829 



FALCONRY-THE CATCHING OF HAWKS AND FALCONS. 

 Being a Supplement to " The Birds of Prey of the Punjab." 



BY 



C. H. Donald. 

 {With two plates). 



I have frequently been asked whether Falconry is an expensive amusemsnt and 

 how best to make a beginning, so before going any further I shall endeavour to 

 answer the above questions. 



The expense depends entirely on the individual. Like everything else, 

 you can make it as expensive as you like or as cheap as you like, but in'either 

 case it is not going to be done for nothing, and no Britisher in this country can 

 carry on entirely by himself, and must have at least one falconer to train and 

 exercise his birds and look after them generally. Plenty of time and unlimited 

 patience are essential adjuncts to the successful falconer, and the former, at 

 least, is not the usual cry of the European in India. 



If it is intended to keep a large team of falcons and " do " the thing really 

 well, and mount your falconers, then it becomes an expensive sport, but the 

 writer well remembers the time when he indulged in a team of over a dozen 

 hawks and falcons, wiith but one falconer and a " chokra " to run the entiro 

 business, and even if the establishment, and the unsystematic methods of its 

 owner, were such as to cause acute pain and grief to good old Peter Ballantyne 

 and his ilk, had ho but seen us at work, they afforded no small amount of plea- 

 sure to the writer. 



I was in a district where sport was fairly varied, but one had to go some dis- 

 tance to get it, and this could not always be managed, so we went on the system 

 of " something for everything." The love of seeing the birds at work was every- 

 thing to me, and if we could not go far afield for heron, lioubara and duck, well 

 there were always kites, crows, paddy birds, rollers, hoopoes, larks and such 

 like near at hand, and it would be a bad day indeed that some of the above did 

 not afford me a good morning's or afternoon's sport. One beautiful Sakar never 

 disappointed us, be the quarry kite or houbara, and a cast of Peregrines, and a 

 lovely Shaheen were reserved for the days we could get out to the haunts of 

 heron, houbara and duck. A cast of Laggars were ever ready to oblige when 

 crows or paddy birds were about, and a Merlin and a couple of Turumtis whiled 

 8iwa,y many a pleasant hour in the pursuit of small fry. Though the fry was small 

 the sport very often was grand in the extreme. 



If £ s. d. had not been lacking the writer would have read up every old book 

 on the subject and combined the methods of the East and West, and indulged 

 to the full in the good old " sport of kings '' according to the teachings of the 

 many excellent books on the subject, but the ways and moans being extremely 

 short, a man and a boy was ail that was possible and a fairly good horse that 

 carried me on inspection duty, as well as out hawking, with equal regularity. 



Since economy was the first consideration, it was ob\'iou3 that the purchase 

 of falcons and hawks, at fairs and bazaars, was out of the question, so the first 

 thing to do was to catch them. This not only proved pretty simple, but extreme- 

 ly fascinating and instructive. My falconer was an adept in the art of making 

 nets and nooses and we soon had all sorts of paraphernaha ready, and how many 

 miles I walked with the old fellow, over river beds, ploughed fields and over 

 every kind of abomination, I should be afraid to say. What was the result ? 

 I got so keen on simply catching birds that I was prepared to go on indefinitely 

 much to the disgust of the old falconer, who mildly remonstrated and asked if I 

 had only got him to catch birds or were they ever to be trained ? The " chokra " 

 by then was mounting guard over some half a dozen birds, quite three of which 

 were only fit for decovs, being ancient tiercel's, bat ha\nng been caught, it went to 

 my heart to let them go again ! The counsels of the falconer prevailed an.l we 



