AL KHOR, Qatar — Just before dusk in a desolate stretch of Qatar desert, Saqr al-Humaidi donned a worn leather glove and prepared his falcon for its daily training. Mr al-Humaidi, 40, lured the bird from the back seat of his Toyota Land Cruiser, removed a round hood from its head and nodded to his cousin to prepare the target: a live pigeon attached to a small red parachute that, was in turn tethered to a drone.
Playing with a remote control, his cousin launched the drone into the cool evening air. It dragged the dove higher and higher until there was only a red speck dancing through the faded sky. As if sensing a shift in the air, the falcon tilted its head, flapped its pointed wings and gave chase.
The hunt was on.
Every evening, Mr al-Humaidi, his 13-year-old son Talal and a handful of relatives come to this site near the town of Al Khor, about an hour’s drive from the capital Doha, to train their falcons for hunting. matches. It is a rite of passage passed down through generations of his family and a touchstone of Qatari culture that links the country’s present with its Bedouin past.
Mr. al-Humaidi’s great-grandfather grew up here when it was still a poor piece of land in the Gulf. He once used the birds to hunt small animals and added a little protein to his family’s meager diet. But as Qatar prospered through the discovery of vast gas reserves, one of its oldest traditions also changed.
Long before football fever hit Qatar, culminating in this year’s World Cup, the sport of falconry was a point of national pride.
A brief guide to the 2022 World Cup
What is the World Cup? During this four-yearly event, the best national football teams compete for the title of world champion. Here’s an introduction to the Men’s tournament 2022:
Today it has assumed a mostly symbolic role in society. The birds are kept as pets and often trained by Qatari men—few, if any, women are involved in the hobby—for tens of thousands of dollars in racing competitions and for new cars.
As the migrant population on which the country relies has grown, ownership of the birds has also become something of a status symbol, a visible way of self-identifying as Qatari in a country where citizens are outnumbered eight to one. Almost all those involved are Qatari citizens, Mr al-Humaidi said.
In the air above him, his falcon dove and edged closer and closer to the dove as the drone pulled the prey through the air.
“Look how he’s chasing him,” Mr.’s cousin said. al-Humaidi, Mohammad Ali al-Mohannadi, as he gently moved the throttle on the drone’s remote control.
Drones are a relatively new addition to training, having been introduced in the past decade or so, he said.
Previously, the men attached a pigeon to a kite and released it into the air for the falcons to chase. And before that, trainers took a bag of pigeon meat, covered it with feathers, attached it to a rope and waved it in circles.
Today, the men try to chase the bird for at least 10 minutes a day to strengthen its muscles. The faster the falcon moves its wings, the more advanced it is as a hunter, said Mr. al-Mohannadi.
If the bird seems lethargic, it could be a sign that it needs more exercise or is exhausted from the previous day’s training.
“They are like any animal: they get sick, sometimes they are tired, one day they go on for 15 minutes and the next day we find them dead tired,” he explained, his eyes fixed on the bird in the sky.
As the falcon snatched the dove, Mr. al-Mohannadi shouted “It’s done!” and released the red parachute that connected the prey to the drone. The men then raced to where the falcon had landed to retrieve it, clutching the dead pigeon in its long, curved talons.
Wrapped around the falcon’s ankle was a bracelet with Mr. al-Humaidi, in case the bird didn’t return to him during training and someone found it on their roof. Mr al-Humaidi stroked the bird’s neck, carefully removed a GPS device – another safety net – and carefully rearranged the feathers.
Losing one of the birds can be expensive: the best race falcons are worth millions of dollars and even those kept as pets often run into the tens of thousands.
The Falcon of Mr. al-Humaidi cost him a relatively modest sum, about $2,000, he said.
It was a peregrine falcon, one of the two species of falcons that predominate in the Gulf, and one known for its speed and courage, as well as its sensitivity.
“You have to take special care of him more than others,” he explained.
As the blood-red sun dipped below the horizon, the men gathered their blankets and tea and returned the falcons to their Land Cruisers. It was a relaxed training day, they explained.
Unlike many other falconers, they did not plan to enter their birds for the big hawking competition that takes place in Qatar every January.
The competitions can be fierce and the training grueling.
The event includes a series of challenges that test a bird’s eyesight, speed and hunting prowess. In one of the competitions, the falcons race to catch pigeons that have been trained all year to evade them.
Last year the pigeons were so good that they evaded the catch with every falcon used. The pigeons won the right to live on and their trainer took home the competition prize.
Elena Hawat contributed reporting.