In march 1965 I read 'Varda the flight of a falcon'- My mother gave me the book for my birthday as a reminder of the 28000 acre ranch I had grown up on between the Sebakwe and the Munyati rivers in the middle of the vast Central African Bush. It is the story of a young Peregrine Falcon on its first migration down the east coast of America to its wintering area on the Yucatan Peninsula. It describes how the Falcon was trapped by a falconer on the sands of Assatuegue Island off the coast of Virginia. Then its training and later loss by the Falconer. From the moment I read that story I was determined to become a falconer.

My first raptor was a Dark Chanting Goshawk. I had shot at the bird with a slingshot and stunned it. It fell out of the tree but to my surprise soon recovered. My parents were very unsuportive of my endeavors. They winced each time I appeared with bleeding hand from the frequent footings from this precious hawk. For me these were the caresses of love. I was determined to make do and made a wire cage for it out of an unused fish trap. I also had no leather, so the jesses I made from braided wool and I used one of my fathers old welding gloves as a glove. I think it was my father who encouraged me to tether the bird outside on the lawn. It was not long before I came out of the house to find it gone. A year later, I took 'Wally' from a nest high in a Mopane tree. Wally was one of Africa's smallest eagles - the Wahlbergs. I had 'Wally' for the rest of the long summer holidays. Then, a few months before my thirteenth birthday, I was sent to boarding school at Falcon College and Wally was released back to the wild.

Falcon College was situated in a remote location near the Matobos hills of todays Zimbabwe. At this school Peter Steyn was my English teacher. Peter was well on his way to becoming one of the best known bird photographers in Africa. He would take select kids out on trips to set up hides and check nests. It was with Peter that I saw my first Tawny eagle nest, Martial Eagle nest, Black Goshawk nest, African Hawk Eeagle nest. At the end of the school year Peter had a young Tawny Eagle that he offered me to take back and handle over the long summer holidays. On the last day of school when it was time to collect the bird it was circling high over the school. I never returned to Falcon College. My parents left the country permanently for South Africa. But not before I found out that a local bird lover who had befriended me had a young African Goshawk that he was going to give me for a Christmas present. I never had the opportunity to collect the bird. In 1968 in South Africa I found a Crowned Eagles nests in a huge dead tree in the Kloof Gorge and pointed it out to a photographer, Neville Bentley. The tree must have died with the nest still in place. The birds continued to use the site even though the nest was well above forest level and hardly a branch still existed on the trunk. Incidentaly the tree fell down in 1970 and the pair moved across the gorge to their current location next to the small waterfall. I also pointed out a Yellow-billed kites nest below the Shongweni Dam to Neville to photograph and an African Goshawks nest also in the Kloof Gorge. But the Rock Kestrel nests and Lanner Falcon nests on the cliffs were inaccessible.

However the circles of life turned in strange ways and as a college student in South Africa I got to know Deets Lamar-Pickett. Deets was a fascinating character. An American who had settled in South African. As a retireee he was also a falconer and a gun maker. When I told Deets of 'Varda' he told me he was a friend of author Robert Murphy and was the 'falconer' in the story. He showed me old black and white pictures of the deserted cabin they stayed in when trapping on Assatuegue Island.

In the summer of 1975 I found myself as a volunteer doing the fencing for a start up kibbutz on the Golan Heights in Israel. In a copse of eucalyptus trees I noted a European Kestrel's nest. Just before the young fledged I took an 'eyas' from the nest. Soon I had the bird flying easily to the fist and the lure. This was the last foray into Falconry for me for the next 25 years. Career and family took away the pursuit of dreams.

It was only in 2000 that I decided to take the plunge and finaly get back into falconry. Falconry is surely one of the most controlled sports in the USA. To start the process of getting a license I had to be sponsored before the Washington State Fish and Wildlife Departement by an already licensed Falconer. I had gotten to know some of the local falconers and asked the most 'colorful' of them all, Kirk Francis, to sponsor me. I took the Department exams and inspections and Kirk's invaluable advice and flambouyant mentorship guided me along the way of the next two years of apprenticeship. As soon as my license was issued, daybreak on a bitterly cold winter morning, found Kirk and I out on the Skagit flats scouting for juvenile 'passage' Red-tailed hawks. A number of sets produced nothing and we were about to give up when we spotted a bird on a power pole next to the road. We set the trap and drove a short distance away and watched. Within a few minutes the bird had flown to the pole closest to the trap and then descended to the ground a short distance away...then into the trap. Gabriel was my first bird in America. Named instead of the African Goshawk I never got for my Xmas present in 1966. A male juvenile 'tiercel passage' Red-tailed hawk.

I released Gabriel after the end of the 2000/2001 hunting season. The 2001/2002 season saw Kirk and I out on the flats searching for a passage Red-tail. This time it was 'Paddy' named after Padilla bay which borders the flats on which we trapped him. Once again a smaller tiercel. When the season ended in march I also released Paddy. He has stayed in the area ever since. Fall 2002 found me once again out in the fields on the Skagit flats across the bay from where I live on Camano Island. It was early on a Sunday, October 20, and I was scouting for a juvenile Red-tailed hawk. Early sundays are my preferred trapping times as the 'Saturday night partiers' are still sleeping off the hangovers and the church going crowd has not yet hit the roads But by 10am the traffic had started and I had trapped 2 adult birds, which have to be released. Heading home just before reaching our local town of Stanwood I noted a passage bird sitting on a pole close to the old Pioneer highway. Luckily a dirt road lead off to the side. This enabled me to shield myself from the birds view as I got out the van to set the trap. Then from a few hundred yards I watched as the bird tightened its feathers, then dropped her tucked up foot. Then bent forward and launched towards the trap. Unlike the other birds this one had no hesitation and hit the trap at full speed. Maru and I started our long hunting partnership!

Hunting with a Red-tailed Hawk Summer with a Coopers Hawk Hunting with a Northern Goshawk