The Eagle Hunters
Eagle hunting is not just Culture or Tradition, it’s a Legacy that passes from One generation to another, from Father to son.
The tradition of hunting with large birds of prey, mainly with golden eagles, goes back hundreds of years in Kyrgyzstan, people in Bayan-Olgii province, Mongolia and other countries in Central Asia in 12th and 13th centuries. Researchers believe that eagles were domesticated by nomads from the Khitan period. Mongolians usually feed falcons.
Birds are taken from the nest at very early age and get trained by hunters for a long time. They spend almost 20 years of their life with the hunter. But at age of 20, they are set in the wilderness to live their wildlife, but this is interestingly done.
Releasing them back is perhaps a practice that helped sustain the population of free-living birds in the times when eagle-hunting was a widespread tradition in Central Asia.
In current days, the art is slowly dying out, and it is only practised by a handful of Kyrgyz in Ton region.