So what is Falconry and what is a Falconer you might ask.
Well, the definitions are:
Falconer – fal·con·er
a person who keeps, trains, and hunts with a falcon, hawk or other bird of prey
Falconry – fal·con·ry
the sport of hunting with falcons or other birds of prey; the keeping and training of such birds
Meet my husband, Collin Waybright. Collin is a Master Class Falconer in the state of West Virginia. He has been doing Falconry since he was 14 years old. A Master Class Falconer is someone who has gone through the 2 years as an apprentice Falconer. After that you move to General Class for 5 years. If you’ve been in good standing, done well hunting your birds and have worked with more than once species, you move on to be called a Master Class Falconer.
Collin’s first ever bird was a wild caught Red-Tailed Hawk
Collin earned his Falconry permit in September of 2014 and he caught his first bird in January 2015. In Falconry, your first bird must be wild caught and either an American Kestrel, or a Juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk. The trapping season for Falconer’s to trap a hawk is Sept-Jan. So on January 10th, with only 21 days left to the trapping season he caught a bird. To his surprise and great delight it was a Juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk!He named the the bird Ace. Over the next year he trained and worked with Ace and completely fell in love with the Sport of Falconry.
If you would like to learn more about Collin and Ace, you can see the first ever article about Collin and his love for these birds published in the Wonderful West Virginia Magazine in Feb of 2016!
Falconry is not the only thing you can do with these amazing birds!
Now Collin not only does Falconry, he also does Educational Programs for schools, 4-H camps, public events, and private groups at home and away. He also does Hawk walks. Which is a way to experience a small glimpse into what it’s like to be a Falconer and work with these amazing birds out in the field and watch them do what they were made to do.
Want to find out more about what Collin does?
You can check out his website at https://laurelforkfalconry.com/ , and you can follow him on Social Media
This blog is going to have many different types of posts, including many Falconry based posts. I plan to categorize and tag my posts so it’s easy to find subjects you would like to learn and read about and skip ones you might not be interested in.
So proud of you both! That’s my boy!