Apache - 2011 Imprint Male Goshawk

[rocgwp]

I'm not sure how detailed I'm gonna keep this thread, but I couldn't resist sharing.

Meet Apache. He is an 18 day old goshawk from Barry's project. I am raising him with full-food association (hand feeding). Here are some pics...

This is the large soft sided dog kennel I'm using as an imprint tank. It is lined with a cheap shower curtain that I can change regularly.


Apache in his nest bowl. (I'm going to get a bigger nest bowl for him, he can already get out of this one)


Exploring the house...


Taking a rest on the dog bed...


Exposing him to horses, just in case I ever hunt from horseback


Last night he crawled out of the nestbowl and explored for a little bit. He went back to the nestbowl on his own where I rewarded him.

At this point I am handing feeding him and introducing the CR (clicker). I only feed him when he is sitting calmly on his haunches. I hand feed him until he loses interest and then I leave the rest of the food with him.

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

He looks a handsome fellow. Good to see you experimenting with hand feeding. Are you feeding from the bare fingers? Are you going to use Steve Layman's system of hand feeding? Please give us any detail in his raising.
I am collecting information on weights used in gender determination in the gos so it would be great if you would weigh him at day 20 in the morning before feeding. My guess is that the male and female gos begin to separate in weights at 20 days but this is only a guess. The aplomado and Cooper's can be sexed using weight so there is a record that the system will work.
My intention is to use food association in hooding a male gos I will imprint this year.
Best of luck with your little boy.

Harry.

[rocgwp]

Harry,

I am feeding him with my bare fingers and I am using Steve Layman's method of feeding, raising, imprinting. I approach the nest bowl with food and set it in front of him. I crouch down with my face close to him and hand him the tidbit as if I am a parent feeding him. I don't hide food from him at all. The goal is to simulate a parent as much as possible and to teach him to calmly wait for food.

I'll try and weigh him on Monday for you since that will be 20 days.

[kitana]

Cool project! I intend to do something very similar the day I get a goshawk. I will follow your thread with attention. Good luck and have fun!

[FredFogg]

Man, I am getting eyas fever! LOL Definately going to watch this thread because I want to imprint a goshawk sometime in the future and really would like to see the OC methond done in steps and detail. Thanks for starting this thead.

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

Most interesting. I look forward to reading the details of your project and how this system works for you and your little buddy.

Many thanks for the weighing Monday.

Harry.

[rocgwp]

19 days

Apache is beginning to understand the feeding routine. I'm not sure he understands the CR yet, but that should come soon. At this point, I approach with a bag of food. I put it inside the small plate/jar lid inside his nest bowl. I wait for him to sit on his haunches. I then CR and lean in and hand him a tidbit. I continue CRing and feeding him looking for things like 'rubbery feet', relaxed posture, etc...my aim is to CR for behaviors that show a calm relaxed attitude. If he stands up and walks around, I stop feeding him. Once he sits on his haunches and is relaxed, the CRing feeding continue. After a 20 or so tidbits, I step away and leave him to self feed with the rest of the food if he wants.

Here are some pics.


This one isn't great because I had to take it through the kennel screen. This is his favorite way to sleep though. Scared me to death the first time I saw him...

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

Interesting keep writing about your system.

Harry.

[TiercelR]

Hi Jeff, good luck with your goshawk !! very interesting the method of rearing you useing.

This is the first time i hear about the method of whole food association of the raptor with the falconer.

You know, in past times this food association was relationed with screaming and aggression behaviours, etc. But i do believe that the imprinting methods still improving new good results with the pass of the time as it is right now.

So, now with the use of a clicker in critical moments of the imprinting, it is a new revolution in the new training methods for raptors.

Are there a link online of the article by Steve Layman about this method of rearing that you are useing ?? or where can i find this article for read it ?? thanks.

[rocgwp]

20 days

I weighed Apache this morning before I fed him. I weighed him twice because I figured there is no way he has gained that much since he left Barry's on Friday morning. He weighed in at 690g this morning. I am going to weigh him tomorrow with a different scale and see if it is a scale issue or if he has grown that much.

Yesterday he was exposed to mowing the lawn and playing outside. He was also"Ooooed and Awwwwed" over by about 10 college students that came over. He takes everything with a grain of salt so far. No fear response on anything...today he gets to go to camp and me LOTS of kids...

Here is a shot of the feather growth:

[rocgwp]

I went ahead and reweighed Apache to see if it was a scale issue. It appears the scale is accurate. He weighed 715g when I reweighed him, but that was with a partial crop after being fed. So I guess 690g at 20 days is an accurate weight for him.

[kitana]

You know, in past times this food association was relationed with screaming and aggression behaviours, etc. But i do believe that the imprinting methods still improving new good results with the pass of the time as it is right now.

That's exactly what one wants to avoid with using the clicker. You want the hawk to associate the food with himself, with behaviors he can do, not with the falconer. I'm sure it works great with a clicker-savvy falconer, as it works with every other species out there. Horse for example are well-known to become troublesome and bite if given treats. Use the clicker though, and they stop these behaviors as soon as they understand what to do to receive the food beside bullying the trainer.

I'm very interested in food delivery mechanics. We all know that hand-feeding a hawk results in being footed. I know about high-level tidbiting and it does work, but then you have to replace the clicker by a whistle or a noise made by the mouth for the mechanics become too complex. I have friends who clicker train free-lofted raptors in zoos using a stick to deliver the food and a whistle as a clicker, it works great but I still think it's a hassle. It would be great not having to worry about those feet! lol

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

Many thanks for Apache's weight at 20 days.

By the way I've brought the dish of chopped food to the Cooper's during imprinting and other hawks for decades. I sit with them stroking them softly as they eat and always with a dog present. In recent years I have bare hand fed aplomado falcons and none of them have been a problem except for one that I modified the procedure to feed bare hand only occasionally.
Falconers flying the larger falcos have been bare hand feeding especially gyrs for years too so the practice is far from new. I notice bare hand feeding of passage gos on kills in a video filmed in China by Nick Fox as another example.
For what its worth we have situated the hawklet near a window so it can view the outdoors along with the activities of the family and provided 30 to 45 minutes of early morning sun daily. I cover my imprints with a wire cage when out sunning and NEVER walk away from them. The local predators are really hungry in this desert. We watched 3 goldens slope soaring above our house last week and the RT is here all too often.
Keep up the good work it is looking good! We want the details...

Harry.

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,
I forgot to mention that I hood trained an aplomado falcon last year using Nelson's system of associating the hood with tidbits. As the hood was presented she would search through the hood looking for a tidbit and was hooded. As the season passed I began to offer a tidbit with the hood only now and again.
I have hooded passage HH using food over the years also and trained my late passage male HH to the hood last year using the same system. This HH is really footy and what one would call a pushy fellow but he takes food from the bare hand delicately.
This year I want to imprint a male gos and see if I can hood him using tidbits or food association. Perhaps it will work who knows with my all thumbs approach.
Harry.

[goshawkr]

That's exactly what one wants to avoid with using the clicker. You want the hawk to associate the food with himself, with behaviors he can do, not with the falconer. I'm sure it works great with a clicker-savvy falconer, as it works with every other species out there. Horse for example are well-known to become troublesome and bite if given treats. Use the clicker though, and they stop these behaviors as soon as they understand what to do to receive the food beside bullying the trainer.

I'm very interested in food delivery mechanics. We all know that hand-feeding a hawk results in being footed. I know about high-level tidbiting and it does work, but then you have to replace the clicker by a whistle or a noise made by the mouth for the mechanics become too complex. I have friends who clicker train free-lofted raptors in zoos using a stick to deliver the food and a whistle as a clicker, it works great but I still think it's a hassle. It would be great not having to worry about those feet! lol

Hand feeding a hawk can result in being footed, but it dosnt have to.

A few weeks ago the subject of hand feeding imprint goshawks came up in a thread about imprint harris hawks. See post 92 of this thread:
http://www.nafex.net/showthread.php?t=11310&page=3

The mechanics become very difficult with using a clicker with the hawk simply because your short one hand. Although you can click with your bare hand, set the clicker down, and then deliver the food.

The whole point of the clicker is to decouple to some extent the behavior to be rewarded (and the instant that it occured) with the actual delivery of food.

Back on the point of delivery methods, I have had hawks with bad manners about taking food, and I delivered food to them by tossing the tidbit on the floor. There were a few hawks that I have had where I just decided floor delivery was simpler for me than teaching them manners.

[goshawkr]

19 days

Apache is beginning to understand the feeding routine. I'm not sure he understands the CR yet, but that should come soon. At this point, I approach with a bag of food. I put it inside the small plate/jar lid inside his nest bowl. I wait for him to sit on his haunches. I then CR and lean in and hand him a tidbit. I continue CRing and feeding him looking for things like 'rubbery feet', relaxed posture, etc...my aim is to CR for behaviors that show a calm relaxed attitude. If he stands up and walks around, I stop feeding him. Once he sits on his haunches and is relaxed, the CRing feeding continue. After a 20 or so tidbits, I step away and leave him to self feed with the rest of the food if he wants.

Hi Jeff.

I think its very exciting to see another falconer willing to walk on the dark side and hand feed an imprint accipiter. There are a number of us out there, but since the collective wisdom is that what we are doing is going to create a face grabbing monster, we dont tend to get a lot of press.

It sounds like your really on the right track. I was going to point out that at the age your little guy is at you dont need to train for a relaxed attitude, but then I realised its never too eary to start that and it never hurts to be too paranoid about that. And, indeed, it does hurt if your not paranoid enough about that and get some bad manners.

You can also take advantage of this time to do a surprising amount of training. I start lure training at about the age your guy is at now by using OC. I start by clicking when they show any curiosity or other interest in the lure, and gradually ramp up the stakes until they are actively footing it. You can have them wed to the lure by the time they are barely able to walk.

There is a lot of time between now and entering, and a lot of fun games you can play while raising them that will actually get them prepared for life in the field and/or life at home.

If your into exercising your hawk so they are super fit in the field, the foundation for those exercises can be laid down while they are a baby as well - not as young as your guy is now, but a bit later on.

One other thing I wanted to point out is that you can take things a lot farther if most of the meal comes through tidbits and OC games. Very young hawks have a short attention span, and their focus on getting fed disappears very quickly once they food actually shows up. This combines to mean that there is a very small window of time to play each individual game, but you can come back in 20-30 minutes and play another game. Depending, of course, on how that works into your own personal schedule.

At this stage - many small games are better than one or two big ones. And, of course, many small games are better than one small game.

[joturley]

Jeff,
I notice bare hand feeding of passage gos on kills in a video filmed in China by Nick Fox as another example.

Harry.

I have bare-hand fed all my goshawks (4 passage/1 imprint) with no footing problems from any of them. My current passage female gos takes tidbits exceptionally gently, and lets me rearrange her food on the glove with a bare hand, as well as on the kill. One of her favourite treats is a half eggshell with the yolk in it, which she 'sips' as I hold it for her. /jo

[rocgwp]

It's good to see lots of good info about OC training.

I will begin the lure training as described tonight.

I had a great talk with Steve Layman today. It's good to see he is recovering well and ahead of schedule. He hinted that he might start working on that book while he is recovering. A lot of the techniques I am using, I might not post a lot of details on. Everything I know OC falconry wise gets credited to Steve and our conversations over the past year. If he publishes it, i want him to get credit for it not me.

I am working toward a modified hack. My coops got electrocuted at hack last year, so I'm a little gunshy. Where I was going to hack this year, I could have some redtail issues. What I am leaning towards is using a 20' x 20' flight pen. I am setting it up with appropriate perches this week.

[rocgwp]

As for the weight issue, Barry helped me sort it out. I was a day off in my calculations. Apache is 21 days today, not 20. Sorry if that throws your records off Harry...

[hcmcelroy]

Jo,

4 gos is a good number. What is the advantage you see in bare hand feeding?

Harry.

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

I'm a great believer in the flight pen and had dual 50' flights in Willcox. Here we live on a hill and it is solid rock, and on a hell of a slant so we only added a 16' flt pen. It took us forever and we were sliding over the loose gravel every time we made a move. But it is finished and so be it. Including the mew the gos will have a 24' area for exercise.

Harry.

[hcmcelroy]

Thanks again Jeff no problem I can live with weight at 21 days.

Harry.

[rocgwp]

Started lure training with him last night and it went well. We did several short sessions with 20-30 minutes in between.

Here is a pic from this morning:

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

An enchanting photo. You might want to put it on the wall.

Harry.

[rocgwp]

Jo,

4 gos is a good number. What is the advantage you see in bare hand feeding?

Harry.

The advantage in hand feeding for me comes in combination with using the CR. The combination of the two allows me to define the boundaries of our relationship. I can reward what I like and shape the behaviors I will need later down the road. The biggest advantage I see is I have a means of dealing with problems as they arise. The hawk and I now have a common language and I have a tool to get through aggression or whatever else pops up.

Here are some pics from tonight...

22days

[joturley]

Jo,

4 gos is a good number. What is the advantage you see in bare hand feeding?

Harry.

*****************

(5 gos) I never thought about advantage/s; I didn't/don't do it with the RT or HH. Maybe it started off as a way to get the gos interested in tidbits without the threat of a cumbersome glove on the hand. I did both high level offering, and a 'hidden in the hand' approach, the treat then dropping onto the [round perch] platform without the hawk seeing the transfer.
The one male gos I used bare-handed feeding with was very hood-shy, and that morphed into being very hood-hand shy; the tidbitting with the bare hand got him over that eventually. /jo

[hcmcelroy]

Jeff,

Thanks for your comments about hand feeding. Do you care to go into details about shaping behaviors using the system. It would be a real service to many of us.

Harry.

[hcmcelroy]

Jo,

Thanks for your comments about hood shy. Can you offer some detail about the hood shyness? How did it develop and at what age? How did you use high level tidbitting, etc. Fascinating information!

Harry.

[joturley]

Harry - the bare-hand tidbitting only got the passage male over being shy of the hood hand as long as he didn't see the hood; but that was still an improvement. I didn't keep him after the season, so the experiment stopped at that stage. I think the fear started soon after the first month of training - November? and went downhill from there.
My current passage gos I did hood train using tidbitting specifically as an inducement & reward -- just as effective was that the tidbitting caused her to focus on food, not the instinct to bate, long enough not to interrupt the sequence. A bate bypass, as it were. For the entire manning period, all her ration was in the form of tidbits, and she was fed throughout a 12 hour day while she was hoodless on a round perch & kept in a medium traffic area with 4 doorways; with nothing to immediately quell her appetite, she was always ready for another interaction and keenly paid attention. Within a couple of days she would be leaning from the perch towards whatever door anyone came through, looking for her tidbit. Only when she was jumping to, and staying on her own on the glove, did I incorporate the tidbitting/hooding & it went very smoothly. From the start of training to the hood & putting her up for the moult, I think I can honestly say she bated during the hooding process less than 6 times; and even then, only a single bate.
Her continuing performance this last winter was an extension of the manning - I kept her in the traffic zone; never fed an entire ration at one time except on the days she hunted; fed with my bare hand & always with some touching of her keel, feet, shoulders & tail with or without a tidbit. As I mentioned before, she goes hoodless except when in the travel box; didn't do the hanging bate from the glove, hardly bated at all, actually; tolerated handling like an imprint but was never in the least footy.
Now she's free-lofted for the moult - who knows what latent monster will emerge <G>. /jo

[hcmcelroy]

Jo,

That is impressive...many thanks for your time! Your combination of manning and hooding seems to fit your female to a T. Good to hear she did not grab your hand in feeding. That must have taken some careful reading of her reaction. With such tameness I assume she was easy to handle in the field. Did she follow along or was she flown out of the hood?
I hooded an imprinted aplo falcon this year and used tidbitting with it a la Nelson and it went nicely. When the hood was used in the field, usually after a kill and some feeding, she peered at the hood searching for a tidbit. She was hooded daily after the hunt on the ride back to the truck. As the season passed the tidbitting was maintained but used less frequently.
I'll try the same general system on an imprinted male gos this year. We pick it up in two days!!!
Thanks again!
Harry.

[rocgwp]

23 Days

We had some great outside time in the yard last night. The lure training is progressing quickly. So far nothing seems to bother this bird. He is more mellow than the coops I have raised. We have been very careful and haven't had any moments that caused fear chittering. As he gets more active, I will transition him to the big flight pen during the day.

Here is a picture of this fall's hunting team:

[joturley]

[QUOTE=hcmcelroy;192583]Jo,

That must have taken some careful reading of her reaction. With such tameness I assume she was easy to handle in the field. Did she follow along or was she flown out of the hood?
*****
I just went ahead and did it as soon as I had her on the perch. If she bated off, she came up again to find the tidbit there on my hand, or on the platform of the round perch. Once she took the first offering, she hardly ever went over the side again, away from my approach. I do feel she was a pretty mellow gos to start with - taken just past mid-Oct of the year. I started feeling her over as soon as she was taking the tidbits eagerly & steadily - I think day#3. Certainly within the week she would be steady in front of visitors, letting me handle her whole body with no bating & seemingly little anxiety. She also let visitors touch her (I encourage it).
She was GREAT in the field; a little more diffident about coming to the glove when called after a miss vs the imprint, but she started doing it well by the end of the season - sometimes running along the ground up to 50 feet to get to me. Always at the end of the hunt she followed VERY WELL, anticipating the quail I invariably kicked up for her on the way (baggy) - but if we did see a hare before the baggy event, she was game to go after it.
A surprising event happened on maybe our third free flight/hunt in the bush - I thought she'd gone after a hare, and followed some 200 yards to the point I last saw her - but she wasn't there. We'd been out maybe 3+ hours, it was getting down to dusk and I was about 2 km from the truck.
My Tracker came out of the holster with the display fogged over, and I had to warm it up inside my coat for a few minutes while I called & whistled.
I spent the next half hour tracking her - she seemed to have kept to a straight line, which I couldn't do in the cover of that woodlot with its deep snow drifts. Eventually I decided that it would be better to track the truck, as it was getting dark. By coincidence, the tracks were almost the same. As I broke into a meadow from which I could see my truck some 300 yards away, I also whistled and swung the lure - and my gos came out of the woods across from me! I am convinced she was waiting at the truck for me all that time.
Since that time, I noticed that she was reasonably independent for the first 3-4 hours of a hunt, but if no kill had happened in that time, she worked in closer & followed much better - NICE FOR ME <G>.
I never let a hunt end without a live kill, in as natural a way as I could set up - I think this helped tremendously in what turned out to be a harsh season w/low population, difficult access re depth of snow & number of hours required to kick up what was out there. It could have been very frustrating for a first year passage hawk, but she was a trouper & easy/reliable to work with- I could walk her unhooded on the glove for a mile at a time, to access different woodlot areas - and thus be ready for a flight off the fist if such a [rare] opportunity presented. To do the same with her just following, would have taken longer, and at 5-10 F, we prefer shorter hunts in the most populated area we can get into!!! /jo

[rocgwp]

I forgot to mention that I weighed Apache this morning. He weighed 746g at 23 days.

Here is that favorite sleeping pose of his:


Here he is in the nestbowl waiting for food:

[robruger1]

Is this a NA bird or a euro?

[rocgwp]

It's a North American bird produced by Barry. The father of this bird was wild taken from New Mexico and flew at 750g+ the mother flew at 1020g. It likes he is going to have some size to him.