ON MANAGEMENT DURING THE MOULT
Now let me say a few words concerning the management of hawks in the
moult. The more hawks of any kind are flown at quarry and the better
they are protected from the severity of heat and cold, the better and
quicker will they moult. Hawks moult cleaner and quicker in the hot
regions of Persia than in the cold.[635] Further you must pay the
greatest attention to the flesh you give them, not feeding them on one
kind of meat only, for if you do, they will certainly fall sick.
Now if you wish to moult your hawks in a hot region, such as Baghdad,
you must construct out of split-cane a “mew” of a size proportionate
to the number of your hawks, building it on the river bank where the
_Shimāl_[636] wind can constantly be felt. In front of this house
or room, enclose an open space with a wall.[637] Inside the room,
construct at a distance of forty inches from the wall, as many hollow
mud platforms as you have hawks.[638] Fill in the top of the platforms
with sand and fine gravel, and spread the floor of the room also to
the depth of a span with sand and gravel. On the platforms intended
for short-winged hawks, spread leaves of willow, or wild mint, fresh
and green, or any other kind of greenery, so that the hawks may lie
down and rest on it. Next, in front of each platform, construct in
the ground a small bathing tank lined with red clay. Every morning
early, you must sprinkle the inside of the mew with water, and every
evening as soon as the sun has set, you must take out your hawks,
short-winged and long-winged, and “weather”[639] them in the open-air
enclosure that is in front of their room. In the outside enclosure,
too, there must be, dug out of the ground, small tanks, which should
be lined with clay. Doubtless you are saying to yourself, “Why
can’t I substitute a copper or an earthen basin?” Now, were you to
substitute a copper or an earthen basin, there would be a danger that
while splashing about in the water, the moulting hawk might strike
the half-grown wing- or tail-quills that are full of blood against
the hard substance of the basin, and that the injury might cause the
blood to dry up in the quills, which would thereby become “strangled,”
and would eventually drop out. Now with a tank of beaten clay and
sand there is no such danger. In short, every hawk in this outside
enclosure also, must have its own bathing-pool.
“RANGLE.”—In front of each long-winged hawk there should be a handful
of pebbles ranging from a size smaller than a pea to a size larger
than a bean; for it is the habit of all falcons[640] in the mew to
swallow small stones on most afternoons before they are fed, and to
cast them up again with a great deal of “bile.”[641] Should a hawk
have stones in her stomach when you feed her, she will retain the meat
in her feet and wait a little till she has cast up the stones. Not
till then will she feed.
SHORT-WINGED HAWKS DO NOT EAT “RANGLE.”—Goshawks and other
short-winged hawks do not eat stones in the moult.
During the moult you must feed your hawk twice a day, once in the
morning and once in the evening, letting her eat as much as she
pleases, so that she be gorged.[642]
If the “mew” be in a “cool-region,” every short-winged hawk, from a
common sparrow-hawk to a white goshawk, should have a room to itself,
proportionate to its size. A few air-holes should be made on the
north side. In this room, two or three perches of varying thickness
should be erected, and the perches themselves should _not_ be turned
to a uniform thickness, so that the hawk may have a choice and select
a perch that suits its fancy at the time. A roomy bathing-pool must
also be constructed in the ground. Next, place in the room a piece
of matting [made of split cane] to the centre of which a cord is
attached. At first you must feed the hawk twice a day, till she is
fat. As soon as she is fat, the amount of her food must be a fixed
quantity, and this should be bound on to the centre of the matting and
left, so that she may feed when she feels inclined.
It is not advisable to keep falcons loose like this in a room; in
fact, it is injurious to do so.[643]
FOOTNOTES:
[633] It is not clear what the author means by “lion with a buffalo.”
The hunting leopard is trained in other countries besides India to
take antelope and gazelle.
[634] By this title the _Shiʿahs_ refer to _ʿAlī_. The writer was
undoubtedly a _Shiʿah_. The _Sunnis_ of the present day, but not the
_Shiʿahs_, style the Sultan of Turkey “Commander of the Faithful.”
[635] _Garm-sīr va sard-sīr_, “hot regions and cold.” _Tabrīz_,
_T̤ihrān_ and parts of _Iṣfahān_ are _sard-sīr_. The city of _Iṣfahān_
and of _Shīrāz_ are “middling.”
[636] _Shimāl_, “North,” is the name given to the prevalent wind in
Baghdad and in the Persian Gulf.
[637] The wall would naturally be of mud or of sun-dried bricks and
would cost little.
[638] _Sakū_ is a “wooden bench, a garden seat”; or as here a “mud
platform.”
The author has not expressed himself at all clearly or else there
are omissions in the text. The passage might mean that the platforms
should be forty inches apart or be forty inches high.
[639] “Weathering” is placing hawks, usually unhooded, in the open air
on blocks. Eastern falconers do not “weather” their hawks, as during
the hawking season the hawks are on their fists in the open air many
hours.
[640] I have never seen a saker eat stones.
[641] _Ṣafrā_, “yellow bile,” one of the four humours of the body.
[642] In the plains of India, hawks during the moult should not be so
gorged, at least not during the four or five months of hot weather.
Hawks that are kept too fat will not moult properly. Further they
should be fed only once in the day, and that in the morning. If gorged
in the evening, their rest is affected, and they do not get the
benefit of the slight coolness of the night.
[643] I one year, in Kohat, India, tried moulting a young (_chūz_)
peregrine in a large outhouse, high and roomy. The hawk did not moult
at all, and frequently got so fat and heavy that she was unable to fly
up to her perch until her food was reduced for a day or two. However,
falconers in England recommend keeping a moulting hawk loose in a loft.