Michigan falconers uphold noble sport

Lansing-- The wide grin on Michael Yachcik's face said it all.

Yachcik, 52, had just watched his red-tailed hawk Sunny put on a textbook show of hunting skill despite a stiff wind and the pressure of an expectant crowd.

With cameras rolling, Sunny took off from his perch in a nearby tree, swooped down and captured a fleeing cottontail rabbit in his powerful talons in just about the time it took you to read this sentence. The hunters had succeeded.

"I'm as proud as a peacock," Yachcik said a few minutes after 13-year-old Sunny -- whom Yachcik began training as a youngster -- brought home the bacon yet again. "He did great, especially in these conditions."

The first two rabbits of the day managed to give Sunny the slip because of that wind, which makes quick maneuvering difficult for a large bird. But that's the way it goes in falconry, an ancient sport in which humans and birds of prey hunt side by side.

"Most of the time, the rabbit wins," Yachcik said. "The hawk catches the rabbit maybe once out of every six or seven times. But sometimes you pull it off."

Sport goes back 4,000 years

The cooperation between humans and wild creatures is what draws and holds falconers to their sport. Falconry -- hunting wild game with a trained bird of prey -- is thought to have originated in central Asia some 4,000 years ago. Over the centuries, it has been enjoyed by kings and nobles in Europe and Asia, and has been handed down to small but passionate groups like the Michigan Hawking Club.

Earlier this month, the group held its annual field meet, where falconers gather and invite the public to talk birds and go on actual hunts in nearby fields and woodlots.

"We turn them loose to do what they naturally do, and if they don't want to come back, there's nothing you can do about it," said Kenn Filkins of Sault Ste. Marie, who flies Harris hawks but was along to help with Sunny's flight.

"The magic of it is they choose to come back. For me, falconry is just a sophisticated form of bird-watching. We want to see what it does naturally in the wild, what God created it to do, and we just get to do it more often because we're falconers."

Yachcik and Sunny's hunt took place on the overgrown property of an old plant nursery on Lansing's west side. Tall grass interspersed with brush piles and low shrubs meant rabbit country, and tracks in the snow confirmed it. A few trees gave Sunny perches from which to scan the action.

After releasing Sunny to a perch, Yachcik and several cohorts fanned out, walking and beating the brush with long sticks to bring the bunnies into the open. Sunny watched intently, then leaped into action when shouts of "Ho! Ho! Ho!" meant a rabbit was on the run.

Michigan has about 100 permitted falconers who will be allowed this year to capture a total of 86 wild birds, but Yachcik said the actual number will be closer to half that. As a group, they are allowed to capture two great-horned owls and four goshawks; the remaining 80 must be red-tailed hawks, Cooper's hawks, sharp-shinned hawks or American kestrels.

Trapping controlled

Michigan does not allow trapping of any other species. Before this year, the limit was 25 birds per year statewide, but that number was leaving some falconers without birds.

More than a year of conversations between the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment, the Michigan Hawking Club and the Michigan Audubon Society helped develop the higher annual limit that was satisfactory to all the parties, said Karen Cleveland, a bird specialist with the DNRE.

"When you drive down the road and see a hawk every quarter-mile, those are red-tailed hawks. And when you look on your bird feeder and see a hawk there, those are Cooper's hawks," Cleveland said.

"These are the species that people really see a lot of. And 80 birds is a drop in the bucket for these species. You're never going to notice that in the population."

The falconers capture "passage" birds that are less than a year old with a special trap known as a bal-chatri that snares the bird without harming it. Passage birds are fully grown but lack their adult plumage. They're easier to train, and they haven't yet joined the breeding population. Most are captured in the fall in the same year in which they hatched, so they're old enough to hunt but still impressionable.

It takes a falconer four to six weeks to train a raptor to depend on a human for food. Once the bird associates the human with food, it relies on its own instincts to hunt but still comes to hand when called. The process takes advantage of the birds' feeding cycle in the wild, where they hunt when they're hungry and don't when they aren't.

Each bird's weight is measured to fractions of an ounce, and falconers know the exact weight at which their birds will hunt. During a hunt, a falconer may feed the birds an ounce or two of meat, enough to keep them going without dulling their hunting instinct. Falconers liken the birds' feeding regimen to that of an athlete in training.

"We do regulate their weight, but it isn't anywhere near starving," Yachcik said. "A red-tailed hawk, when he's full, he's not going to kill anything. They don't need to. But out in the wild, when their crop goes down, their stomach is empty, and they hunt and kill."

Lives extended

Taking birds out of the wild is a part of the sport that has drawn criticism, but falconers say the birds' life expectancy skyrockets once they're trained to work with humans. Some birds can live 20-30 years in captivity, according to Yachcik.

"Between 70-80 percent of all young birds of prey die in their first year," Yachcik said. "They don't make it to 1 year old. Their life expectancy in the hands of a falconer is way, way better than that. Very infrequently we hear of somebody losing a bird."

Cleveland agreed.

"A bird taken for falconry is probably just one less that's going to die in the wild," she said. "So we don't expect to see any reduction in our wild populations from this take."

Only certain birds are suitable for hunting in Michigan. Peregrine falcons are speedy and exotic, but they climb so high and need so much open space that it's difficult for them to hunt even Michigan's farmlands, where pigeons can escape to barns and trees.

In Michigan falconry, red-tailed hawks are the Ford F-150, while goshawks are the Corvette. One is steady and dependable, the other fast and flashy. A red-tailed hawk will hunt within a weight "window" of up to 3 ounces. A goshawk may only fly when its weight is within a half-ounce window.

"You can get rabbits with a goshawk, you can get ducks with a goshawk, you can get pheasants with a goshawk, you can get squirrels with a goshawk. They are so fast," Yachcik said. "But a goshawk is also like a sports car. It takes a lot more maintenance.

"But a red-tailed hawk, if you want consistency, and you want to be able to hunt when you're ready to hunt, you want it to do the same thing day in and day out with a window of weight. ... You're not going to get the flashy flights, you're not going to get the variety of game it can take, but you're going to get the consistency."

Test is required

Falconry is heavily regulated in Michigan and elsewhere. It's subject to state and federal regulations for now; in 2014 oversight will fall to the states, but little is expected to change. Hunting rules like seasons and bag limits mirror those for hunters who use guns and archery equipment.

To become a falconer, you must first pass a detailed, 100-question test, then acquire the equipment needed to build a suitable place for a bird to live, called a mews, that has to pass a state inspection.

At that point you find a general or master falconer to sponsor your 24-month apprenticeship, during which you may keep only one bird: a red-tailed hawk or an American kestrel.

Capture permits needed

State and federal permits are required to capture your bird.

"People say, 'Hey, I want to do that,' but you have like a year and a half before you can put your hands on a bird," Yachcik said.

During the apprenticeship, you must have a working relationship with your sponsor so at the end of two years he or she can sign off on your apprenticeship. Then you're a general falconer for five years before you can become a master falconer.

All that work is part of the reason for the Michigan Hawking Club's annual field meet. It shows prospective falconers all the effort required.

"You get a lot of people who are interested in it, but they realize the amount of time it would take to stay involved in it," said Kory Koch, the club's communications director. "But at the same time you have people who enjoy it so much and enjoy watching falconers and birds work together. ... They realize that's all they can do, but that's all some people really need to enjoy it."

For Yachcik, the best part is the privilege of watching up close as nature's dance unfolds over and over again.

"The thing that impresses me personally is that I get to experience something that's been happening for hundreds of thousands of years, and this hawk allows me to accompany it while it does it," Yachcik said. "Because that hawk would be doing it with me or not."

Dave Spratt is editor of http://www.greatnorthernoutdoors.net">www.greatnorthernoutdoors.net. He can be reached at dspratt@greatnorthernoutdoors.net">dspratt@greatnorthernoutdoors.net.