There are lots of way to burnish your college application resume: play the tuba, be the star running back on your high school football team, or, of course, be a legacy. But here’s a rather novel one: falconry -- the sport of hunting wild animals with the help of a bird of prey.
Getting into his first choice college wasn’t Max Zimmerman’s goal when he took up falconry at fourteen. But he admits he wouldn’t mind if it helps distinguish him from the pack applying to college this year.
I joined him as he and his latest red-tail hawk, who’s he still training, went hunting in the woods near his house in Kinderhook, NY on a recent Sunday afternoon.
The bird has no name, at least not yet, and there’s a reason for that. “I haven’t figured her out yet,” Max confessed.
His father Kurt, who briefly joined us, was more pointed. “She hasn’t shown us her personality,” he observed, “other than meanness.”
But Max explained that a mean streak may actually be an asset. You’re not looking for the same qualities in a raptor that you would in a house pet. “They say they’re never really tamed,” he explained as the hooded hawk perched on his leather-gloved hand. “They hang out with you because you fill their belly with food.”
I hadn’t really understood it until I met Max. But falconry’s really hunting by other means. Some hunters do it with a crossbow. Others with a rifle. Max, who’s seventeen, does it with a hawk.
The goal, after weeks and months of training, is to have an animal that is as dependable when it comes to hunting small game as a conventional hunter’s firearm.
The teenager still had a ways to go with this bird that he’s owned for about a month. But he hopes soon to travel with it through the woods, flushing game. Actually, it’s sort of the opposite of hunting with a bird dog.
“She’ll follow me from tree to tree as I push up game,” he explained. “The human is the dog and the bird is the hunter.”
Max told me he’s been hunting with his family since he was six or seven years old. He describes falconry as the next step. His relationship with his birds has helped him develop an even greater understanding and appreciation for the natural world.
“It doesn’t kill what it can’t eat,” he told me. “As a hunter I respect that.”
Knowing nothing about falconry – my notion of it was Middle Eastern sheiks racing golden eagles while their Bentleys idled nearby – I had a lot of questions.
The first one was: how do you catch a hawk? I would have thought it’s about as easy as bottling lightening.
But Max explained it’s not that hard. All it requires, after driving around and locating an immature bird, is a mesh trap and a live gerbil or mouse, to attract the bird’s interest. He found this one about a mile from his house. “Within five minutes,” he told me, “you have yourself a bird.”
It’s not quite that easy. Falconry in New York State requires you to be over fourteen, train with a knowledgeable falconer and pass a rather strenuous written exam with a grade of 80 or higher. (By the way, if you have any interest in birds of prey, whether you want to enlist one for sport or not, I suggest you look up the test on the Department of Environmental Conservation website. You’ll learn a lot taking the multiple-choice test, which comes with the answers.)
You also need a small game license.
Max also weighs his birds daily since every bird has a flying weight. You want it to be hungry but have sufficient strength and stamina to land prey.
But perhaps the hardest part – and this is where, when applying to college, you can argue to the college admissions officer or alumni interviewer that the sport has taught you a sense of responsibility way above the average teenager’s – is training the bird.
“It’s like having a child,” Max said.
It requires exceptional patience as you develop a relationship, getting the animal to trust you, eat out of your hand, and eventually take it flying – initially with a long rope. “You take it to a big field where she can’t get tangled up in trees,” Max said.
Our destination was actually the woods beside a field across the street from his house where he’d strung up a dead squirrel in a tree. Max admitted that he’s been known to pull over in his car to retrieve road kill. “When she’s flying on the creance without hesitation,” he said, referring to the long, fine cord attached to a hawk’s leash, “it’s time to start free flying.”
But just in case this bird went rogue it was also equipped with a pricey radio transmitter so the falconer could track it.
Free flying was the stage where Max was with this bird. When he released it, the raptor flew to a nearby tree and then, like a guided missile, exploded through the forest, hitting the dangling squirrel and bringing it to the ground, both its feet planted on the rodent’s head.
By the way, one place you don’t want to find any unprotected fingers is between a raptor’s beak and the prey in its razor sharp talons. Speaking from personal experience Max said the talons that are more dangerous than the beak.
On the other hand, the bird isn’t taking unnecessary chances for good reason. Max told me that a squirrel fighting for its life has been known to bite off a bird’s toes.
We returned to the teenager’s home, where he deposited the ornery bird in its mews, a large walk-in birdhouse adjoining his family’s home. Finally free of interruption, the hawk got to work on its meal of wild game in peace.
Ralph Gardner, Jr. is a journalist who divides his time between New York City and Columbia County. More of his work can be found at ralphgardner.com
The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.
