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With the origins of falconry elsewhere in
the world going back at least to the third
millennium BC, North American association
with the sport cannot be termed anything but
brief. We can find no tangible evidence of
any practice of the sport by the native
peoples here. Even though Columbus had at
least one falconer in his party who
reportedly hunted with his hawks prior to
1500 in what is now Haiti, falconry here
long remained a rarity. Brief practice by
Spanish conquistadores in Mexico and even an
early New England pilgrim-falconer really
had little if any lasting influence. North
American records of those attempting to
practice the sport, through the 18th
and 19th centuries are rare
indeed and those to whom we have been able
to find reference were widely scattered both
geographically and in time. Although we may
have missed some records, such general
absence in the historical record more likely
reflects both a lack of any significant
measure of interest as well as participation
in falconry on the continent during that
period.
A handsomely illustrated article in the
National Geographic magazine for
December, 1920 aroused an interest in some
and provided ready reference in an era when
falconry books were both expensive and hard
to find on this side of the Atlantic. By the
1930’s we find a growing interest in the
sport, especially among young men associated
with eastern universities. Significantly,
without the long hawking tradition that
existed elsewhere in the world, falconry
here found an appeal not so much within the
North American hunting fraternity as among
those with an interest in nature and natural
history. It is noteworthy too, that stemming
from a natural history rather than hunting
background, most North American “falconry”
of that era consisted far more of possession
than of actual hunting. Much of that trend
can be traced to the glorification of the
Peregrine in the then-available literature
and the comparatively ready access to those
birds which commonly, for a falcon, nested
in the eastern U.S. The drawback: neither
the terrain nor the quarry readily available
in that part of the continent were suited to
active hunting with Peregrines, hence
much more having than hawking.
Late in that decade discovery of Peregrines
migrating along the barrier islands of the
eastern U.S. caused a significant shift in
American falconers’ approach to their
sport. From an orientation pointed almost
entirely toward the use of eyess falcons,
many American falconers began to trap their
own passage hawks, not just Peregrines but,
with lessons learned on those eastern
barrier islands, migrants of a variety of
suitable species. In contrast, where
passagers were used in Europe for the most
part they were obtained from professional
trappers, resulting in few local falconers
actually participating in their trapping.
The result was a circumstance
differentiating North American falconers
from their European brethren which continues
to this day.
By the end of the thirties and early forties
a series of articles by John and Frank
Craighead, themselves destined to gain fame
in a variety of natural history and
conservation venues, fueled an increasing
interest in the sport. Their account of a
trip to India and the falconry they
encountered there was the thing of which
American falconers could only fantasize.
Still, by the beginning of World War II, the
number of falconers known in North America
was less than 200.
Travel resulting from that war, along with
the ensuing advances in communications,
attracted increased numbers to falconry and
facilitated contacts among them. That
expansion was further enhanced by the
appearance of numerous – if sensationalistic
– articles in popular magazines. While many
of those initially enamored with the sport
through that media fell by the wayside when
faced with the realities of keeping, much
less hunting with a raptor, the number of
serious devotees expanded.
Up until the 1950’s falconry had received
little legal attention. In most states and
provinces the majority of raptors were
unprotected and in some instances bounties
were offered for their killing, their
possession thus being unrestricted. Falconry
was commonly omitted from regulations
listing “means” legal for taking game -- not
due to any opposition to the sport but
simply because falconry was too little known
even to be considered. To their credit,
falconers took a proactive role in seeking
legalization of their sport and its sensible
regulation. In these early efforts we see a
distinct if not unique advantage North
American falconers enjoyed, an advantage
stemming from their natural history
orientation already noted. With such
origins many falconers had become
professionally involved in ornithology and
wildlife management and hence were in a
position to credibly represent the sport
from a biological point of view. They were
simultaneously motivated to work toward a
scientific appreciation involving the
long-needed conservation of raptorial birds.
In both aspects their efforts and
representation are reflected in current laws
and regulations.
Almost from its beginnings, and despite the
tendency of falconry to attract
individualists, local falconry clubs began
to appear. Often begun on a strictly
informal, social basis, many evolved into a
means by which to influence
falconry-associated legalization and
regulation, and a few extended to national
level. Nationally these organizations,
though often short-lived, were a reflection
of the personality (and ego) of
strong-minded adherents to the sport. The
most notable of these was Captain (later
Colonel) R. Luff Meredith. A retired
military (Air Corps / Air Force) officer,
Meredith had developed an active devotion to
the sport early in the twentieth century.
With his age and experience, he was admired
by many coming later. Directly involved in
two of North America’s earliest national
falconry organizations -- one before and a
second following World War II -- he is,
today, considered the “Father of American
Falconry”.
By 1961, with numbers of American falconers
considerably expanded (at least
comparatively) and with Meredith aging and
ill, the North American Falconers
Association (NAFA) was formed. While on
occasion enmeshed in some of the same
personality issues as its predecessors, NAFA
has weathered such issues and is today a
solid, permanent, continent-wide,
representative of the sport. The current,
enviable status of falconry nationally, can
be traced directly to efforts orchestrated
by this organization. One immediate impact
on the sport here and directly attributable
to NAFA occurred at the organization’s first
“field meet” in Reno, Nevada in 1962. Over
the period of the meet and before its
assembled membership two young California
falconers, Louis Davis and Jimmy Adamson,
flying a west coast Peregrine and European
Goshawk respectively, consistently took wild
quarry with their birds, Davis even taking
three California quail over a single point.
While scattered others had taken wild game
in our past, the hunting instead of
just having that Davis and Adamson
demonstrated before so collected an audience
convinced many who witnessed it that indeed,
beyond all the books and all the talk,
falconry could be, truly, a hunting sport.
Few single events have had such a profound
and long-lasting effect on the practice of
falconry on the continent.
The 1960’s saw other events however, that
had major significance on how the sport was
practiced here. First falconers and then
scientists became aware of marked declines
in nesting populations of our native
Peregrine falcons, a situation most
especially evident in the East. A 1965
scientific conference on this population
disaster called upon those most familiar
with the species to seek to document and
then discover the cause (eventually
determined to be the result of persistent
pesticides) of and solution to the problem.
Initially unrecognized by its organizers,
many of those participating “experts” were
falconers.
Despite the fact that by then most
falconers’ Peregrines were passagers taken
on migration, to some “knee-jerk
conservationists” the falconers were to
blame: falconers take Peregrines, Peregrines
were declining, ergo, falconers must
be the cause of the decline! In contrast,
falconers were unwilling to accept the
extinction of the species – and they did
something about it! Again our natural
history origins played an important role.
Falconer-scientists, chief among them Prof.
Tom Cade, then Director of Research at
Cornell University’s prestigious Laboratory
of Ornithology, gathered together in search
of a solution.
Aided first by a dedicated group of graduate
and post-doctoral students -- falconers all
-- and then with the support of three others
best described as “hard-core falconers”,
Cade formed The Peregrine Fund. Using
falconers’ birds, techniques and money --
but most of all falconers’ passion -- that
group learned to breed the species in
captivity, to breed them in numbers and then
to successfully release them into the wild.
In so doing they played the major role the
most significant endangered species recovery
of the 20th Century, the return
of the Peregrine falcon in North America.
The importance of The Peregrine Fund’s role
was exemplified by the fact that when time
came to remove the Peregrine from the
endangered list the U.S. Secretary of the
Interior flew some 2,000 miles from
Washington D.C. to announce that recovery at
The Fund’s interpretative center. The
importance of the role of falconers in this
conservation effort cannot be
overstated. Recognition of that role,
particularly in circles previously opposed
to the sport, did much to enhance the status
of the sport and to elevate falconers to a
position well above just “users” of
wildlife.
It seems likely that along with the growing
appreciation of the overall value of our
bird of prey populations, the attention
drawn to the Peregrine and to ospreys and
bald eagles in that pesticide crisis, helped
influence a U. S. governmental decision to
assume federal (as opposed to the former
state) jurisdiction over raptors by their
addition to the Migratory Bird Treaty in
1972. That change was particularly
significant for falconers’ (NAFA’s) efforts
toward legalization of the sport, by
providing a single, federal point upon which
to focus efforts rather than having to work
as they had previously, piecemeal,
state-by-state.
By the time that raptor jurisdiction went
from state to federal hands NAFA had already
been active in developing a model state law
/ regulation aimed at developing better and
more consistent raptor management and
falconry regulation, country-wide. With
NAFA’s recommendations accepted in essence
by the International Assn. of Game and Fish
Commissioners it was not surprising when,
upon assuming jurisdiction over raptors, the
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service used the NAFA /
International proposal upon which to base
its proposed new, federal falconry
regulations. While it took some four years
to eventually come up with a final rule, the
falconry community under NAFA shepherding
did an exemplary job in expressing itself to
the federal authorities. They generated more
comment letters supporting those proposed
regulations than “The Service” has ever
received on any single issue, before or
since. Those regulations allowed
considerable development of the sport and,
despite being admittedly stringent, they are
highly, and indeed enviously, regarded
internationally.
Henceforth NAFA has assumed the role of
formally representing the sport with federal
officials while providing guidance and
assistance to its various state affiliates
in support of their efforts aimed at
legalization, regulation, seasons and the
like at the state level. With such an
arrangement NAFA was able to facilitate
local clubs in utilizing lessons learned in
similar efforts throughout the country. The
success of such an approach was exemplified
by 1998 in the legalization in all 49 of the
states in which the sport might be
practiced. (Hawaii, with its only indigenous
hawk on the endangered list and with imports
of non-native raptors prohibited, is the one
state where conduct of the sport is not
feasible); but we get ahead of ourselves.
An incident culminating in 1984 at first
appeared to threaten the good standing of
the sport in the United States and Canada.
The Law Enforcement Division of the U.S.
Fish & Wildlife Service became convinced
that there existed a multi-million dollar
illicit trade in falcons conducted between
North American and Middle Eastern falconers.
A major “sting” operation was undertaken
but, unable to find any falconers they
claimed were offering illicit birds, the
Service itself took a number of gyrfalcons
and then-endangered Peregrines from the wild
to use as “bait” in what amounted entrapment
actions. Culminating in numerous arrests,
charges and publicity, The Service was
unable to substantiate its claims of such a
market since none existed except of their
own making. In the long run, the Law
Enforcement Division suffered more than
considerable humiliation. Unfortunately,
falconers still suffer in the aftermath of
this federal debacle. Given the spectacular
nature of Law Enforcement claims when it
“revealed” our imagined transgressions there
remain those who still today, despite all
the evidence to the contrary, view us as
representing illicit commercial motives.
Because of their lack of long-established,
historic traditions, North American
falconers have been inclined to “push the
envelope” rather than simply follow past
practices in lock-step. Perhaps for that
reason five of the six major advances in the
sport occurring in the 20th
Century originated in North America,
specifically:
1.
The development of captive breeding
techniques, to include the creation of
hybrids, as a source of birds for use in the
sport as well as a technique valuable in
raptor conservation efforts.
2.
The development of radio telemetry, both
facilitating recovery of lost hawks and
enabling falconers to fly their birds in
higher – and, thus, healthier and more
effective – condition. The results of the
latter have had significant effect on the
quality of the sport to be seen here today.
3.
Development of the “American hood”, with its
thin leather, exceptional workmanship and a
beak-opening conforming to the natural
contours of the falcon’s head – the most
significant advances in hood making in the
preceding half millennium.
4.
Discovery of the cause of, and then cure for
the ancient, lethal falcon’s disease of
“frounce” (trichomoniasis).
5.
Introduction of the Red-tailed Hawk and
Harris’ Hawk into international falconry.
The sixth such major 20th Century
advance was the development by British
falconer Guy Aylmer of the “Aylmeri jess”.
Through the period following final
establishment of those first U.S. federal
falconry standards in 1976 falconry in North
America has continued to expand and improve
significantly, not so much a matter of
numbers (the very nature of the sport is
itself self-limiting) but more in
quality. The 1970’s saw the onset of a
revival of the sport in Mexico where ensuing
decades have seen a steady expansion of its
practice with a number of local clubs now in
established, meets held and with the
undertaking of efforts toward improved
raptor conservation and falconry
regulation. Without federal oversight
Canada has remained fragmented with
considerable variation regarding the sport,
province to province from outright
illegality to provisions as generous as any
in the U.S. Certainly the improvement of
quality in hawking to be seen in the United
States has been equaled in Canada, if only
on a smaller scale given a much smaller
population of falconers. In all three
countries, example, regulation, peer
pressure and opportunity have combined to
produce a standard of falconry of which all
its participants can be proud. Overall we
have as fine a state of falconry in North
America as anywhere in the world.
As we close the first decade of the 21st
Century we find falconry in North America in
a healthy and encouraging position. A
lengthy review and revision of the federal
falconry standards has been accomplished and
approved and awaits state compliance, due by
2014. Not only has the Peregrine been
removed from federal endangered designation
and eyess take now sanctioned but more
recently passage Peregrine take has been
approved, with implementation beginning in
the autumn of 2009. The role of falconers in
conservation becomes increasingly
appreciated and NAFA, approaching some 2,000
members, is on a solid foundation as it
continues its representation of our sport. |
