Reborn in the 1980s: I made my fortune hunting wild game in Changbai Mountain

Soon, Xiao Weimin and his men adjusted the cameras from two positions and gave Yue Feng a ready signal.

Yue Feng held a slice of meat in his hand and rubbed it against the beak of the white eagle.

A slice of meat, stained with a little bit of bloody juice, fell onto the hook in the beak of the white eagle.

The eagle smacked its lips and then swallowed the blood.

Seeing this, Yue Feng knew he had a chance, so he immediately took the meat and rubbed it against the eagle's beak hook.

This time, the angle and force of the hook were clearly adjusted, and several strands of meat got caught on the eagle's hook.

Having tasted the blood, the white eagle swallowed the shredded meat and blood without any hesitation.

Yue Feng tried for the third time, but this time he didn't immediately take the slice of meat from his hand.

The white eagle tentatively pecked at him, and then Yue Feng didn't let go, letting the eagle peck off a small piece of meat and swallow it.

Having properly taken its first bite of meat, the grass eagle completely let down its guard and composure, pecking and swallowing repeatedly.

Yue Feng let the white eagle swallow the whole piece of meat before slowly saying, "Feeding the eagles is an essential task! Newly caught eagles won't eat for the first few days. They will only try to eat after their affinity with the eagles and their energy reserves have been depleted to a certain extent!"

At this point, use the same method I just used to test the waters little by little. After a few times, the good-tempered eagle will know to eat meat!

Once you've taken your first bite of meat, you've basically passed this hurdle!

When you first start eating, it's called "opening the dark," which means you don't have to eat in front of people or in the open. It's fine even if it's in a relatively dark and quiet room!
Once the eagles have adapted, there are still two hurdles before they start feeding!

Which two levels?

“Enlightened food, open-minded food!” Yue Feng replied.

"Enlightened feeding means that an eagle eats food from a person's hand in front of others, in an outdoor environment where the sky is visible overhead!"
As for the "large meal," this is the next step after the initial feeding, once it's confirmed the eagle is in good condition. The meat is processed into larger chunks to prevent the eagle from pecking at it with its sharp beak, allowing it to swallow the meat whole instead.

"What's the point of opening the big food? Can't we just let it tear off pieces of meat and eat properly?" Xiao Weimin scratched his head in confusion after listening to Yue Feng's explanation.

Yue Feng smiled and shook his head, saying, "Of course not! Every step here is purposeful and not done in vain!"

The earlier, covert and overt feeding operations were all preparations for the final, massive feeding operation!

Why did we lay the groundwork? It's so that it can eat food with peace of mind, and eat whole pieces of food!

Once the eagle can swallow larger chunks of meat whole, we can start feeding it its "shaft" (or "hemp shaft"). We wrap meat around feathers or feed it a coiled hemp shaft; this both removes excess oil from its belly and increases its hunger! This is an essential step in training a large eagle!

"Xia shou'er? What's this 'hair shou'er' and 'hemp shou'er'? What are they?" Xiao Tian listened carefully from the side, but after hearing this term, he felt completely confused and had no knowledge of it at all.

Yue Feng smiled and glanced at Xiao Tian before continuing, "The term 'lower axis' is used by eagles to describe their actions. In fact, this behavior of swallowing and spitting out foreign objects is indispensable for wild birds of prey!"

During hunting and feeding, birds of prey swallow large amounts of feathers, indigestible bones, and even soil, pebbles, gravel, and other debris!

After digesting each day, the eagle's stomach and intestines will perform a rumination-like action, expelling the undigested waste through its esophagus!

These debris will turn into small balls of food and appear in the areas where eagles roost overnight!
Eagle handlers believe that the skewer used to feed eagles is designed to mimic the process of eagles regurgitating their food in the wild!
During our training period, the eagles are fed refined food. We deliberately feed them by feeding them the spool, which triggers the physiological behavior of regurgitating the food ball!
This process can cleanse the raptor's digestive system and reduce its weight to some extent, thus increasing its hunger!

When I personally train eagles, I use feather shafts the most. This material is relatively soft, non-irritating, and less likely to injure the eagle. However, the downside is that it takes a little longer.
We have a filming assignment this time, and to save everyone's time, I've decided to put a spindle on the eagle! If everything goes smoothly, it can save us about one or two days!

"A hemp stalk? Do you have one? What exactly is it?" Xiao Weimin nodded after listening and continued to ask curiously.

Yue Feng turned and went to his room, then took out several shuttle-shaped balls of hemp thread, each slightly thinner than a one-yuan coin.

"This is what I call a hemp spindle! It's made by boiling hemp thread in hot water to sterilize it, then folding it several times, continuously winding it around the longitudinal axis, and finally pressing it tightly from the end. That's how you get a hemp spindle for feeding eagles!"

"Holy crap, this is huge! Can an eagle swallow it?" Xiao Weimin held the coiled hemp stalk in his hand and examined it carefully for a few moments, somewhat incredulous.

Yue Feng grinned: "That's why you have to feed eagles a lot! Their throats and esophagi are used to swallowing coarser food, so when you feed them hemp stalks, they'll be able to swallow them!"

As for spitting it out, that's definitely not a problem! As long as the technique of coiling the hemp is up to par, and it doesn't spread out in the eagle's crop after being swallowed, then it can be swallowed and spit out!

According to our subsequent plan, after about three axes, the eagle will be able to land and become a fully grown eagle!

Xiao Weimin exclaimed repeatedly, "Tsk tsk, there's so much to learn about falconry! To be honest, before I came here, I did my homework on falconry through other channels, but no one mentioned putting a saddle on the falcon!"

Yue Feng grinned: "Even without using a hawk harness, it can be trained over time. Using a hawk harness, because of its stealthy behavior and outstanding effects, is a closely guarded core hawk-training technique among many hawk masters! We're filming a documentary, so naturally we can't keep anything secret!"

Actually, to elaborate further, besides wool and hemp shafts, there are other even more bizarre shafts!

"Are there any other axes? What are they? Tell us about them, it'll broaden our horizons!"

Yue Feng said unhurriedly, "For normal eagle training, the two types of eagles, feather shaft and hemp shaft, are sufficient!"

However, in other special circumstances, other axes can be used as auxiliary axes!
The first method is to use a radish shaft! Use a green or white radish, cut it into the shape of a shaft with a knife, and feed it to the eagle on the day it comes to the ground after it has grown up and you find that the eagle is in a slightly poor condition!

The eagle will vomit it out in about an hour or two!

At this time, it can significantly enhance the raptor's spirit, that is, its hunting desire! The general principle is that the substances in the carrot stimulate the mucous membrane of the gastrointestinal tract, making the eagle even hungrier!
Besides radish shafts, there are also rock sugar shafts! Feeding eagles whole pieces of rock sugar can stimulate their condition to some extent, similar to the principle of radish shafts! However, this stuff can harm eagles and easily cause dehydration!
The last one is elm bark stalks!
I can tell you about this separately!

If an eagle has problems spitting out feathers, debris, or stuffed hemp fibers due to lack of weight or parasites, and these become stuck in its crop, you can try chewing up the inner bark of an elm tree and feeding it to the eagle along with the juice and fiber.

The sap and fiber of elm bark are neutral in nature, have almost no irritating effect, and can even produce a lubricating and moisturizing effect.

Eagles that previously had crop compression problems might experience relief after being fed this supplement, as it helps to clump together foreign objects in the crop and expel them.

Upon hearing this truly valuable information, the four members of the film crew stared wide-eyed, their faces filled with astonishment.

Radishes, rock sugar, and elm bark—these seemingly unrelated things all have different applications in falconry. Through this inherited knowledge, we can glimpse how many detours and trials our ancestors went through in exploring the path of falconry training and release.

This is the unique charm of cultural inheritance. Now, hearing it spoken by Yue Feng, a young eagle-fighting expert, can be considered as triggering a collision of ideas with the predecessors.

"Write all of this down! Write it all down! It absolutely cannot be cut out when we do the dubbing!" After a brief moment of shock, Xiao Weimin immediately grabbed his notebook and started writing furiously.

"Haha, don't be so nervous. If you can't remember, I'll repeat it to you a few more times later, it's okay!" Yue Feng grinned.

Xiao Weimin scribbled furiously with his head down, and after he finished, he said in a serious tone, "You don't do this kind of work, so you don't really understand. These things look simple, but they play a huge role in deepening the theme!"

This is the soul of the documentary, the root of the falconry culture that has been passed down to this day! Not a single word can be cut!

"Hehe! You're the professional, I won't argue with you on this!"

……

After a brief communication, the operation of giving the eagle a Dark Eater was completed.

Yue Feng didn't feed the eagle too much meat. The "dark feeding" was just a transitional measure. The core goal now was to reduce the eagle's weight. If it ate more, it would gain weight and become fat. All the effort he had put into keeping the eagle warm and staying up all night would be wasted.

After confirming that the eagle had opened the Dark Eater, Yue Feng sliced ​​the prepared meat into thin slices and then soaked it in water.

By noon, the slices of meat had turned white from being soaked in water, and only when you pinched them with your fingertips could you vaguely see a few traces of blood inside.

Eagles need to eat flesh and blood to grow strong. If they are soaked in water and turned into white meat, even if eating it can resist hunger, the effect of gaining weight and replenishing energy will be greatly reduced.

Even so, the grass-white eagle, which had been starving for several days, still began to devour the white meat in large mouthfuls.

Yue Feng used the white meat to carry the eagle to the yard to feed, and succeeded in one go with almost no obstacles.

Opening the hawk's food means that the hawk's state has transitioned from a fully raw hawk that has just come down from the mountain to a second stage of being half-cooked.

If we use the four subjects of a driver's license test as an analogy, we have now completed the theory test, which is subject one.

The remaining tasks are: opening the large food basket, then jumping and running the line, and finally landing as an eagle. These are the remaining subjects and are expected to be completed in the next three to four days.

That evening, after dinner, Yue Feng used the remaining soaked meat to give the eagle a trial feeding.

On camera, Yue Feng was seen gripping the eagle's leg tightly, preventing the white eagle from lifting its claws. He then fed the eagle a piece of white meat that had been soaked until it was completely bloodless.

Hungry and less afraid of people, the eagle immediately became aroused when it saw the white meat, even stretching its neck to try and snatch the meat from Yue Feng's hand.

Yue Feng held onto the tripod tightly to prevent the eagle from lifting its foot, and then handed over the whole piece of white meat.

The eagle snatched the meat in its beak and lowered its head, intending to stomp on it with its toes, tear it apart, and devour it.

Unfortunately, the tripod was stretched taut, making it impossible to lift his feet even slightly. Several attempts failed, and he had to give up.

Without its toes to grip, the flesh couldn't be torn, so the hungry white eagle had no choice but to swallow the pieces of meat whole.

A piece of meat, cut with a knife, was at least as thick as a thumb when rolled up, but the eagle tilted its head slightly and swallowed it whole, leaving Xiao Weimin and the others amazed.

Yue Feng wiped his hands with his sleeve, then said with a smile, "Alright, the opening of the big meal is a success. We'll consolidate it again tomorrow, and then we can wrap it with meat slices and put it on the main course! Tonight, let's continue to cook the Eagle Lantern Flower!"

"Okay, we still have a few days. Let's try to get the eagle out as soon as possible!" Xiao Weimin nodded repeatedly.

Whether there's much to say or little to say, that night was another sleepless one.

Yue Feng and the production crew kept changing personnel but not the eagle, working non-stop through the night once again.

The eagle, which had eaten water-soaked white meat during the day, was a bit restless at night. After digesting, it produced a few watery fry with black and white residue, and its condition was still relatively good.

On the morning of the fifth day, when the white eagle was weighed, it weighed only three and a half pounds.

After the previous groundwork and rigorous training, the eagle, which had lost half a pound, showed a significant reduction in its wariness and defensiveness towards humans.

Taking advantage of the momentum, Yue Feng fed the eagle meat slices wrapped in hemp stalks after breakfast. Then, the whole group moved on to the market outside the village and ganged up on the eagle.

In reality, there's not much need to go to the market to make a name for yourself. After all, there are always people coming and going at home, often in groups of four or five. Making a name for yourself in the yard doesn't make much of a difference.

However, in order to have more footage to shoot, Yue Feng and Xiao Weimin went to the market after discussing it.

In an instant, the shouts of the Northeast mountain people at the market and the sight of a giant eagle perched among the crowd collecting pine needles were all recorded by the equipment and became part of the documentary material.

By the afternoon of the fifth day, Eagle's condition had improved significantly again.

Putting aside other things, they no longer shy away from or fear regular touching, such as stroking their claws, chest feathers, and back.

On the morning of the sixth day, Yue Feng put the hawk in the yard before dawn.

Just after five o'clock, the white eagle with a hair shaft in its crop began to bend its neck and squeeze its crop in an attempt to expel the shaft.

Upon seeing this, Yue Feng hurriedly called over the film crew and filmed the footage of the eagle spitting out its shaft.

The eagle that had spat out its spindle was now starting to look quite photogenic.

The fine hairs around its eyes stood up, and the fur all over its body fluffed up.

Having passed the second part of the driving test, how far away is getting your driver's license? (End of Chapter)