Qatar 2022’s millennial falcon: tourism, luxury, tradition
Doha, Oct 11 (EFE).- Falconry has been a practice in Qatar for over 5,000 years. Considered an essential part of its culture, falcons hold a special status in the Gulf nation and drive a million-dollar industry that reflects a national fascination with this age-old tradition.
These birds of prey are not only sold for high prices at hunting exhibitions and used in international tournaments and for breeding, they are also raised as family pets in Qatar, the host nation of the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
Rather than calling it a sport, Qataris consider falconry a lifestyle, says Zayed al-Ali, secretary of the al-Gannas Falconry Society, founded in 2008 to promote the art of hunting with falcons.
“We are trying to protect those birds from (being) smuggled, electrocuted, and also poisoned by agriculture,” al-Ali tells Efe.
Training and caring for falcons is the key to forming a unique bond between the trainer and the bird, and increasing their endurance.
Al-Ali says that this bird is powerful and intelligent because it thinks, reacts, and remembers what it has been taught.
Falcons are highly prized for their hunting abilities and beauty, and the rarest ones are always the most sought after on the Qatari market.
FANCY FALCONS
A falcon costs between $4,000 and $10,000 on average, but there are exceptions.
At the S’hail, the international hunting and falcon exhibition in Doha, a bird was sold for 911,000 Qatari riyals ($250,000).
The price of a falcon depends on its color, origin, breed and other characteristics it displays. Those that typically fetch more are white ones, for esthetic reasons, the female for its ability to breed and falcons originating from the Mongolian or Iraqi steppes.
Gyrfalcons, lanners and peregrines are the most common species showcased at the exhibition.
“In Qatar, the bigger and whiter, the more expensive it is. They love the color white, and the females are the most expensive because they can breed,” Alberto Relaño, a participant in the Qatari exhibition, tells Efe.
Specialized in selling falcons, falconry products, hunting gadgets, weapons and even vehicles modified for birds, the sixth edition of the fair featured representatives of 180 companies from around the world as falconry’s popularity in the region continues to soar.
From eye-covering hoods to prevent the falcon from becoming stressed in noisy situations, to telemetry tools for birds, flying robotic decoys and chips that measure their speed, distance and positioning via satellite to avoid losing them during training, everything can be found at the fair.
KING OF THE DESERT
The art of hunting with falcons was born out of humble beginnings.
“Nomadic people in the desert lived side by side with those birds in order to catch… and eat, so this was their source of food,” al-Ali explains.
A falcon’s eyesight is as many as eight times sharper than ours, and can reach more than 320 km/h (nearly 200 mph) in the air.
“They are killing machines. If a shark is a killing machine in the sea, this is a killing machine in the sky because they kill only to eat, and not for the sake of it, like wolves,” he adds.
