This weekend was mild enough to fly both falcons on Saturday, so I took some pictures of them doing their thing. Here's Cora, a Peregrine, chowing down on some quail wing.
Lady offscreen: Oh my god, it's alive!
Well, not any more.
Here she is, coming in for the lure. The lure is swung around in circles, and yanked away when the bird dives in. They either have to be fast enough to catch it from Scott (a Master Falconer) or wait for him to slow down for them.
Cora dives faster than Spyder, who puts on the brakes when he takes the lure.
See how his wings are outspread? This is just before grabbing the lure. He's being trained to not slow down before the impact, but he's not quite there yet.
Here he is zooming in. He loses a lot of this speed when he brakes.
When they've caught the lure, they are re-tethered while they eat their prize. To get them back on the glove, they're given another meaty treat as incentive.
Yeah, I'm talking about you.
This weekend JrFalconer and I made some new jesses for the birds.
Jesses are the leather anklets and straps that allow us to handle these birds of prey. They're very soft, so they don't irritate their delicate legs, but are strong enough to keep them from slipping out of them. Usually.
I was making kestrel jesses here, but it took a few tries to get them small enough for their tiny legs! Along the way, we ended up with Barn Owl and Merlin jesses too.
Henry is a master at chewing through his anklets. So are the eagles.
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