hi German Gems! I did a quick Google search on "experience falconry" and the first two pages were all from the UK. Nothing from North America at all. Interesting. Also, we didn't have to sign a liability waiver or anything... in the U.S. one would probably have a mountain of legal forms to fill out. [sigh] Cheers, Heff J