Ringing flights through O/C

[Gerkin]

I use shaping and chaining techniques for all my falconry training. I used to think that the Kings, Queens, and Emperors flights were the hardest to train. By using these techniques any falcon can be taught to mount or ring its quarry (houbara, crane, heron, crow, seagull, and skylark) with simple backyard training!

I, and indeed others would appreciate your starting a thread on this.

All of my ringing flights have very much been dictated by fitness, geography, point of slip and most important... limited quarry!
obviously made possible with some basic target recognition training,
I would love to hear more about what your comment alluded too.

[barbedraptor]

Let me organize my thoughts and post details tomorrow. Tonight I just want to set the stage. How to Teach Animals by Skinner in the 1951 December Scientific America and The Art of Falconry by Fredrick II tell most of the story. I simply teach the falcon to put quarry to ground. Merlins will loss their quarry in prairie dog holes or cover most of the time. But of course they are rewarded for ringing high beside their quarry and forcing it to stoop to cover. More about training technique tomorrow. Jim Fustos

[barbedraptor]

Ringing Flights-- Falcons can physically easily out fly all the traditionally pursued quarry such as houbara, crane, heron, crow, rook, seagull and skylark. It is the falconer's job to completely WED the falcon to the quarry and HABITUATE the desired flight. When chaining behaviors together remember to train and shape the last behavior first. Training Sequence: 1. Thoroughly wed falcon to quarry. Merlin plucks and eats about 10 dead English sparrows. 2. Whistle(CR) means fly back to fist. Train falcon to come to fist for food. 3. Habituate mini flights "to ground" in the backyard. Emperor Fredrick II used shaping and chaining techniques 750 years ago. Many teaching methods have hidden built-in CR's present in them. But now we know to make them obvious and instant. You can probably think of better backyard "to ground" methods then I have. Here are 3 of mine. 3 Mini Training Flights: I. Merlin-- Tie dead English sparrow lure to a circular string that runs through a 2 inch diameter PVC pipe. Stand about 10 feet away from the lure, unhood merlin, twitch lure, merlin catches lure, transfer to fist meal and feed up. Fast Forward: the next day merlin chases lure as you pull it into the pipe "to ground" and loses it. After each "to ground" whistle(CR), falcon flies to fist, pull lure out of pipe and she chases it again. Do 3 to 5 "to ground" each day for about 20 days. That is over 60 "to grounds". I will finish post tomorrow.

[barbedraptor]

II. Crow Hawking(mini): Using a dead frozen crow lure, suspend it about 10 feet off the ground. From about 100 feet away unhood the falcon and let her fly and bind to the frozen lure. Whistle(CR) and lower the falcon and lure to the ground. The falcon gives up the frozen lure and flies to the fist for food. Hood her and do it again. Do 3 to 5 "to ground" for 10 days. That is over 30 "to ground". III. Continue Backyard Training: Have an assistant twirl the frozen crow lure as you unhood the falcon from about 300 feet away. The assistant stoops the falcon once to the lure and then hides it under her coat. Whistle(CR) and have the falcon fly back to the fist for a tidbit. Hood and do again 3 to 5 times per session/day for about 10 days. Now the crow falcon has experienced over a total of 60 "to ground" trials. 4. Exercise: The merlin is trained in the morning and stooped to lure or jump-ups in the evening. Every third training day the crow falcon is stooped to the tennis ball lure up to 100 times or 100 to 200 jump-ups. 5. Crow falcon--Fly progressively able bagged game for about 6 more days with only 1 catch per day. Merlin--Is it E.B. Michell's hawking book or Mavrogato's or Lascelles' that says to first hunt molting adults because they don't ring and just fly to thicker cover? Whistle(CR) each put in "to ground" and feed up. After about 10 "to ground" go fly the ringing singing young of the year with your clumsy unhacked merlin. Using the CR is key. Jim Fustos

[Mandragen]

Jim, I'm thoroughly enjoying this thread, please continue. It gives me some great new ideas for training. I do find the posts a bit difficult to follow in some spots, I'm assuming you are jumping back and forth between two birds here, so it seems?

Are these birds you are currently working on, or is everything past tense?

[barbedraptor]

Sorry about the back and forth. The hiding the dead lure in the PVC pipe works so easily for the merlins that I wanted to show how that is done. I used the mini backyard frozen lure stuff for bigger quarry. Seagulls and crows training during pest bird abatement. I could call off (CR whistle) the falcons after one or two or three stoops after they had ringed the seagull keeping them from killing or binding and bringing them to ground so they wouldn't get killed by the local bald eagles or resident redtails. The training sequence just explains how to shape each stage of the entering to the ringing flight. Habituating the falcons to chasing their quarry to ground is what I wanted to explain. It is quit simple. Jim Fustos

[Mandragen]

That makes sense, thanks~!

[barbedraptor]

The beauty of the CR allows you to train a behavior that is not usually common in the wild. Merlins don't ring quarry in the wild because the quarry just gets away in the bushes most of the time. So to be able to CR and reward rare behavior enables you to practice that particular style flight. Example: I remember the article of the passage ferruginous hawk that quit flying jack rabbits after several days of coming up empty. All you would of needed to do is CR the misses until the hawk started to catch them regularly. The CR and reward would have encouraged those long beauty flights until the hawk learned how to finish them.

[Mandragen]

Correct, you are just reinforcing approximations at that point. If the individual cannot perform the entire behavior, you have to reward the approximations to the end result.

[Gerkin]

The beauty of the CR allows you to train a behavior that is not usually common in the wild. Merlins don't ring quarry in the wild because the quarry just gets away in the bushes most of the time. So to be able to CR and reward rare behavior enables you to practice that particular style flight. Example: I remember the article of the passage ferruginous hawk that quit flying jack rabbits after several days of coming up empty. All you would of needed to do is CR the misses until the hawk started to catch them regularly. The CR and reward would have encouraged those long beauty flights until the hawk learned how to finish them.

Wild Merlins of all races do ring quarry until the energy efficient & survival learning curve kicks in..

Motivation is offset by more efficient survival techniques.

Ringing flights are only possible for as long as the bird over flows with confidence, fitness and easier opportunities are not present.

What you describe is quite similar to how I train game falcons to be in a position of dominance, and is not how I would shape the necessary mind set for ringing pursuit.

A ringing flight is a very natural behaviour, as is the willingness for the bird to continue to do it..

The longevity of this style of hawking is down to the falconer and his skills in preventing the natural progression to more efficient techniques as seen in wild birds.. (hence your suggestion that wild birds DONT ring) they probably did, but learnt that such a high level of input both draws attention and is less effective than sneak attacks at low level

In the case of the Passage Ferru, I would suggest that additional disheartening factors took the bird away from its natural confidence and ceased the desired behaviour.. to maintain the positive motivation of ALMOST all other elements must be in place.

I've had birds try incredibly hard all season to catch things they have never caught or eaten before..
For this you need to work birds in a mind category that does not pressure them in to coming up with a solution fast to better their situation.
Effectively the bird is suspended in a serious play mode..


The natural learning of birds is simple, but is based on multiple aspects..
its influenced by confidence, fitness and recognition of suitable opportunities.

[barbedraptor]

I can't overstate the fact of the dead lure and PVC pipe with 60 "to ground" trials accomplishes the exact mindset for the merlin that you describe. Besides ringing flights my unhacked eyass merlins easily force small flocks (5 to 20) of English Sparrows, starlings or wild pigeons out of the air and into the ground. The setups are very similar to the classic rook hawking into the wind. The pigeon flights are just setup at their roosting and nesting sites at bridges or buildings. Pigeons aren't very afraid of a young merlin until about the third shallow stoop at the high circling flock and then a young bird will be picked out and forced out of the air into the ground. Beware that gyrfalcons, prairie falcons, redtails and great horned owls like to kill and eat the merlin on quarry. Jim Fustos

[falcon56]

I'm more than a little confused here Jim, maybe it's just me. How does training a bird to go from your fist to the dead sparrow lure on the ground /into the PVC pipe, transition to a bird that will energetically pursue ringing flights? The two behaviors aren't similar at all.

[Gerkin]

The two behaviors aren't similar at all.

I wonder if it might boil down to the personal interpretation of what a ringing flight actually is.. and what is required to maintain that behaviour?

I have to admit to reading his post & often skipping a lot of it as indigestible binary code.
Maybe its just me but the approach seems both over complicated without much explanation.. and certainly not much runs parallel to natural behaviour shaping
And I would consider myself one of the more complicated types & still didn't take much of it in.

[falcon56]

Marcus,
My interpretation of a ringing flight is a merlin pursuing quarry, whether starlings, horned larks, pigeons or whatever, up high in an attempt to get in a superior position above the quarry, then either stooping to the ground on the tail of the prey, slashing thru the flock to separate a "weaker hearted" individual and binding to it, or just following the prey up and snagging it out of the air.

[Hunner]

Marcus,
My interpretation of a ringing flight is a merlin pursuing quarry, whether starlings, horned larks, pigeons or whatever, up high in an attempt to get in a superior position above the quarry, then either stooping to the ground on the tail of the prey, slashing thru the flock to separate a "weaker hearted" individual and binding to it, or just following the prey up and snagging it out of the air.

Whew!! I was hoping things hadn't changed! Ringing is ringing is ringing! With the edge going to the larks.

[Tanner]

In America, haggard merlins do ring quarry as part of their repertoire. Furthermore, as Ray points out- many catches are made in the air during ringing flights, either at a high pitch or on the way down as both are stooping back to the ground. That is true for wild merlins as well as falconry birds.

My experiences with eyas merlins and high ringing flights in open country do not jive with what Jim is saying. Young merlins pursuing that quarry will engage in high ringing flights within a few attempts, naturally, without any "training". The young merlins have to be flying hard and learning how to foot that quarry very early in the year - and if they are going to be successful, they have to develop in lock-step with the quarry as it becomes tougher by the day in early fall (youngsters maturing and adults becoming full-summed in their flight feathers). Taking that much time (any time for that matter) away from actually flying at quarry at that time of year will put the young merlin behind, developmentally, and the game will be up. That's my experience anyway. Of course I am talking about house sparrows out in the open desert grasslands.

But who knows, I'm not much of a bird trainer in any respect.

[Tanner]

To Audry's original post - Audry if you find your kestrel hood shy, you can try putting a small piece of meat on the tip of your pinky finger. Put that through the beak opening of the hood so your finger tip and the meat are inside the hood. When she reaches forward and takes the meat, slip the hood on. That makes a no-brainer out of a dodgy small bird that isn't too enthusiastic about the hood.

[Gerkin]

Marcus,
My interpretation of a ringing flight

Is the same as mine

The question was directed at Jim to see if we are all following the same picture.

[barbedraptor]

I found after years of failures and a few successes I needed to put the ringing flight into a teaching model. It turned out shaping the "to ground" behavior to a high repeatable rate was all that was required of what I thought was complicated behaviors. The merlin easily and lazily will ring quarry up into the sky out of sight of the naked eye. It doesn't get any easier than that.

[Tanner]

Alrighty then.

[passagejack]

My brain now hurts..... not sure if it's the complicated dialog or the margaritas I'm drinking lol! I have found that if a merlin is reluctant to ring up with said quarry then teaching it to wait on is the answer. I have had a nice jack reluctant to ring up said quarry from the fist. I backed up a bit and over the course of 5 day had him waiting around d 500 feet. When said quarry was flushed he completely dominated them at this point. His throw ups were epic and the quarry lost its mind due to his complete dominance of the flight. I will be trying this again with a couple of new jacks this next season. It's natural for merlins to ring however they know when they are out matched physically. The advantage of height from a waiting on post on gives them all the confidence they need to ring up and dominant their quarry.

[JRedig]

I found after years of failures and a few successes I needed to put the ringing flight into a teaching model. It turned out shaping the "to ground" behavior to a high repeatable rate was all that was required of what I thought was complicated behaviors. The merlin easily and lazily will ring quarry up into the sky out of sight of the naked eye. It doesn't get any easier than that.

uh?

[falcon56]

Double "uh".

[falcon56]

I found after years of failures and a few successes I needed to put the ringing flight into a teaching model. It turned out shaping the "to ground" behavior to a high repeatable rate was all that was required of what I thought was complicated behaviors. The merlin easily and lazily will ring quarry up into the sky out of sight of the naked eye. It doesn't get any easier than that.

I don't know what you've experienced with ringing flights, but there is nothing easy or lazy when it comes to a focused merlin ringing quarry up out of sight, if the merlin was lazy, it would be left in the dust and never be successful.

[falcon56]

Whew!! I was hoping things hadn't changed! Ringing is ringing is ringing! With the edge going to the larks.

Glad you chimed in here Al. Just to set the record straight, explain to us how easy and lazy the ringing flights you and Szabo and Snider were having with those eyass merlins back in the 70's. Maybe things have changed!

[Saluqi]

I remember Jim Fustos had posted this to the Hawk-l list server and I had copied
and saved it on my hard drive, it had a date of May 1999. Maybe this sheds a little
more light on his method. Sorry it's not formatted better.


How to Teach an Unhacked Eyas Merlin To Ring Birds
by Jimmy Fustos

It has long been assumed that to teach merlins to ring birds out of
sight took exceptional falcons and careful entering. The falcons had to be
hacked for up to three weeks to become strong flyers and exceptional
footers. They had to be carefully entered and trained in a precise gradual
manner with no mistakes, and even then many didn't make the grade because
they started to bag-off their quarry. That was one way. I will describe another
way that will enliven an unhacked clumsy eyas to easily ring birds out of sight
using shaping and chaining techniques.

After flying merlins for over six years with some successes, some
failures and always confusion, I started applying shaping techniques. While
analyzing ringing flights I heard an offhand comment from an English
falconer and it all became clear. The English falconer reminded me of an
overlooked important point: That eyas merlins rarely catch their quarry in
the air, it usually is caught on the ground. It was that step in the
chaining process that I needed to focus on. All I needed was to shape my
merlins to put quarry to ground. It didn't take incredible stamina, extreme
confidence or haggard style footing to force ringing quarry to the ground.
A young eyas with little flying experience can mount up as fast
as the smaller quarry because of their weight and wing-loading
differences. Once the naive eyas learns that all she needs to do is force
the quarry to ground she rings rather lazily as if she can take the time to
manicure her talons on the way up. The rudiments of forcing quarry to
ground is what I can teach her in the backyard before she is even
hard-pinned.
The backyard training apparatus consists of two one foot long,
two inch diameter plastic pipes laid on the ground about six feet apart.
Secure the pipes so they won't move because they act as a safe refuge for
the sparrows. A nylon string is put through the two pipes and the two ends
are tied together. On the string between the two pipes I attach an English
sparrow with a string harness attached to its wings. I can stand about ten
feet away from the pipes and move the sparrow between them by pulling the
string either way. Block off one end of both pipes, so it is dark inside the
pipes and the sparrow can't be accidentally pulled out of the back end.
To condition the eyas there are three main behaviors I need to
shape to specific objectives. First, she needs to learn to put the same
bird repeatedly into cover during several reflushes. Secondly, she needs to
learn to stay on "point" (stay near the put in and hiding quarry) for three
minutes until I call her to the fist for a reflush. Three minutes is just
an estimated appropriate length of time based on my field experience. Later
in the field she may put quarry in several hundred feet away and she needs
to "point" the quarry until I am able to run up there. It she would leave
the place before I am close enough to identify the exact hiding place, we
may lose the quarry. Landmarks are hard to pick out on the monotonous
prairie. Thirdly, she needs to learn to ride the fist for five minutes
waiting for a flush. Later in the field she may be shaped to ride on the
fist for a much longer time before a flush.
In chaining behaviors together, start teaching the last thing that
happens in the flight first, working backwards.
Teaching sequence:
A. Merlin eats sparrow.
B. Merlin launched from fist and captures sparrow.
C. Merlin comes to fist only on command.
D. Merlin launches from fist and forces quarry to cover(pipe).
E. Repeat C and D three times.
F. Merlin comes to fist only on command.
G. Merlin "points" to hiding place for three minutes.
H. Merlin launches from the fist and puts quarry into pipe the first
time.
I. Merlin rides on fist for five minutes before first flush(being pulled
out of a pipe).
J. Take off hood.
K. Beginning
I did two training sessions a day, one in the morning and one in
the evening. Chain the behaviors together by adding each new behavior after
the previous one is mastered. Reaching the goal behaviors will take less
than a week, but don't rush it, the merlin needs several dozen put ins on
the harnessed sparrow to reinforce that behavior.
A. Before backyard training begins she has eaten several whole
sparrows. I condition her with anti-carrying strategies used for Accipiters
(McElroy,1977). I walk up and around the feeding eyas. At this time I also
condition her to the use of the quarry stick, a proven several hundred year
old anti-carrying technique. It is a 2 and 1/2 feet long 1/2 inch diameter
dowel with a blunted 3/4 inch nail sticking out of the side of one end. I
secure a freshly caught quarry by rolling the nail into the body of the dead
bird from a "safe" distance of about three feet away.
A&B Easy.
AB&C Don't tidbit the merlin when she comes to the fist. Shape
her to learn she only gets the sparrow flushed when she comes to a signal
(whistle) to ride on the fist.
ABC&D Easy
ABCD&E Easy. The merlin may start coming to the fist before the
come whistle is sounded. This is a bad behavior and should never be
reinforced I make sure I only continue the reflushes when she comes to the
fist only on command.
ABCDE&F Easy, nothing new, go to G&H
ABCDEFGH Shape "pointing" on all put-ins now. Shape the length of
the "point" from, let's say, 15 seconds to three minutes by 30 second
intervals. After each intermediate objective is reached about 50% of the
trials start shaping the next intermediate objective until the goal
objective of three minutes is reached. Once she will "point" the first
put-in for three minutes, the reflushes can be made with very short
"pointing" times.
ABCDEFGHI During the whole teaching sequence I have been
inadvertently shaping riding on the fist for longer periods.
The eyas may be doing five minutes already. If not, shape riding on the
fist at this time. One merlin became so wedded to the fist that once she
did catch a bird in the air she flew back to the fist to eat.
All objectives are met. She will ride on the fist for five
minutes, point the first put-in for 3 minutes and try hard on 3 reflushes.
Let's go
hawking. I hunted my merlins in the cool quiet mornings of August and
September. In the evenings I stooped them to the lure in my backyard.
Fly molting adults or young quarry that can barely fly in places
with good cover to entice the quarry to put-in. I fly the merlin with a
transmitter on one leg and a bell on the other leg to deliberately hinder
her from footing the quarry in the air. I want 2 or 3 reflushes before the
quarry is captured. Often after several reflushes the falcon and quarry
will be found sitting on the ground a couple of feet apart, panting. When
the quarry is forced to ground after the first ringing effort it becomes
intimidated and usually never tries to ring again, but only flies a short
distance looking for better cover. If the quarry escapes for good, such as
down a prairie dog burrow, reward the eyas with a dead sparrow pulled out of
the hole. She will be wedded to her quarry after taking about 7 head in 7
days and can now be taken to open ground to hunt high flying young of the
year.
It is stormy when I release the clumsy eyas on a huge flock of autumn
birds. They all ring up out of sight of 7x binoculars and birds start
raining down on me. The quarry is stooping down to nearby bushes or holes
desperately searching for cover. It sobers me to realize that the
individual organism has only a brief glorious existence.
To understand some of the directions on shaping and chaining
techniques study "How to Teach Animals" by B.F. Skinner from Scientific
America, Dec.1951, pp26-29.

[barbedraptor]

That article is from California Hawking, Vol. 21, #3, Dec. 1991. The funny thing is that it took me about 20 years to realize that it worked for all King's flights (heron, crane, rook) also. I want to highlight two important teaching tools. Remember when chaining different parts of the overall behavior together, start by shaping the last behavior in the sequence first. When bridging those behaviors together use distinctly different CR's for shaping each different behavior. Later each CR can be paired with a sign or signal that means that behavior is completed and the next one needs to be done. An instant use of the CR is the magic teaching tool. Many falconry books fail to teach the sequences backward. Now I just take every observed or read about behavior and put it in the operant conditioning model for clarity and ease of replicating the behaviors. My claim to fame is that I can teach a tired crying baby to go to sleep by themselves and I can potty train a 2 year old in half a day( It is a book by two of Skinner's students). Jim Fustos

[Gerkin]

For me the maths don't add up.
Lets examine the learning curve and its partnership with the motivation to happily apply a work load %

Juvenile birds already have the workload set far beyond the fitness level..

Its only when they hit the fitness boundary does the bird recalculate itself.. the onset of the economic learning curve.. natural learning of tactics..

Thus... the need to Teach a bird to ring is redundant.. yet the need to provide sufficient fitness is essential to subdue the onset of learning (combined with suitable slips & an absence of easier targets)

I Personally have rung game off the fist with a captive bred hack penned falcon with little more than a few out the hood exorcises to a dragged lure..
The fitness retained from the hack pen was sufficient enough to back up the target recognition and the bird continued all the while it had power..

The ringing flight is entirely down to the terrain, and if game is caught on the ground or attempting to enter cover you have entirely failed at achieving a traditional ringing flight..


I fail to believe that your ringing flights represent the traditional meaning of the term

[barbedraptor]

The two main obstacles for encouraging a ringing flight are: 1. quarry goes to cover and doesn't get caught. The CR "to ground" solves that problem. 2. Ringing quarry often employ flying at the clumsy merlin and zigzagging around them causing the merlin to stall out as it is trying to grab the quarry. After several of these failed grabs the merlin sets her wings and bags off the flight rejected and tired. After several days of this the merlin doesn't even hunt that species anymore. I site this observation because I don't know why or how my "to ground" trained merlins never get sucked into that tactic, they just ring up as high as it takes for the quarry to get nervous, panic and stoop to the ground.

[barbedraptor]

The classic King's flight is an attack on quarry on passage. So the key to the set up is to release your falcon from down wind of the quarry who is flying to a distant destination over open ground. A classic starling set up: I find a group of about 10 starlings sitting about 60 feet up in a lone tree with farmyard cover about 1000 feet up wind of the tree over a bare field. I drive to a position about 500 feet straight down wind of the tree, get out and unhood the merlin. The starlings recognize the merlin and take off into the light breeze heading toward the farmyard. About 600 feet passed the tree and 100 feet off the ground the merlin catches up to the small group. They panic and split up (each starling for itself) or as they say "9 of them just have to fly a little faster than the 10th one".

[Tony James]

Ringing Flights-- Falcons can physically easily out fly all the traditionally pursued quarry such as houbara, crane, heron, crow, rook, seagull and skylark. It is the falconer's job to completely WED the falcon to the quarry and HABITUATE the desired flight. When chaining behaviors together remember to train and shape the last behavior first. Training Sequence: 1. Thoroughly wed falcon to quarry. Merlin plucks and eats about 10 dead English sparrows. 2. Whistle(CR) means fly back to fist. Train falcon to come to fist for food. 3. Habituate mini flights "to ground" in the backyard. Emperor Fredrick II used shaping and chaining techniques 750 years ago. Many teaching methods have hidden built-in CR's present in them. But now we know to make them obvious and instant. You can probably think of better backyard "to ground" methods then I have. Here are 3 of mine. 3 Mini Training Flights: I. Merlin-- Tie dead English sparrow lure to a circular string that runs through a 2 inch diameter PVC pipe. Stand about 10 feet away from the lure, unhood merlin, twitch lure, merlin catches lure, transfer to fist meal and feed up. Fast Forward: the next day merlin chases lure as you pull it into the pipe "to ground" and loses it. After each "to ground" whistle(CR), falcon flies to fist, pull lure out of pipe and she chases it again. Do 3 to 5 "to ground" each day for about 20 days. That is over 60 "to grounds". I will finish post tomorrow.

Dear Jim,

it's always fascinating to see different ideas put forward, as it is with yours, but I'm perhaps a little old fashioned and I don't really understand what some of the modern terms mean, even though I might well be doing some of what they're describing, and I often find myself wondering about the thinking behind them.
One thing that seems common to many new 'training methods', is that they take an awful lot longer than more traditional methods, and rarely produce as good a hawk.
The 20 days devoted to 'to ground' training, in my experience, is more than enough time to enter a merlin, and achieve the most spectacular ringing flights.
There's nothing especially clever or complicated about it (assuming the falconer manages his hawk well), but it requires an appropriate quarry, and suitably open ground.

For any falcon to show good ringing flights at a well matched quarry, nothing is more important than confidence.
With the right mental attitude, borne of good management and success at increasingly difficult slips, the best flights are possible. If that attitude is missing, and the hawk doubts her abilities, the spiral is more likely to be downwards rather than upwards.

I wish you well in your quest,

Tony.

[Hunner]

Well stated Tony!

[Mandragen]

I think what Tony said was right as well, as there are many ways to train. They always say the only things two trainers can agree on, is what the third is doing wrong.

As Tony stated, with his methods there are a lot of what seem to be, requirements. Appropriate quarry, suitable open ground, confidence, mental attitude, born of good management, success at difficult slips, and so on, are all necessary for a individual to certain things on it's own accord, and do it well. I think the reasoning behind some of the new methods is trying to take any individual and do the same thing, even if it is lacking some or all of those things.

[Gerkin]

I think the reasoning behind some of the new methods is trying to take any individual and do the same thing, even if it is lacking some or all of those things.

The problem with theses so termed "new methods" is that they are not new, but they are suggested by people who might be "new" to falconry or at least do not have a grasp of its many different styles.

Thus the interpretation of the relevance is lost to those who are already great falconers, and will quickly see through the science & write the whole lot off as garbage.

The fault is not in the modern approach, but in the connection between it and those that can apply it species specifically..

I think a lot of these dead ends come from the geeks trying to apply the science in a broad spectrum fashion.. in some cases to try & fit in to groups when they lack any real hands on.

[Mandragen]

I only called them new because that's what was being said, I understand fully there is nothing new here. I believe Jim was even saying that he got all this from history anyway, or something of that nature. I'm not actually disagreeing with anyone, or taking sides here, just trying to fill in the gaps.