Imprinting

[tescobedo]

For those that have imprinted accipiters by not following the recipe, what do you believe are key factors in rearing well-mannered, aggressive game hawks?

[Saluqi]

Hi Tony,

Sorry this turned out to be a long post...


I've only imprinted one accipiter, a tiercel gos, and after reading McD's book several times I decided that I didn't want to use his method. He lives in a really game rich environment and his constant bagging while the bird is growing just naturally segues into multiple kill days once the bird is free flying. I figured it would really create a nightmare bird if I bagged it constantly while it was growing up and then couldn't get huge numbers of slips once out in the field for real, besides I didn't want to have to keep 100 pheasants for bagging. I talked with a bunch of falconers who I had heard were successful with imprnt accips and eventually I decided to try out Steve Laymans method of imprinting.

Without going into all of the details of what I did, I'll tell you what I shouldn't have done, as best as I can remember anyway.

Rule 1 - like your wife the bird is always right. Once when the bird was nearly penned, still living free in the house, someone dropped a red bandanna on the floor near his ledge. He dove off the ledge and mantled and screamed and wouldn't give it up for love nor money. As is usually the case, my time was short I had to be somewhere and I wanted to put him in a more secure enviroment while I was gone. I got tired of waiting him out and I pulled the bandanna away from him - big mistake. I should have just left him alone and gone on my business. After that incident he was suspicious of me when he had food and I'm sure I layed the groundwork for future problems with that single indiscretion.

Rule 2 - like your wife the bird is always right. Pay strict attention to the birds mood, if anything raises a flag that the bird is "out of sorts" chances are it is - don't push issues. Come back later, stop a session earlier on a positive note, end before it gets ugly.

Here's what happened when I didn't follow this advice - if I only knew then what I know now. It was early September, we'd been flying since mid-July, with no kills and I was frankly getting anxious for a kill (gotta watch that), anyway we were out at sunup and had several nice flights on bunnies with no catch. After one flight the gos landed in a low tree and on my way over to him I flushed a quail which he didn't see, but I knew there would be more around. I go to the tree and he won't fly to the fist, he has this weird far off look in his eyes, like "who the hell are you". I repeatedly call him, fist, lure, nothing will bring him down - now I'm getting pissed. By standing on a low branch I'm able to reach up into the tree for him to step on my fist and I grab a single jess, well he bates and I release the jess and he flys off a couple 100 yards and lands on a fence post. When I walk up he takes off before I'm 20 yards away, he flys a half mile and lands in some trees. It took me at least a half hour to coax him down from the tree. When I finally get him on the fist he's a fearful chittering, bating maniac - total meltdown.

In my selfish desire to go chase those quail I pretty much wrecked our relationship in that one moment. I should have just sat under the tree and waited him out, he eventually would have come down and things would have been better. I believe the key is patience, I think you almost have to have a zen like patience in situations where your brain is telling you something else.

Anyway, that was 2002 and we just finished our fifth season together and he's a super game hawk, very well mannered and very tolerant. I may try and imprint another this summer, but I have to ask my wife first...

Paul

[tescobedo]

Paul,

Thank you for the reply. I'm curious as to how folks raise imprints and the successes they've enjoyed.

Congrats to you and your bird.

[`Chris L.]

Paul, great post. I apprecaite you taking the time to write that up. I am thinking of doing an imprint this year as well and will keep in mind what you have written.

[tescobedo]

Paul,

Once the bird began branching where did you place the bird while you were gone or did you leave the bird alone?

[wesleyc6]

Imprinting is a lot of fun, isn't it!!! I have imprinted only two birds, but I enjoyed it both times. Once they started branching in earnest, I tethered mine in the house on a low perch. I did close the lid on the box for a few days and that helped, but I feel like you can only get a few days out of that and once they are branching, they need to row those wings and flap and such. One imprint ended up well for me and one was aggressive.

I think Layman's methods are much different than McD's, right?

[Saluqi]

I've been getting excited about the prospect of maybe imprinting another bird, so I've been thinking a lot about it, and posting yesterday was good to jog my memory.

I raised him in a clear storage box with two inch holes cut into it, I used to bring him to the office in that, and it served as his nest while at home. I'll post some pics later. When he got bigger, we rolled up our small area rug, we have a brick floor, and pushed the furniture back, and I set a 3' circle of 3/4" ply wood on top of a 4' post in the center of our family room (again, your wife is always right, especially when she lets you do what mine lets me do). Until the time he could fly he lived on top of that platform, my kids were 8 & 10 at the time and we had four dogs running around constantly. As soon as he could fly he was jessed and tethered, I used a pole perch in the house and he was free in the mews when I wasn't around.

Steve's way of imprinting is the a lot different than the recipe. The biggest difference is that you hand feed from day one, and it doesn't call for baggies like the recipe. With Layman's method you use operant conditioning techniques to reinforce good behaviors and ward off bad. There's definitely a steep learning curve and I think overall the recipe is easier to follow - and I'm not saying that following the recipe is easy, it's a ton of work - but I think Steve's way requires even more work because you have to learn operant conditioning, which at first seems straight forward, but it's one of those things where the more I learn I realize the less I know.

The other major aspect of the method is physical conditioning. Once the bird is strong and close to being penned you initiate an exercise regimen, vertical jumps, controlled bates, restrained pursuits, yo-yos. The idea is to put muscle on the bird and get rid of the baby fat, it acts to really kick the birds metabolism into high gear even in the heat of late summer. Entering is accomplished with frozen quarry, sounds crazy huh? I used a frozen cottontail (Mr. Frosty) as our "prey" and used as our target for restrained pursuits. I can fill in details of what I did if anyone is curious.

Take Care.
Paul

[Saluqi]

That's "Lou" on 06-04-2002, 3 days after being pulled, somewhere around 18 days old(?)




Here's him on 06-17-02, view from my old office.

[`Chris L.]

Paul,
I am very interested in hearing about your ideas on entering him with the frozen quarry. If you would like to share it.

I have been talking to a good friend about imprinting and he suggests what you have in your picture. He said that the rubber maid boxes work gret. He also suggested always leaving food in the box as to not build a food association with me. he always like his imprints to be full. He always has the food in the same spot in the box. . He told me to take the bird to the food never bring the food to the bird.

What are your thoughts on that...

thanks for the great pictures

[wesleyc6]

Yep Paul, I had the same kind of container. My wife let me carry mine on vacation. LOL. Taking the bird to food is a big thing in the recipe too when they are young for sure Chris. The idea is simple really on the recipe if you haven't read his book yet. He believes in no food association, FULL exposure to everything from day one, and killing for food from the day it runs until it is released.

[Saluqi]

I was kind of on the fence at first with regard to food association, the nightmares that people always tell you about the birds attacking you and so forth, I was skeptical to feed by hand. I'm not sure there's a way to totally dissociate you - food - and the bird. If you're present when there's food then there's a food association, I think it's more of the degree of food association. Anyway, after a short time of trying to cover up that I was the source of food, I just dove in head first and fed by hand and it's never been an issue. Following Steve's method tidbiting by hand is part of the deal, the click and treat paradigm of Karen Pryor.

The bird was clueless the first several times with Mr Frosty. I thought I could toss Mr Frosty out in front of Lou and he would bate maniacally at it, but not so. I had to start slower, I'd tie a chunk of meat between Mr Frosty's ears and sit down in the lawn with him and let him walk over and find the meat and eat it, then I'd jump him to the fist for a pick up piece. Anytime while I was doing this if he'd show any aggression toward the rabbit, like footing or anything, I do the click-treat to reinforce the behavior. These sessions transformed into me having the bird on the fist and then flying down to Mr Frosty on the ground, to me tossing Mr Frosty and Lou flying down, to tossing Frosty and me holding Lou's leash for extended bate and so forth until the bates intensity grew and grew. Eventually he got intense and would pluck the rabbit and act like he was on a kill.

In terms of transfering this to the field, he chased bunnies from day one when I flew him. We chased and chased and chased, but it wasn't until I cranked his weight down a few notches that he got serious and started catching. I couldn't honestly tell if using Mr Frosty helped solidify a prey image or not, isn't natural for goshawks to chase rabbits? I think if you wanted to hunt a different quarry like ducks or crows using a frozen kill would go along way to introducing it.

Paul

[wesleyc6]

Paul,
what really is interesting to me on both ideas is how completely polar they are. I know Steve will actually work with an already aggressive bird to change it. Does Steve actually use a clicker to mark the action? Does he just mouth whistle? Last time he was down they invited me over, but I couldn't make it. He is a nice guy from what I have seen and heard. Definitely a pro at the operant conditioning for sure. Karen's book is a NEAT read. I train my dogs sometimes with a clicker for them to learn the action desire and then I finish the training with a pinch collar. Makes for an obedient dog.

[Saluqi]

Hey Wes,

They are kind of polar opposites. It's too bad because the Imprint Accipiter was such a great book, I just feel that it got too many people stoked to fly Coops and McD, in my opinion, didn't stress the committment and the importance of having a huge number of bags, tons of wild quarry to fly, and most important the necessity of not breaking this routine for anything. I think the result was life gets in the way of falconry and a lot of people were not able to keep up the routine of the recipe through the first season and lots of messed up birds resulted. Funny that his 2nd book is about dealing with screwed up accips.

Steve whistles, just a quick single note, I make a click with my tongue. It's a simple marker - conditioned reinforcer (CR) - as a substitute for the primary reinforcer (food).

Steve's a great guy and very generous with his knowledge, and light years ahead of me (and probably most folks) in applying these methods in falconry situations. I don't know that he would ever claim to "cure" a bird of aggression, but he can sure use his methods to control it. I think aggression is sort of like alcholism, once aggressive always aggressive, it becomes a matter of management and with time the bad behaviors will largely extinguish themselves.


Paul

[tescobedo]

Paul,

Thank you for all the details. It's good to hear that successful accipiters can be made from non-recipe approaches.

I travel to Albuquerque every so often for work. Hopefully I'll go out there during hawking season. If so, would you mind me tagging along on a bunny hunt?

[Saluqi]

Hey Tony,

Anytime your in town drop me a line and we can get together, I'm in the NAFA directory and the NM phone book, not too many Domskis in NM. I fly the gos usually starting in mid-Oct, but if I imprint another this summer I'll be going way before then.

Paul

P.S. What non-recipe method are you thinking of trying?

[wesleyc6]

Hey Paul,
You are right about the committment. It is a good book, I agree. It is a valuable book now too. LOL I enjoyed the time spent imprinting a great deal though. It is one of my favorite parts of my falconry so far too!

[tescobedo]

Paul,

I'm just curious about imprinting since most discussions revolve around the recipe and don't delve into limited baggies, calling and/or feeding on the glove, entering on various game, etc. I'd like to try imprinting a bird and information like yours makes the responsibilities seem more managable.

Thank you for the offer. My trips end up being in August and/or October. I'll see if I can work a week long training course in [smilie=icon_thumright.gif]

[everetkhorton]

The idea of imprinting a Cooper Hawk entered my mind. It has faded fast, because I just do not have the game I need for a Cooper Hawk. I have read a lot of articles. To me it has come down to, Plan your work and work your plan. It is a crap shoot to say the least with your first bird, but do it and learn and move on. Keep a journal so you do not make a mistake on the next one.

[tescobedo]

Ev,

I agree about working a plan. I'm fairly detail oriented and I'm certain imprinting a bird would ensure that my Type A personality is polished to a blinding shine [smilie=icon_thumright.gif] .

[goshawks00]

Hi Paul glad to hear from you. I got a couple of questions that I don't think you meantioned. Being that you fed openly by hand , did you experience any screaming issues once ot's weightwas cut. If so--- did it go away with time and exposure in the field?
I'm an admitted McD. type of imprinter, with many bags , but have done a few twists such as hacking, and using exercises as a way of 'burning up' some of the youthful exuberance which if not allowed 'out' will find other more destructive ways of manifesting it' self.
Barry

[Saluqi]

Hi Barry;

Yup, he did start screaming when his weight came down, but not hard core programed screaming. The first season was by far the worst with respect to screaming, I think that had to do with my mistakes and the rough spots early that first season.

Now, during the season he screams at dawn until the sun shines into his east facing window. As soon as it starts getting light out he'll hear me let the dogs out, or see the house light come on and he'll scream, but then once the sun is shinning he stops, unless I walk up to the mews. I don't like the term "calling" but it's kind of what he does to say, "hey, let's go out and hunt". In the field he's silent. In the winter during the week I generally hunt afternoons, when he hears the truck pull in to the driveway he starts up again screaming. One odd behavior, is in the evening when we're doing verticals and restrained pursuits and stuff he screams then - that I could live without, earplug for the left ear.

IF I pull an eyas this year I'll be using basically the same approach as I did before, but I will hack this bird. What age do you start the hack? How long do you leave them out? Do you use a transmitter? If so, how do you mount it?

Thanks.

Paul

[goshawks00]

Paul here is something I wrote a while ago...
At the bottom I will try to answer your other questions,
Barry

""The best part of summer eyas hacking is it's full fun time with no regimented rules to follow. There are no set rules that need to be followed because the hawk doesn't know any better and his whole mission is to learn to fly, use the wind to his advantage, learn to maneuver, and he will learn to chase things that try to get away from him, and possibly learn to escape things that chase him. Before they are ever released they have learned from earliest on what a lure is and that food is attached to it. They also have learned to come to a whistle much like chicks come to their mother when called. It may mean food , a where are you call , an alarm and possibly others. At our house during the summer there are always GKs hanging out with friends and the hawks love all the commotion that goes on with it. They will stoop the kids when they are down at the creek, land on heads while swinging, come in on them and lay down in the middle of the group when they are eating ice-cream on the rear deck. I put no restrictions on the kids other than to stay away from the roads, as many times the hawks will fly to them land on the ground and just run around like idiots with no care in the world. Oh yea--no picking them up , though they can offer a fist , arm or what ever to the hawk. If the hawk jumps up great if not they are not allowed to force the issue by pushing on the hawks body to MAKE them step up. All my hacked hawks are brought in at night and tied to a bow which is on a platform ( for the sharpies) or a bow on the floor for the goshawks. As soon as any hawk can stand it is tied to a bow, usually this takes place at around 15-20 days depending on the bird. They become comfortable with it and that is all they will know so bringing them in and tying them up at night is just another thing they have always known.
I can't say about a hack board, though, almost every year, we end up hacking out rehab K's and they will use it a little but within a few days they will be spread out where ever they want but will come in again for food,as we try to show no attention to them other than to feed them Then as soon as we can we start tossing food for them to catch and the GKs make big efforts to catch them big grasshoppers, the ones that or about an inch and a half long, and tossing them for the k's to chase. Eventually they will just leave and not come back. Even so we do have a male that will show up every once in a while and will take white mice that we toss for him to catch. He has shown up for four years now and every hacked hawk here will try to chase and catch him but none can and they so learn the wrath of a K if they stay out in the open long<G>""


OK the rest of the story or at least answers to your questions>>>G<<<


Start as soon as they can get around... creates independency( one of the reasons they scream)
I leave them out at least until hardpenned, which for a gos is about 60 days I think-(boy it's been so long since I have looked I forgot as 'penning isn't that important to the whole scheme of things) but have left them out to hack until the hawk is over 80 days before. Use a junk transmitter ( plan on bringing the hawk in each night) that you can take the battery out of ----they have never gone more than a 1/2 mile from the house--and do so frequently. I use an old Luksander Mewrlin special that one of the goshawks has stripped the antenna off of. Bewit to the leg for easy on and off, as the tail is not out of blood yet. hacking is wrought with dangers , go into it with both eyes open.
Barry

[Saluqi]

Thanks Barry. Sounds like your place is a fun place for kids (and falconers!) to hang out during the summer.

It's tough to take the leap and hack out a bird, especially a gos which are tough to come by anyway, I think it could be worth the risk. I hoping to pull a female this year, and maybe get her going on jacks, but we'll see. Started scouting for nests this past weekend, good habitat but no birds yet...

Paul

[goshawks00]

Not sure where you live but I worked with a guy last year and we hacked a tiercil gos on a friend's farm.... He just went there in the morning , gave it a bit of a crop, so it wouldn't scream and draw attention to it'self and left it. Then went back in the evening to gather it up for the day. He only stuck with it a couple of weeks but had no problems. He hunts out of the trees like you would a RT so he didn't have the problem of having to re-establish staying on the fist. Worked great.
Barry

[carlosR]

Hello I'm going to throw my two cents in on this; first thing is it is not a good idea to have a static plan that you follow blindly. You have to be flexible! I remember the hawks I tortured inadvertently back in my early days by blindly following the training laid out in some book or another. Sometimes things don't work out the way we plan and when they don't you gotta start asking yourself why? So have a general map of where you are going and don't be afraid to change and adapt.
I really like the "lazy days of summer" young goshawk hack. That's my plan this year.

[tescobedo]

Carlos,

That's exactly what needs to be said. I've never imprinted, but I got the disctinct impression from reading books and other forums that a single error created a monster. It appears that failing to read the bird's responses creates a monster moreso than inconsistent errors.

[goshawks00]

Tony actually all three methods you mentioned will work for malimprinting.
Barry

[tescobedo]

Barry,

One man's 'error' could be another's correct action. From what I've read, since I have no experience, is the bird will show what you don't know moreso than what you do.

[goshawks00]

Tony, this could turn in to an interesting thread... pease explain what you mean.
Barry

[wesleyc6]

You certainly have to be flexible in some ways I think, but it can't be completely fluid. I like to think I am a decent animal trainer. I have trained dogs well and hawks, but my coopers was great for a short time only and then blew up. I was trying to be as careful as I could. I am pretty sure I can read animals ok and was certainly trying to constantly read mine. My falcon this last time was near perfect. So I have tasted some success with imprinting along with gross failure.

I believe for the average person that there are certainly some do's and don'ts there. I mean somethings will probably always be an error. smile. Like picking him up and smackin' him. LOL Or forcing him to wear diapers and baby clothes. hehehehe

I am interested to see some of your ideas myself Tony. I also hope that you would be willing to chronicle your adventures with your imprint here on the site. It would be a great way for you to journal and a great way for us to see what you choose to do. I think we could ALL learn from it, I know I can!

See ya and best of luck!
Wes

[Jimmy]

Or forcing him to wear diapers and baby clothes.

Just because your bird didn't like the diapers, doesn't mean others' won't......... [smilie=smileys13.gif]

[everetkhorton]

Wes: I was thinking of imprinting a COHA this year. From what I have gathered it is a hit and mis deal. One thing that most people say is when that Coops give you the evel eye, back off and think of what is going on. Do not force the issue. You have to have lots of game to fly at and had time to be in the field. Remember I have not imprinted any birds. So take this for what it is worth. I know there is some bad spelling in this post but I have to be off.

[goshawks00]

Ev you are completely right. I wish you WOULD try a coop , you got the time , the game, and the resources to do it. Shoot you've gone to long without giving some blood back to the sport and band-aids are cheap<G>, why not give it a go.
Barry

[Lee Slikkers]

Barry, I dropped you a couple emails over the last few days. Just checkin to make sure they arrived or didn't get tossed into the spam bin.

Thanks,

Lee

[tescobedo]

Tony, this could turn in to an interesting thread... pease explain what you mean.
Barry

Barry,

What I was attempting to say is I have read other forums and books and each experienced imprinter has their own way or methodology for imprinting. Yet, I think it would be fair to say that they were all working to the same end - a properly imprinted bird.

If you had to be limited to 10 things to create a properly imprinted bird, what would they be if hacking (as mentioned above) was not an option?