This video introduces owls for use in falconry. There is a lot of different schools of thought on their use in the sport. This video introduces the concept and shares limitations and benefits of hunting with a trained owl.
I got so burned by our local club the second years as an apprentice for saying some of these exact same things, I’m so happy to have watched this video. I agree with the not having a owl as a pet. But I’m almost certain in the right hands a person could be quit successful with a owl. One of my very first experiences with a raptor was a screech owl that had fallen from its hollow. I took it home to a run down apartment we lived in. We had tons of mice at that place. Over run to be exact. When it began to fly I would get him out of the enclosure and sit on the couch after everyone went to bed. And we would hunt the mice that would take control of the house at night. If he misses he would fly right back over and sit by me on the chair. 11 years old I was, one of the fondest life memories I have. Until the neighbor called game and fish and they came and took him.
Great video mate...As Greek I would like to clear something up,if you allow me...owl was the symbol of Athena (goddess of wisdom) not because it is a clever bird ,wisdom has nothing to do with brightness even in people, but because it could see when other creatures couldn't , which is at night as the owl species in our country are hunting only at night time...cheers!
My father had an owl while I was growing up. I have always been in awe of falconry, but was never permitted to participate because it’s not seen as something acceptable for women to do in my culture. My husband participates In falconry now, and I hope one day to be allowed to ad well. Thank you for your videos!
Good stay in the house and don't beg for approval on the internet from modernist soy men like the guy on this channel I'm glad you didn't get to interact with it and I hope it pooped on everything like all birds do women pollute this old medieval practice they should not have opinions
@1s23d depending on where she live she could be lynched for doing something "non womanly" so i mean, could very well be many things other than herself standing in her way.
Gurl how about you start a new tradition. If you've wanted it your whole life and are still held back by flimsy excuses of men around you, it;'s time to change that by any means necessary.
I raised a Great Horned owl when I was in high school. He was very affective. He caught a Mourning Dove on the wing his first outing. His next time out he accidentally caught a Meadowlark on the wing. Well, he did it on purpose, I did not. I did not have any trouble training him at all. If I ever have time for falconry again, I would have another Great Horned Owl in a heartbeat. I actually think they are very smart, and unlike the hawks I had, extremely affectionate.
Shadow is so cute!! Owls are certainly extremely intelligent animals is you really get to know them and think in their "mode" and no dubt they are deadly hunters and I would LOVE to see video of you and shadow hunting together！！
👍🤚Ben excellent points you made. Beautiful Owl. I really enjoy watching your videos and am so glad you are educating all who watch. Thank you for all you do. Your friend in Florida ❤️Raptors. Take care stay warm it was 88 degrees in Florida today lol 💕
When I first herd about falconry and owls were a possibility I really wanted one. When I learned more about them I kind of found that hawks are more my style. And I think owls are off limits to apprentices. I’d like to try a great horned owl someday tho.
thanks for the wisdom Ben, i’m a month away from becoming a general falconer and i’ve been scouting nests for a great horned and all i’ve heard from falconers is that they are awful falconry birds, this gives me hope haha
@@sauronthegreat489 Never ended up grabbing a great horned but I found a couple nests. Life happened and I’ve had to post pone falconry for a couple years. Looking forward to get back into it with a gos or red shouldered this year though.
I can relate to an owl....I've trained for years as a Classical musician, but people think I'm not very bright because I don't make a lot of money. I experience the world a lot using my ears, as well. Owls would make great musicians!
Can I just say thank you for the comments about Autism? I'm autistic though I'm what most people would consider "high functioning." I'd just appear kind of shy at first and quirky/awkward once you get to know me. I am kind of the stereotype of "Autistic genius" so I'm very much what's considered "conventionally" intelligent and even excel in a lot of fields. But I still have my own ways of thinking and communicating with the world that others just don't understand. Like I'm shockingly good at making organisation systems from scratch or modifying something that already exists. But most people wouldn't consider that a sort of "intelligence" even though it's a skill a lot of people don't have. I know this is really off topic for the video, but it just always makes my day when I hear positivity like that instead of people demeaning those of us on the spectrum. Although to relate it to the video, one of my special interests at the moment is falconry which is why I'm here. I'm just learning so I can write about it (my main special interest), but I love learning about it in general!
Awesome. Love the reference you had made with your son. I’ve worked with kids on the spectrum for years and have always used a similar mind set and behavior modification training. Temple Grandin!
My baby nephew is also on the spectrum and nonverbal, but if u dont take the time to be with him and interact, u would miss out on how much he actually does know and understand. Very intelligent actually. It's awesome to gain that different perspective on intelligence and learning in regards to other people as well as animals. Too many people like to compare these types of things in perspective of their own experiences rather than staying open minded and open to different types of thinking and perspectives.
Your comment about the pygmy owl has seriously sparked an interest. They're diurnal and dietary habits seem to make them a good candidate for a falconry bird. What is the most significant factor when training a bird with no crop when it comes to weight management? When you "feed her up" could you do it 2x for like a morning and evening session? And get more hunting/training in?
I have joined other people when they said that owls are dumber, but I only did because of how much space their eyes take in their skull as opposed to their brains.
I am looking into getting a pygmy Owl for Sparrows mostly they r small thats where I wanna start *on owls* Since I am afraid of them I am trying to get over it. Had a Horrible accident with one when younger. I LOVE falconry with smaller hawks. So guess I be doing video's of how he/she dose also how I do too!.
I hunted with a northern hawkowl, and she was as gamey a bird as anything I've flown! She was a beast; bit of a rage-monster :P She'd have a go at anything- she was CONVINCED squirrels were completely reasonable, but she'd go for small birds too.
Portland is using falconers with Harris hawks for crow abatement in their downtown area at night. It seems to have worked that the Harris hawks scare the crows enough that it's not deemed a safe place. But an owl seems to be the better bird for the job since they do hunt at night and might be seen by the crows as a bigger threat. I wonder if anyone has used owls for that purpose.
Like the African Caracal (mid-sized cat with tufted ears) the feathers on top of the owl's head are used to judge wind direction and velocity to assist with hunting.
I’ve just noticed that in this video you kind of move your head like a bird does I can tell your mind processes way faster than most, kinda neat alignment
Hi Ben, Thanks for the really informative video. I am a 2nd year general Falconer and I am interested in learning more about owl falconry especially with the GHO. There isn't any information out there to learn about owl falconry nor do I know anyone who is an expert at it. As you mentioned in your video to find someone who has had success with it? I don't think I have being successful with this especially given most people I have talk to about this have actively discourage this. Will you be doing more videos on lessons and tips fro Owl falconry? Do only thing I know so far is if you want an owl capture as an eyass not more than 5 days old. Also are GHO good for squirrel hawking? Thanks so much. Love your videos.
Do you release the owls to the wild, at some point? If you hunt with them, will that be enough preparation for them to survive in the wild? As always, interesting video, very informative, a great graphic of the feathers versus bone structure, and, applause for your openness to all hunting birds.
I'm a falconry I grew up in stl.but manage to get out of the hood and train owls Falcons and my owl killer 7 rabbits the last night great video luh bro
How hard is it to train a wild caught owl compared to a hawk? I know owls don't have a crop so it seems like it would be harder to win them over with food.
Hey Ben, i moved to northern idaho to the university and im looking forward to studying raptors more. Wondering if you ever did the video about record keeping, i didnt see anything yet and i remember you sayi g it was a good idea. Anyway, thank you for the videos!!
Rich Law Thanks for the reminder. Hopefully I can do that in the next two weeks. I am in the middle of working on one that will talk about the flight differences and equipment and all that between American kestrels and Eurasian kestrels and can probably do one after that. But if you don’t see it, feel free to leave another reminder. Between work and ADHD and memory issues from a car accident, I get very forgetful. So reminders are always appreciated.
I too would love a video about record keeping, both how to keep them and your adjustments made in training, feeding etc, from your record keeping observations. I stumbled upon your videos the same week I passed my apprentice exam. You're videos are amazing and so helpful. I appreciate what you do!
I have to admit, I always thought owls were a little spacey. Seems unfair, now, that I was judging them during the day.... if someone ran an IQ test on ME at 3 am I wouldn't do so hot either
Hey ben, love this video! Im very interested in hunting with a GHO successfully, but id love to know a little more about hunting with the northern pygmy. I fly a kestrel right now so im familiar with hunting sparrows and small bird game. Once agin thank you for the great information!
frank wallace Pygmys are interesting birds. I know this doesn’t help much, but mentally for their training they are like 90% burrowing owl and 10% sharp shinned hawk. A kestrel is a good basis. Helps you nail down precision weight management. As with any owl, I contend that success for training them to hunt requires flying an baby. Almost any owl can be manned, but they really seem to need to be raised from a downy chick to get them legitimately hunting.
Hey Ben, I have trained a few harries successfully and I am now about to get a great horned owl. I want to introduce it to hunting but as you can imagine, everyone here in Brazil says it is crazy and that owls are useless. I would really like to speak be with someone with real world experience on the topic. Would you be willing to help a fellow falconer?
As you mentioned, owl falconry in the US isn't super popular and because of that there isn't much material to read on training and hunting. Can you recommend any good source? I do have one book by Jemima Parry Jones but if I recall correctly it wasn't written for US falconers, it felt sort of lacking for us on the other side of the pond.
I’ve never come across any books on hunting with owls. I had to blunder my way through over the years. The JPJ book is okay, but really doesn’t get in depth into their training.
There is another book you'll want to read called called "Nocturnal Mind". It covers manning, training, and how to enter an owl on prey. It's the best book on training owls for falconry I have read so far. It's also the only one I have found too.
Would you say that a barn owls are good with falconry? Barn owls astonish me so much, and I really would like the opportunity to train one, but I’m not trying too sure if it’s okay? Every time I try to do research on it, I never find anything, so any advice is great! (I haven’t started falconry yet, but I’m highly considering it!)
2005 minivan imprint barn owls can be trained very easily to fly to the fist and the lure and even a target such as game. But their flight style does not lend itself to aggressive chases. It can be done, but I’d recommend a barn owl far more as an education bird than a falconry bird. But again, it technically can be done 👍👍
As an apprentice falconer i would love more instructional videos regarding falconry with owls. How is training them different? What does hunting with an owl entail, how is their care different. I would love more information if you could. I love the fur anklets video. Thanks!
Depends on who you talk to. I used the made up term “owlconry” just for fun. In the USA the term Austringer is almost non existent. People use the term “falconry” here for eagles, hawks, falcons and owls. I’ve even seen wildlife educators holding ravens with falconry jesses, glove, swivel and leash and tell people they are a “falconer” I don’t know if old world falconers use austringer to describe working with owls. But it seems like every region might view it differently
The fact that humans can't acknowledge that every single living specimen on this planet should be treated the way they would want to be treated with respect and appreciation. If I wasn't a human, I would probably feel shame, embarrassed, and disappointed in myself. Which is the same feeling when you lose at Ball-in-a-cup.
