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Allowing your hawk to get hung up by the creance is an insult to her... and it sets back <br />her training so it must be avoided at all costs. <br />After being trained to the lure, she will be prepared for free-flight. Experienced <br />falconers have seen the highly attentive 'look' of a hawk who is ready for free-flight... <br />she is focused only on the lifting of the glove, the blow of the whistle, even the reaching <br />of the falconer for the food in the food bag. These are the same actions that a novice <br />should look for. Once she is at this stage, remove the creance in the flying field and call <br />her. Most likely she is already on her way. If she does swing up into a tree, try calling her <br />to the glove once more -then offer the lure with its full ration of food attached. She <br />should plummet from the trees to either the glove or the lure. <br />All that must be done from this point is to take your hawk down, make sure she is <br />at proper weight and that the wind is not too great for her (passage or new young birds <br />especially can be lured off by the prospect of a thermal) and to bring her to a field <br />where prey is known to be. <br />Once the relationship is established and trustworthy, the pair go out into the field. <br />The bird is unhooded and, in the case of a falcon, quickly takes to the air. Hawks either <br />hunt from the air, from a soar, from a nearby perch, or from the glove itself. Once the <br />bird is untethered, the falconer becomes the bird's servant, dutifully seeking out the <br />quarry and flushing it for the raptor. The raptor then takes chase, providing stunning <br />aerial maneuvers. Hawks can seem to defy physics, and the falcon's stoop (dive) is <br />recorded at speeds up to 240 miles per hour, and her turns have exceeded 29 Gs! To <br />many falconers, this aerial display is the greatest reward, this close witness to nature at <br />its most impressive gaining him a front row seat to what is inarguably the greatest <br />airshow on earth. <br />Hawks are not exercised by chasing the lure, but instead encouraged to fly from <br />tree to tree as the falconer walks along by occasionally offering the tidbit-garnished <br />glove. Some falconers employ a method called "jump training" in which the hawk is <br />required to fly nearly straight upwards to a height of 10-12 feet for a tidbit of meat. This <br />can be performed many times, the reward being given intermittently (as psychology <br />principles have taught that the intermittent reward is a stronger reinforcement,) to gain <br />strength and stamina. <br />Telemetry <br />A transmitter attached to a Harris' Hawk's jessln order to track a raptor who has <br />flown away, many falconer use radio telemetry. Typically a transmitter is temporarily <br />attached to the leg at the jess or on a bewit. Sometimes a mount for it may be <br />attached to one of the center tail feathers by very careful application of a small drop <br />of Superglue. Recently, a lightweight harness made of Teflon tape has also been <br />employed as a means of hanging the transmitter off the middle of the bird's back (out <br />10 <br />