The Avian Behavior Podcast

What should you do when a bird of prey avoids the trainer, flushes during an approach, or will not step onto the glove? Where do you even start with a bird of prey?
Before focusing on the step-up, take a closer look at the environment. Housing, perch placement, privacy, approach paths, and opportunities to move away can all affect whether a bird is able to learn and participate.
In this lesson, I use the early training of an African Fish Eagle to explore:
• How to assess a bird's environment, temperament, and learning history
• Why immobility is not always calm behavior
• How inappropriate housing can increase avoidance
• How space can function as a reinforcer
• Why trainers should build movement and husbandry skills before prioritizing the step-up
• How a broader behavioral repertoire gives a bird more ways to succeed
Although this lesson features an African Fish Eagle, these principles apply broadly to hawks, falcons, eagles, owls, vultures, and other ambassador birds that are difficult to approach or reluctant to engage. We rely on principles based on the constructional approach and using space as a reinforcer, starting off by rating birds on an avoidance scale from 1-5 that helps us formulate a starting point.
This podcast episode is adapted from Building Confidence with Birds of Prey, a course in the Avian Behavior Lab.
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This video is adapted from Building Confidence with Birds of Prey, a course in the Avian Behavior Lab. You can get your free 14 day trial with the code AVIAN

This is an excerpt from our Masterclass on How to Raise an Ambassador Owl. We added this lesson after fielding many questions about quarantine procedures, and wanted to ensure that an ambassador owl would still have a viable start to their career in conservation education. Here we cover specific signs of illness, potential practices that can lead to stress, and what to do if your facility puts your new ambassador under strict quarantine protocols. For visuals, you can check out our video. 
 
For the full Masterclass, check out https://avianbehavior.thinkific.com/courses/owl-ambassador
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For free resources, including our podcast, blog, and best practice guidelines, check out https://avian-behavior.org

What does it mean to be an expert, and what happens when expertise becomes a shield from scrutiny rather than a commitment to precision?
In this episode, Hillary examines the role of authority, rhetoric, and responsibility in professional animal training spaces, especially as conference season brings new ideas, disagreements, and uncomfortable conversations to the surface. Prompted by recent concerns from trainers who felt confused or unsettled by remarks at a professional conference, this episode draws a careful line between scientific discourse and rhetorical labeling.
Here we ask broader questions about what our community should expect from its leaders. How do we assess skill without moral ranking? How do we talk about positive and negative reinforcement without turning functional processes into ethical identities? And how do we create professional spaces where newer trainers, women, consultants, employees, and others with less social power can ask questions without fear?
Hillary discusses the problems with vague categories like "grade school" trainers, and why labels like these do not tell us anything meaningful about fluency, judgment, safety, or the animal's learning. She also revisits the constructional approach, clarifying that it is not about "replacing" behavior or choosing one type of reinforcement over another, but about building repertoires, identifying functional contingencies, and expanding degrees of freedom.
The episode then pivots toward stronger models of skill assessment, including the Dreyfus model, as a more useful way to evaluate trainer development through observable criteria, contextual judgment, autonomy, adaptability, and standard of work.
At its heart, this episode is a call for more rigorous, compassionate, and accountable leadership in the animal training field. Expertise should make us more precise, more open to revision, and safer to learn from — not harder to question.

This episode is a conversation between friends Simone Lupson-Cook, Lauren McGough, PhD, and Hillary Hankey about what mentorship means to them, growth through falconry over the years, and how to navigate complex relationships. Set on a sunny outdoor deck while casually bird-watching and enjoying morning coffee on a warm winter morning in Southern California, this long conversation invites the listener  to celebrate curiosity with bird behavior and learning.



Come learn with us in the Avian Behavior Lab. Guided courses, private forum, and live trainings with dozens of bird species. Free 14 day trial with the coupon code AVIAN.

Explore the transition from traditional to choice-based training for ambassador raptors with Hillary Hankey. This professional discussion is a presentation from the 2026 NWRA conference that looks into evolving welfare standards, the science of behavior, and the distinction between coercion and choice. Learn about the benefits of choice-based methods, including reduced stress and improved feather condition, and understand the strategic steps for successful implementation in avian programs.
For a free 14 day trial of the Avian Behavior Lab, use the code AVIAN