Falconry Displays

Some of the best evenings I ever had as a young falconer was rabbit hawking over at Red Marley in Gloucestershire.

I would phone the Falconry Centre and ask if Paul the head falconer was going out hawking in the evening – and if I could come.

Then I would cycle out and we would take a Hawk Eagle or some other bird that Paul was flying. We would drive the few miles down to Red Marley in his Morris 1000 with the bird sitting on my fist. Fantastic.

The place itself was a long winding valley and apart from sheep grazing the place was left to the rabbits – and it was so quiet not a car to be heard.

On those windless early summer evenings, we had the most marvellous sport with rabbits sitting out a long way from cover. We had some wonderful flights.

One evening we met by chance by a couple of falconers from the Welsh Hawking Club. What followed was a great evening with the three Goshawks chasing rabbits all over the place. They had a little Jack Russell that was excellent at flushing rabbits out of ditches.

Strangely enough I met one of the falconers many years later when I was doing the falconry display at the Herefordshire Country Show. He remembered that evening well.

In fact, I had an evening at home a few years later of a very similar nature with my buzzard. Rabbit numbers were high that year and subsequently many were feeding in semi-long grass well away from cover. We had some great flights. He was deadly out of a tree. He was the bird I used to fly with friends along the brook that I have mentioned in an earlier blog. He had been a wild young buzzard that was brought in sick and three years later after my first year at College, I released him back to the wild in the knowledge that he could look after himself.

The one thing that links these events together is the rabbit. Where are they now? Before myxomatosis – which was introduced in Northern France – and came to the UK in 1953 there were estimated to be about 100 million rabbits in the UK. On the arrival of the disease the rabbit population crashed by between 95%-99%. Clearly huge drop.

Rabbits through immunity in individuals began to slowly increase and apparently their numbers were almost up to pre-war levels in the early 1990s. Although anybody interested in the rabbit population including falconers would be aware of a cycle where rabbits numbers began to build up and then only to crash again as the selection pressure for immunity waned and the population once again became vulnerable to the ever-present myxomatosis virus. Country folk became familiar with this cycle. Some years football pitches were damaged by rabbits’ and in other years when rabbit numbers were down they were not.

Now things have changed again with a new virus known as viral haemorrhagic disease or a new strain RHDV2 in 2014 which has proved to be deadly to rabbits. When I walk the fields around where I live, I only ever see just one lone rabbit. I have found fully grown rabbits dead without a mark on them. Apparently, the virus can kill them very quickly without any visible signs of illness.

This is nation-wide and is worrying. You no longer see patches of shortened grass where rabbits have been grazing. At this time of year, young rabbits should be appearing. Long term this will affect the ecological balance and plants that we are now seeing will disappear as places begin to become overgrown and scrubby.

For falconers the never-ending supply of rabbits even available in lean years have for now disappeared. From what I have read rabbits are not showing ‘bounce back’ in terms of immunity as they did regarding myxomatosis and this is particularly worrying. This is because the number of surviving rabbits is so low meaning recovery if  it does take place will be slow.

The wonderful days are rabbit hawking have gone in many areas – certainly around here – at least for now which is such a shame.

As I have said in  my book ‘Falconry – aspects of care of the trained falcon and hawk’ in section 5 ‘The development of the hawk including buzzards’ you can fly a Harris hawk – get it to do all the things a hunting bird will do – following on, circling back and slope soaring and even ‘waiting on’ without the hunting component involved. This allows the falconer to still enjoy flying and developing a hawk.

Below is a picture of Red my Harris hawk. A bird for all seasons with a wonderful temperament  He would circle, soar and do everything well. I had him for 25 years.

Back to Red Marley or back from Red Marley I would cycle the 14 miles home in the dark buying fish and chips in Newent on the way home – to eat at the halfway point. Wonderful!