Hello all,
I am a native New Mexican. I started falconry in 1990, flew birds for ten years, then went to graduate school in Tallahassee. After graduate school I ended up getting a job there for a while. So after an 8 year break from falconry (Tallahassee was not conducive to my kind of falconry--too many trees!), I consider myself extremely lucky to be back home in New Mexico.
I flew a passage merlin this past season just to dust off my falconry skills. I had a great time with her. Here she is:
Here is a video for you all (peace offering??). What you are watching is a prairie falcon coming in on a harnessed pigeon (it hid in the grass). I left the camera running about ten feet away. I edited out all the stooping etc. The interesting thing was that after the first few passes the prairie landed on the pole directly over the pigeon (the pole in the video), sat there a while then ended up stooping off the pole and whacking the camera , twice! I guess it got confused. Make sure your volume is turned up. Now you know how the pigeon feels, enjoy.