My old Brittany died yesterday. He was over thirteen years old and had gone totally blind and deaf. Now he is gone to the great hunting ground in the sky to hunt all the rabbits and pheasants he wants - which doesn’t really make sense, because more…

Not so long ago, well a few millions years ago, there was a bird that was the absolute master of its world.

Today we consider the eagle to be the ultimate predator and top of the food chain, and rightly so, as there is no other bird or beast that can master it or regularly use it for food.

But between two and sixty million years ago, just before modern man walked upon the earth there was a bird so ferocious more…

I started flying a Gyr X Peregrine hybrid this week and he is the most handsome falcon. Even though he is still in his immature plumage he is such a pretty dark coloured bird. He was bred last year and the only reason I took him on, as I like to do all the training myself, is because he was owned and flown by a good friend of mine whose training methods are not too different from my own. I gave him a few days to settle down more…

 I lost my good female Harris Hawk “Martha” the other evening. It was five o’clock and the rabbits were just starting to pop their little heads out into the evening sunshine to feed. Just like I had done a hundred times before, I unloaded herself from the jeep, quietly closed over the door and snuck over the brow of a certain little hill to let her see the rabbits feeding below. The hill dropped steeply down to a laneway and there was a thick old hawthorn hedge bordering the grassy field where rabbits were plentiful. As soon as we peered over the hill a half-grown bunny high-tailed in across the lane toward cover and off she went in pursuit.

It was a typical downward glide flight. A couple of strong flaps to get herself in motion, then she set her wings and glided steadily on a direct course for her target. Not the most exciting of flights but it can be very effective, as from the rabbit’s point of view there is very little moving to catch its eye, and then it’s nearly too late as the hawk is upon it and the rabbit must act extremely fast if it wants to survive, and this is exactly what happened in this case. The rabbit ran, she tried her best, but she missed and I saw her standing on the ditch by the lane under a large sycamore tree.

And this is where things went wrong. more…

If you would like to see a few of my birds, take a look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCpCGmqkqLM

It’s a small piece the kids done for childrens television, and please feel free to leave a comment on you tube,

thanks,  Tom

I have been watching a lot of raptors lately here in Ireland. The local pair of kestrels I see nearly everyday, battling the wind as they hover above the grassy hill, watching for beetles below and getting mobbed by the local hooded crows which take exception to their presence. Every sunny day I see more…

When I was a kid I used to spend my time walking the hills with the dogs. I would walk for miles along the beaches in Winter-time when no one was about, or to distant fields or any piece of waste ground in the chance of spooking up a rabbit for the dogs to chase. more…

There are two types of falconers in this world; those that love Harris Hawks, and those that don’t.

If everyone loved the same things, if everyone agreed on everything and thought the same the world would be a less colourful and interesting place, so this surely can only be a good thing.

Since the first Harris Hawks were introduced into the falconry circle just a few decades ago more…

My first ever bird of prey was a kestrel. I was about fifteen years old and fascinated by hawks of all kinds, so when a young kestrel was handed to me after it had obviously fallen out of a nest I was more than ready for the challenge. I trapped mice and starlings to feed it on and the lurchers were kept running through the nights to make sure there was always rabbit meat available. After spending weeks rearing him, re-reading every falconry book I could lay my hands on more…

The other day I was out with my two year old female Harris Hawk. While waiting for the rain to stop I sat in the jeep listening to the radio before the usual ceremony of putting on my wellies and jacket. The landscape was quite undulating with a steep drop off to the left, and as Joe Duffy’s phone lines opened and the callers complained about whatever was on the agenda that day, I noticed a raven and a hooded-crow more…