Lords of the Air

All of my life I’ve been captivated by birds of prey. When I was sixteen I was on a camping trip next to a creek a few miles from our home. While exploring a cliff face above the creek one night, I spotted several sets of eyes in a cleft with my flashlight. The next morning I fashioned an Indian style snare and attempted to catch, one of, whatever was in the cleft of the cliff face. I pulled out a baby Great Horned Owl. (He was not the least bit happy about his new predicament. And it was sheer luck on my part that his mother wasn't around or she might have taken my scalp!) I put him in a brown paper bag and secured it to the back of my motorcycle seat and took him home. I named him Amon-Ra after an Egyptian god. I didn’t know the first thing about raising a bird of prey but I was determined to learn. That began a love of hawks, owls, falcons and falconry that burns in me still.

I refused to cage my new friend. I opted instead to let him fly wherever he liked around the house. I would call him to eat and he would dutifully fly down from where he was perched to land at my feet. I didn’t realize then that I was doing him harm by feeding him raw steak. Raptors need bones, fur and feathers as roughage in their diet to stay healthy. (We can harm the things we love, while thinking we're doing them good, too easily...)

What I instinctively knew then, I more fully understand now. The thing I love about birds of prey the most is their spirit. To break that would be to destroy the very thing that draws me to them. Not to break it, is to risk losing them…but that’s a part of loving them.

It was given to mankind to dominate the earth…but that doesn’t mean everything in it should be dominated. To destroy the very things we are drawn to is to destroy a part of ourselves. We are all connected. God works through us to affirm that when we let Him. I pity those who haven’t found their sense of connection. And I especially pity those who’ve lost their sense of awe.

What a wonder and a miracle is a bird of prey in the air. It doesn’t matter how long the leash is from the jesses to the glove, sometimes the leash has to come off and then they’ll do what God intended them to do...the things that we love them for!

The falconer that treats his bird like a pet will destroy it. They're not pets. The person who just wants an unusual animal to keep and tell his friends about should avoid birds of prey. They're our partners. They have to be worked with every day. It is our honor that they allow us to participate with them in the Way. We owe them our respect. The falconer that doesn’t treat his partner with respect soon loses her.

The wise one learns the lesson…