Happy Christmas

My beloved wife finally got her Christmas present today

Last Christmas I bought a half day Falconry experience and today we finally got to it. There were Hawks, Owls, Falcons, Eagles and Buzzards to admire and then a selection of them were brought out to fly from hand to hand of from post/fence/shed to hand all bribed by small pieces of food. The good news was that my wife enjoyed the experience immensely and we both learned a great deal. The owl shown on the left here was a particular favourite of mine as he would only fly to the food, and had to be carried back to the perch from which he started.


One of the things that struck us was how much the birds were characters. The owl being flown also had a habit of provoking the Raven in his aviary by walking on the roof of it. Apparently before the roof was planked over the Raven, when provoked, would grab the piece of leather tied to the owl's leg and fly round and round in his aviary in order to upset the owl.

John the demonstrator was the most knowledgeable person I've ever met, and I'm pleased to say that he had strong opinions on most things ecological.

Details of the Falconry Centre are here and I would recommend it wholeheartedly.

Oh, and the weather was brilliant too.