The Art and Practice of Hawking

by E. B. Michell

When the hawk has been lost through raking away or checking at chance quarry, the work of finding her necessitates often very great exertions and fatigue. There is nothing particularly unusual in the fact of a passage peregrine wandering off in an afternoon seven or eight miles from the place where she was lost sight of. To explore at all thoroughly an area eight miles long and ten broad at the far end means, of course, a great many miles travelling, even if the country is exceptionally open and clear of trees. Nevertheless, the dull and dreary journey must be undertaken if there is a real desire to recover the wanderer. The best hawk-finder is he who travels the farthest and sees the greatest number of possible assistants in his search. If you make an excuse for shirking a visit to a particular copse or valley, it is as likely as not that you will hear afterwards, to your chagrin, that the missing hawk was seen there, and might easily have been caught. If you will not walk a quarter of a mile out of the way to hail a passer-by who is going in what you think an unlikely direction, that will perhaps be the very man who, ten minutes afterwards, comes across the object of your pursuit.

There is not much to guide a man in choosing what direction he should prefer for going about his search. But, other influences being equal, the truant is more likely to have gone down-wind than up. Weak hawks especially, when they have no particular object in facing the wind, are apt to shirk the trouble of flying against it, and drift away to leeward. Of course, if it is an eyess that has gone astray, and the place where she was hacked is within easy reach, there is a more or less strong probability that she may have gone towards it. Eyess hobbies, when lost, are said almost invariably to go back to the hack place in this way. Merlins have been known to do so, though not within my own experience. But a really strong and fast hawk, in full flying order, seems often to assume almost at once the rôle of a wild one. Such a hawk, especially if fond of soaring, soon sees that there will be little difficulty in finding her own living. And she sets about it without any particular influence to guide her, starting in whatever direction chance may decide, and shifting her ground as capriciously as it is possible to imagine. When Tagrag, already mentioned, was out, he would be reported one night in a certain plantation, and early the next morning would be seen three or four miles off on the opposite side of the small village where he ought to have been housed, and where his brothers were (or ought to have been) lamenting his absence from the screen-perch.

Farm-houses and all habitations near the spot where a hawk was lost should be visited without delay. Not only are they generally frequented by either pigeons or fowls, towards which a stray peregrine or goshawk may well cast a hungry glance, but their shelter is always a tempting haven for any wandering house-pigeon which may have been chased and bested in the air. As the falconer proceeds from place to place, swinging his lure and calling or whistling, if it is his custom to use such means of bringing up his hawk, he should note the behaviour of the rooks and other birds within sight The presence of any hawk, especially if carrying a bell, causes some excitement amongst the feathered world. The unwarlike wanderers of the air, when an armed cruiser comes in sight, exhibit some such signs of panic as might be expected of a fleet of merchantmen if a hostile battleship were viewed in the offing. The symptoms most remarkable are generally those observed in a flight of rooks, which often begins to whirl about in the air, as if it were composed of escaped lunatics, shooting up and wheeling suddenly in unexpected directions, filling the air at the same time with discordant croaks and screams, and with big black specks, which hurl themselves about as if driven by impulses which they themselves cannot understand or control. But many other birds, by their strange movements and queer attitudes, will betray the near presence of a hawk to whose visits they are unaccustomed. When a hawk has killed anything, and is pluming or eating it, crows, magpies, and jays have a way of sitting on the top of a neighbouring tree, craning their necks, and peering down with a morbid curiosity as they watch an operation of which they strongly disapprove.

Rooks, starlings, and small birds are all fond of mobbing a strange hawk when they think they can do it with impunity, and swallows occasionally indulge in the same rather adventurous amusement. It is therefore often worth while to make a détour and investigate, whenever any bird seems to be engaged in eccentric and unusual movements. Of the thousand and one causes which may have given rise to such vagaries, only the most practised eye can determine which are likely to be connected with the appearance of the lost hawk, and which are not. The safest plan is to go up and make sure that the commotion is not to be explained in this way. Of course when a hawk has been in the habit of flying any particular quarry, a disturbance amongst birds of that species is more likely to arise from her presence than in other cases. But most peregrines, when they are at large, are fond of taking occasional shots at lapwings, though very seldom with success. Merlins, though they are most partial to skylarks, will make stoops at any bird which they suppose they can tackle, from a wood-pigeon to a wren; and the short-winged hawks are, of course, almost always ready for any bloodthirsty adventure.

Fortunately stray hawks, at least of the long-winged kinds, do not usually betake themselves to thick places where they cannot easily be seen. In open countries, where alone they should be flown, there is no great choice for them of convenient perching-places. Probably the most likely of all stations for them to take up are the tops of ricks; and here a peregrine, or even a merlin, can be distinguished at a great distance by a pair of good field-glasses. As a rule, the best hawks like the highest perches, where they can command, as from a watch-tower, the farthest view of the country over which they hope for a chance flight. A hawk which takes perch on low railings or on the ground is not usually much of a performer. Some of these are very fond of perching on fallow-fields, where it is almost impossible for an unpractised eye to distinguish their plumage against the colour of the ground. A knowledge of their ways will make the falconer aware that in such a field, however apparently flat, there will be either mounds or small peaks and projections of earth where clods have been unevenly turned up, which a hawk is sure to choose as a resting-place in preference to the surrounding ground for some distance on every side. The predilections of each of his hawks for particular kinds of perching-places will generally have been noted to some extent by the falconer, who will naturally look for each of them on the sort of stand which he knows that she most often prefers. Trees, while still leafy, are some of the worst places in which to have to search, and of course they are very common resorts. A lost hawk may be watching her pursuers as unseen as King Charles in the oak, and not deigning to come down to the most enticing dead lure, until, having cast, she feels an inclination to do so.

When a lost hawk is not recovered early in the morning a very good plan is to fly another, either at the lure or at some quarry, in the neighbourhood of the place where the loss occurred, or where you have ascertained that the truant was last seen. And the higher the decoy hawk can be induced to go the more chance will there naturally be that the other may come up and join her. Whenever one hawk is on the wing for any length of time, there is a good chance that every other hawk within about a mile will catch sight of her, and not a bad chance that the other may come up. In case of a high ringing flight, wild hawks will come up from much farther than a mile. And lost hawks will, of course, come and fraternise much more readily, especially if the stable-companion flown as a decoy happens to have been a comrade at hack or in some double flights. They will, however, do so quickly enough without any special inducement at all. A friend of mine brought a hawk, newly trained, from a distance to Salisbury Plain. She was lost in a very long flight before she had passed a single night in the house to which she was being taken, and was not even seen by her owner for two or three whole days. One morning I was exercising a hawk which the lost one had never seen, and suddenly there were two hawks stooping to the lure instead of one. I had never seen the wanderer, but understood at once what had occurred, and tried to so arrange that the lure should be struck by the new-comer. Either by accident or design she failed two or three times in succession to do this, and I was obliged to take down my own hawk and carry her in, and bring out a live lure for the other, upon which she was quickly taken up. Both Tagrag, which had been out a week, and a merlin, which had been out for nine days, were brought up from the unknown hack ground to join in a ringing flight by another hawk, and recaptured in the same way.

A trained hawk will sometimes be taken off by wild ones, with which she will go soaring and otherwise amusing herself for a while. But the good-fellowship between them does not usually last long. In the open places where long-winged hawks are flown there are often a good many wild hawks about—peregrines, merlins, and occasionally even hobbies, besides the ubiquitous kestrel, with which the higher quality hawks disdain to associate. But each wild hawk, or at least each pair or family of wild hawks, seems to have its own appointed beat, and resents the intrusion into it of a stranger. Everyone knows that birds will frequently attack any interloper which comes with any intention of staying and quartering itself in the country already appropriated by its own denizens. Now the wild hawks, though they will often attack a trained one as soon as they have set eyes upon her, yet will also often go playing with her as long as their idea is that she is merely a visitor, and will not permanently poach on their preserves. It is when they find that the new-comer is really intending to take up her abode in the neighbourhood, and appropriate her share of the booty, which they looked upon as reserved for themselves, that they begin to really make it so hot for her that she is fain to get on into a less-favoured district which has not been already effectively occupied. Thus the copse haunted by a couple of young peregrines, or the down quartered by a wild merlin every day, is not the best place to look for a trained bird of the same species which has been lost for more than twenty-four hours, although during the first period the tame and the wild bird may be seen stooping at one another or racing together in a most amicable style. If you have seen them together one day, and been unable to get down your own hawk, you will do well to seek her afterwards not on the same ground, but in a different, though not very distant, district.

As soon as you can get well within sight of your lost hawk, the live lure may be relied upon to effect her capture, until she has been out several days—in the case of eyesses for at least a week. But I should not advise forcing it upon her notice at a time when she has a full crop, if you can defer this at all safely until she has had time to get a bit hungry again. For though she will probably take and kill the bird offered, she may, if she is not hungry, refuse to stay on it while you can secure her; whereas when she is keen after her meal you will be able to wind her up as she stands over it on any reasonably level piece of ground. The process of winding up consists in merely dragging a fine line, the end of which is affixed to the quarry or to a stone or weight, round and round the feet of a hawk which is feeding on the ground. The difficulty is to pass the line under the tail, which, of course, acts as a mild sort of shield to keep the cord off. As the falconer walks round and round his hawk with the end of the line in his hand he must wait, as the line gets to the hawk’s tail, for a favourable opportunity of pulling it under. If the hawk is fidgety and keeps disengaging her feet from the loops which have been already wound round her, it may be necessary to make many circles, and to begin the work several times all over again. But if the hawk is not frightened by any violent pulls on the line, or by unsuccessful attempts to take her up, the loops will sooner or later be so securely hitched round one or both feet that she cannot possibly escape. In the case of a hawk which has been out long, and is shy and suspicious, a long line must be used, and much care must be taken not to alarm her by jerking or tugging at it as you wind. Some hawks will, during a week’s holiday, have retained a great many of the habits and much of the tameness which a course of training has deeply instilled into them, while others will in the same space of time have developed into almost wild creatures. This method of recapture is usually the simplest and handiest, when it is found impossible to take the hawk up by hand in the ordinary way. For no preparation or paraphernalia are required except a live lure and a long coil of string. If, however, you prefer to haul about with you a bow net with its pegs and rings, and do not mind the trouble and delay of setting the net, with the bait in the proper place, that will, of course, effect your purpose in many instances very well. But it is rather an intricate business compared with the other, and one in which an unpractised hand may easily make a mistake.

Another plan which has been recommended is to fly a bagged pigeon or other quarry in a light creance, and let the lost hawk take it. Then, as she is breaking in, walk slowly in and endeavour to take her up with the hand. If she objects and tries to carry, let her go, but keep hold of her victim, which she will be obliged to drop. Then, pegging that victim down firmly to the ground, take a few feathers and stick them up in the earth on every side of the body, the tips bending inwards, but not quite touching it. Round these feathers pass the loop of a cord with a running slip-knot in it, and carry the end of the cord right away to a distance, where you can hide, or where at least your presence will not prevent the hawk from coming back. As soon as she has come back pull the string, which will tighten the noose round her legs, and, keeping it taut, run in and secure your prisoner. The plan is ingenious and sounds feasible. I cannot doubt that it has been found so. Only—what if the hawk never comes back at all? You may sit for hours, with the string ready in your hand, waiting for her to reappear, and if she does not, will you not look rather small? Often, perhaps, hawks do so reappear. But sometimes I can affirm that they do not. A lost hawk in full condition and feather will, if scared away from one quarry, not always sit disconsolate watching for a chance of getting back to it, but go off simply and kill something else. A third-rate hawk may be so overjoyed at having for once captured some live creature, and so diffident about getting another before nightfall, that she will hang about and come back to her much-prized victim. But remember that it is the best hawks which run most risk of being lost, and which one is most anxious to get back.

Some hawks seem to have a natural aptitude for feeding themselves. They will do so at hack, before their sisters and brothers have even chased anything except in fun; and when left out for a night they may be seen in the early morning careering about after their favourite quarry, or some other. When tidings are brought in as to their whereabouts, the message is either that she was “see’d on a bird,” or “very near got ’im,” or at least was “chasin’ of ’em like one o’clock.” Such hawks are easier to track, no doubt, than the dull ones which sit still by the hour together; but on the other hand, more activity is required to come up with them and disabuse them of the idea that their rôle is now merely that of a wild bird. Liberty often acts as a wonderful stimulant to a trained hawk’s energies. The same falcon which has persistently refused rooks, and can seldom score off a partridge, will perhaps after twenty-four hours’ fasting in the tree-tops bowl over with alacrity whichever of these quarries first offers her a chance, and then, having been reduced again into bondage, relapse into the same indifference, and refuse to be induced by any amount either of feeding up or starving to fly a yard after one or the other. It is extraordinary what feats a bad hawk can be made to do by the schooling of the hard mistress Necessity. There was once a lame merlin which had injured her wing badly against a wire, and could only just fly at all, and that with a clumsy wobbling action. She was turned out loose in a place where some rebellious hobbies were being hacked, on the chance of her bringing them down to participate in her meals; but finding one day that her rations were not forthcoming until much later than usual, she wandered off in search of what she could pick up for herself, and was caught by a lad about three miles away from where she had started, on a small bird which she had actually killed single-handed!