Utah sky trial w/pics

by **Mat B.** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 12:29 pm

All I have to say is that is some of the coolest stuff I have ever seen. Standing out in the field with the judges and the handlers, watching the birds at over 1000 ft in the air, let me tell you, the neck starts to hurt looking up like that after so long. But when the bird comes down in the stoop, to try and catch the pigeon, it sounds like you are at a air plane show with a jet that just passed over your head. That is the best way that I can explain it. It is LOAD! Way sweeeeeeeet!

These guys do a great job in getting the young involved.

This young man is paying very close attention.

You can't slap the smile off of this kids face.

I thought this guy looked kinda old school, so I tried to make it black and white. This guy had some very cool birds.

This bird in the air is in the above picture.

My good friend going over the rules with the handler and his scouts.

A quick snap shot before the flight.

The gentleman is removing the hood form his bird so it can be released.

And we have lift off.

Just a few more of mis. pictures of some beautiful birds.

These would ruin somethings good day.

This should be on everybodys to-do list. What a great time, and I will definitely go and check it out again when I can.

Mat

by **Kim S.** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 2:51 pm

Wow Mat, thanks for the report!! Watching something like that is definitely on my want-to-do list. Now, what exactly does a "scout" do? I have a hard time not thinking in bird dog terms, so I need it explained in falconry terms :-)

.

Thanks again!

Kim

by **justuspr** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 3:33 pm

very cool, I wish I had been able to go watch.

by **Mat B.** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 6:15 pm

I will do the best I can to explain it. They pretty much do for the handler of the bird what a scout would do for us in a FT. The guy in the black n white pic, he hunts his birds with his EP. So he had 2 or 3 scouts out there with him watching his bird, as he was too. He would let his birds fly for 10 minutes. Once they were in the air for that long he would start running around with his dog like he his hunting it. He would ask the scouts "it it coming this way yet"?. Just so you know his birds were so far out and up, there were times you could not see the bird with your naked eye. The bird would just circle around and up, when he was ready, I don't know what he did but his scouts said "ok he's coming straight in, straight at us", he would be out there with his dog making some kind of motion to the bird and it would come back to him, then he would tell the "bird planter" (if you will), to release the bird. The birds goes up and the Falcon quickly comes down. So long story short, the scouts are there to help watch the bird as we are to help watch dogs. As sometimes he/you can not always see your bird/dog. :smile:

Hope that helps a little. It was very cool, but if you go take a pair of binoculars, you will need them, I forgot mine.

Mat

by **Kim S.** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 6:39 pm

Thanks for the explanation, Mat. Very interesting!

Kim

by **Ryfly** on Sun Feb 21, 2010 7:32 pm

I really wanted to go as well but we had other plans.

Looks like fun stuff. Hunting wild birds like that has got to be the pinnacle of hunting but another expensive hobby is all I need right now! :shock:

by **Shagrunner** on Mon Mar 01, 2010 3:52 pm

And very, very addicting. My #2 son got into it at age 14 and has never been the same. It's a total obsession which consumes almost all of his spare time.