Falconry

Gerald Lascelles

Description

This vintage book constitutes one volume of a detailed and useful guide to falconry, and includes information on the care and management of falcons and related birds.

This fascinating and extensively illustrated text will be of considerable utility to modern hawking enthusiasts, and would make for a wonderful addition to collections of related literature.

The chapters of this book include:

- General Management

- Mews

- Blocks

- Perches

- Bow Perch

- Bathing

- Condition

- Feeding

- Casting

- Imping

- Mounting

- Various Diseases

'

Many antiquarian books such as this are becoming increasingly hard to come by and expensive, and it is with this in mind that we are republishing this book. It now comes in an affordable, modern edition - complete with a specially commissioned new introduction on falconry.

Falconry

- Falconry

- General Management

- Mews

- Blocks

- Perches

- Bow-Perch

- Bathing

- Condition

- Feeding

- Castings

- Imping

- Moulting

- Various Diseases

- General Hints

Sujets

• Sports
• Recreation
• Hunting

Informations

• Publié par: Read Books Ltd.
• Date de parution: 29 mars 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781446548769
• Langue: English

Extrait

FALCONRY
GENERAL MANAGEMENT, MEWS, BLOCKS, PERCHES, BOW PERCH, BATHING, CONDITION, FEEDING, CASTINGS, IMPING, MOULTING, VARIOUS DISEASES AND GENERAL HINTS
BY
GERALD LASCELLES
CONTENTS


TITLE
FALCONRY
GENERAL MANAGEMENT-MEWS-BLOCKS-PERCHES-BOW-PERCH-BATHING-CONDITION-FEEDING-CASTINGS-IMPING-MOULTING-VARIOUS DISEASES-GENERAL HINTS.
T HE first consideration of a falconer will naturally be to provide himself with a mews, or place to keep his hawks in. Almost any stable or loose box will do for this, and elaborate buildings are rather to be shunned. The requirements are: first, that it be well ventilated, but quite free from draughts; second, that it can be made dark at any time. The best mode of ventilating is what is known as a Tobin tube, by which plenty of air is admitted without either light or draught, combined with a ventilator in the roof which can be closed. When the place is made dark, hawks will remain still, and can be left for the night without any fear of their jumping or fidgetting during the early morning hours. The mews should be kept as dry as possible, and for this purpose one of the little slow-combustion stoves known as a Tortoise stove is exceedingly useful, and, though anything like coddling hawks is undesirable, still it is a good plan when they are getting no exercise at all to give them a little extra warmth, and the stove keeps the whole place dry. The perch may be arranged in the mews just as is most convenient to the shape of the building; a very good plan is place it round the house, parallel with the walls, and not less than three feet from them. It should be four feet high, and is best made of a rough larch pole with the bark on it. In any case it must not be too smooth, lest the hawks slip off it. 1 On the under-side of the perch is nailed a piece of stout canvas, (whence it is often called the screen). This is best nailed firmly along the pole, with the use of leather washers to prevent the canvas from tearing at the nail-holes. At intervals of about eighteen inches can be worked large eyelet holes, through which the leashes can be passed, so as to tie round the perch. If it is preferred, the nails can be put in at intervals of about eight inches, so as to allow the leash to be passed between the canvas and the perch; but by the first-named plan the canvas will last twice as long. The object of the screen is , first, to make sure that a hawk that has bated off the perch will certainly attempt to regain her position on the same side that she came off from, and so will not get her jesses twisted round the pole; secondly, it enables a hawk that is not very active, to struggle to the perch again by getting a hold with her claws in the canvas. This perch is in universal use indoors and is perfect for passage peregrines, merlins, or the short-winged hawks; but eyess peregrines, being less active, cannot safely be placed on the perch at first, though most of them will gradually become used to it. A sick hawk should never be placed on any perch from which it can possibly be hung.
A bed of sand, three inches thick, should be placed below the perch, and that part which is foul must be removed every morning. If sand is not procurable, sawdust can be used; but in that case great care must be taken lest any of it find its way on to the hawk s food, especially if it be deal sawdust, which contains turpentine.
In fine weather hawks must be kept in the open air as much as possible, and every day, before they are flown, should be placed out at least for an hour or two to weather. If put out for this purpose by seven o clock in the morning they should be well weathered and ready to fly by eleven o clock at latest, and those which are so inclined will have bathed and got thoroughly dry; but when hawks are being flown every day, and perhaps late in the day, they cannot be so fed as to be ready early the next morning, and therefore, when the same lot of hawks are being daily used, the sport must take place in the afternoon for the most part.
The blocks on which hawks are kept in a garden or on a lawn are made in different ways, but the best pattern is the simplest and the cheapest of all. Take a plain simple log of wood with the bark upon it, saw into lengths fourteen inches long and six inches in diameter; drive into the base thereof an iron spike ten inches long, the end of which is then sharpened so as to be driven into the ground and thus hold the block firmly. Into the centre of the top drive an iron staple, to which the leash is to be tied, and for a few pence a block is produced that cannot be surpassed for all practical purposes. Hardwood of any kind is the best, for fir decays, loses its bark, and rots from the staple, which may thus wax loose. Birch with the bark on it makes a very neat, pretty-looking block, and a very durable one; while holly, if it can be obtained of large enough size, is almost imperishable and very neat. Both blocks and perches have been devised of various and more or less complicated forms. Blocks which revolve and blocks which do not; with fixed staples and with revolving rings (which have been known to break, and which invariably jam).