Tag: hunting

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Falconry Terms

Falcon on Forearm Courtesy and Copyright Mary Heers, Photographer
Falcon on Forearm
Courtesy and Copyright Mary Heers, Photographer
In 1962, Rachael Carson rocked the bird watching world with her book Silent Spring. She identified the commonly used pesticide DDT as the culprit responsible for declining populations of eagles, falcons and hawks. Rachael was able to prove that once DDT got into the food chain, it fatally weakened the eggshells of these birds. DDT was banned the following year.

Would the raptor populations be able to respond? The answer to this question was spearheaded by Hawk Watch International. They recruited volunteers to camp out near Mendon Peak which overlooks a major flyway for migrating birds in the fall.

Armed with pencils and paper, these volunteers checked off each raptor that flew by. It was a tough camp, because once the snow melts, any water on top had to be carried up there. Sometimes my family and others would hike up and give them oranges. Every year the news got better. The raptor populations were rebounding. In 1999 they were officially taken off the endangered species list.

At this time, for most people in Utah, getting a close look at a raptor required a trip to the Hogle Zoo to see the bird show. COVID shut down these shows. But luckily, a young volunteer at the zoo, Nick Morris, stepped up, got the licensing needed to own raptors, and created a traveling show called Long Wing Inc.

When I was able to meet Nick on his home turf, he told me that in Shakespeare’s time, most every man owned some kind of raptor. The kings owned eagles. The nobility owned falcons. It was no accident that talk of falcons worked its way into the spoken language.

For example, falconers kept ankle bands on the bird’s legs attached to short study strings. Before flying their birds, falconers held these strings in a tight fist with their thumbs pressing down hard. This is why we say we keep things “under our thumb.”

Falcons were always easier to handle while being transported with a hood slipped over their heads. This led to our saying today that when someone does not see something clearly, he is “hood winked.”

Morning chores were underway when I showed up at Nick’s house. He carried each bird out into his driveway and put a piece of quail on a sawhorse. The bird was happy to hop over and eat it. Nick then put a piece of quail down the driveway on top of his fence. This was a chance for the bird to spread his wings and fly to the treat. Everything was going to plan until one bird took off and settled on the roof of the house. There were a few tense minutes. Nick admitted to me he had once had to chase a runaway bird all the way to Evanston.
Shakespeare captures a moment like this when Juliet is on her balcony and Romeo has walked away.

Juliet says, “Oh for a falconer’s voice to lure this tassel-gentle back again.” Once we know that a “tassel” is Shakespeare’s word for a male falcon, we can see that Juliet is seeing Romeo as a noble and beautiful creature. Juliet sees herself as the falconer, hoping that Romeo will return and possibly be tamed by her.
Just as Romeo ran back to Juliet, Nick’s bird came down from the roof.

Nick explained how falcons were not pets in the traditional sense. Falconry is an ancient sport going back thousands of years. In Shakespeare’s time, it was a way of putting food on the dinner table.

This is Mary Heers and I’m Wild About Utah

Credits:
Photos: Courtesy and Copyright Mary Heers,
Featured Audio: Courtesy & © Mary Heers and Anderson, Howe and Wakeman.
Text: Mary Heers, https://cca.usu.edu/files/awards/art-and-mary-heers-citation.pdf
Additional Reading: Lyle Bingham, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/

Additional Reading

Wild About Utah, Mary Heers’ Wild About Utah Postings

The Story of Silent Spring, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), August 13, 2015, https://www.nrdc.org/stories/story-silent-spring

The Wellsvilles Hawkwatch Site, Bridgerland Audubon Society, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/our-projects/the-wellsvilles-hawkwatch-site/

Utah’s Hogle Zoo, https://www.hoglezoo.org/

Tracy Aviary at Liberty Park, https://tracyaviary.org/liberty-park/visit/programs/daily-programs-activities/

Falconry, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, Utah Department of Natural Resources, https://wildlife.utah.gov/hunting/main-hunting-page/falconry.html

Falconry terms in the English Language:

  • Bate: In falconry, “bate” refers to a hawk’s attempt to fly off its perch while still tethered. This has become “bated breath” in common English, meaning to be in a state of nervous anticipation or anxiety, according to Wingspan Bird of Prey Centre.
  • Fed up: A falcon that is well-fed has no incentive to hunt, leading to the term “fed up” meaning to be bored or uninterested.
  • Haggard: A “haggard” hawk is one caught from the wild as an adult, often difficult to train. In common usage, “haggard” describes someone looking exhausted or unwell.
  • Under his thumb: In falconry, this refers to the way a falconer holds the jesses (straps) of a hawk to control it. In general usage, it means being completely under someone’s control.
  • Hoodwinked: Originally, a “hood” was used to calm a hawk by covering its head. “Hoodwinked” means to be deceived or tricked, often subtly.
  • Rouse: A “rouse” in falconry is when a hawk shakes its feathers. This has evolved into the general meaning of shaking or awakening.
  • Pounce: A falcon’s “pounce” is its claws, used to seize prey. The word has entered common usage to describe a sudden, forceful movement.
  • Gorge: In falconry, a hawk “gorges” itself when it eats to capacity. This has become the general term for eating to excess.

    • Sources for Falconry terms in the English Language:
    Evans, Andrew, How falconry changed language, BBC. February 24, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20170111-how-irish-falconry-changed-language
    The Language of Falconry, Wingspan Birds of Prey Trust, https://www.wingspan.co.nz/falconry_language.html
    Amy, Falconry terms in common language, Powered by Birds, February 26, 2010, https://www.poweredbybirds.com/falconry-terms-in-common-language/
    Assembled by Google AI https://ai.google.com

    Utah Falconers Association, https://www.utahfalconers.com/

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    Duck Tornados

    Duck Tornado: Male Mallard, Wings Set Courtesy Pixabay, Ilona Ilyés(ilyessuti), Photographer
    Male Mallard, Wings Set
    Courtesy Pixabay, Ilona Ilyés(ilyessuti), Photographer
    If it flies like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, but there’s hundreds in a maelstrom whirlpool whose torrent of wingbeats make your ears mute and skull hum, it must be a Great Salt Lake tornado a la duck.

    This past waterfowl season, I saw them out in some of the flats not yet trammeled by cover brush in the wetlands which drain the Bear River to the Great Salt Lake. The experience was possible because my friend, a well-seasoned duck hunter, had “a spot” he wanted to check out. We headed out at 4:30 in the morning from town, drove to the icy ramp, and put in his boat. We navigated the winding canals lined with irreconcilable phragmites in the black until we reached an end. When he cut the engine, nothing but the sound of water trickling from unnamed subfoliage passageways could be heard. We unloaded our equipment, moored the vessel, and took off on foot for “the spot”.

    We hauled floating coffins with our gear: decoys, grass blankets, some food, and our hunting tools. The air was cold, but hauling sleds through muck and knee deep water is warm work. We could see the delicate prints of yesterday’s game puttering in the mud, foraging for fuel. Our heavy feet cratered their Pollack art, mud streaking behind and steam rising as we trudged on.

    When we found the spot to set up near a small patch of open water just deep enough, we set out the decoys, took our positions, hid, and waited until the clock struck the shooting hour. With the sun yawning from behind the morning’s dense clouds, the tornados began.

    They started to the west on a rest pond and slowly rose about a half mile out, an acrid steam swirling along magnetic edges of lazy morning thermals. Slowly, the steam became more dense, a heavier molecularity, and yet somehow like the paint stretching off a worn artist’s haggard brush, harnessed a fluid winged chaos into streaks of prehistoric migratory cosmos.

    Once a feathered mass rises and begins its molasses churn about its night’s pond, it is as if an intuition shoots through the birds, and they become an it, and suddenly strike off unified in a particular direction on the morning flight. One such wave comes our way.

    You don’t hear the mass at first, but when you do it begins with quacks. Their distant airy rasps build as they approach and eye our decoys and open water. It gains slowly, like Holst’s Mars, or Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries, a romantic era symphony of avian legions unified by the course of cacophonous time. It’s epic and deeply beautiful.

    Soon, they decide to give our hole a scout and the whirlwind aims itself at us. The squadrons of drakes and hens give passing dives. This is where the real magic lies; nothing makes your hair stand on end like the sound of cupped duck wings catching air, braking in the atmosphere with such force, and then throwing on the afterburners to pull back up towards their comrades. It makes F-35s look like the Wright brothers’ Kitty Hawk flier. That howl as air is held compressed beneath stressed wings comes in from all angles. We are transfixed within the eye.

    Northern Shovelers Flying Courtesy US FWS, Steve Hillebrand, Photographer
    Northern Shovelers Flying
    Courtesy US FWS, Steve Hillebrand, Photographer
    And as quickly as the tornado cometh, it also flyeth away. The music dissipates as the breath of ancient gods gains altitude, eyes another pond, and moves on from us. The duck tornado roars on.

    So even if you’re not a hunter, or even that keen on ducks, there is nothing quite like a duck tornado; a force in this world which once was commonplace with the other primal elements of nature, but now only rarely seen in those last lightly touched places. Know that they’re out there, and if you can, one day go looking for them. Gaze at the power, the glory, and the mystery of the Great Salt Lake wetland duck tornados. You’ll never forget it.

    I’m Patrick Kelly, and I’m Wild About Utah.
     
    Credits:

    Images: Image Courtesy Pixabay, Ilona Ilyés(ilyessuti), Photographer, https://pixabay.com/photos/duck-bird-waterfowl-lake-wild-5838408/
    Images: Image Courtesy USFWS, Steve Hillebrand, Photographer https://digitalmedia.fws.gov/digital/collection/natdiglib/id/9588/
    Audio: Contains audio Courtesy & Copyright Kevin Colver https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/collections/special-collections
    Text:    Patrick Kelly, Director of Education, Stokes Nature Center, https://logannature.org/
    Included Links: Lyle Bingham, Webmaster, WildAboutUtah.org

    Additional Reading

    Duck Tornado, Idaho Fish & Game, Feb 20, 2015, https://youtu.be/HmK9ArTgU0A

    Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, US Fish & Wildlife Service, US Department of the Interior, https://www.fws.gov/refuge/bear_river_migratory_bird_refuge/

    Waterfowl Guidebook, Utah Division of Wildlife, Utah Department of Natural Resources, https://wildlife.utah.gov/guidebooks/2020-21_waterfowl.pdf

    Hellstern, Ron, Autumn Migrations, Wild About Utah, October 15, 2017, https://wildaboututah.org/autumn-migrations/