How Keith falconer turned a love of birds into a full-time family business

Falconry – the ancient practice of hunting with trained birds of prey – is not the profession most people turn into a full-time career. But for Speyside’s Clare Morrison, it has become exactly that.

From a small startup near Keith to a decade-old family business, Speyside Falconry now combines hands-on bird of prey experiences with pest control work, using hawks and falcons to deter seagulls, feral pigeons and other nuisance species.

We asked Clare about her journey, the challenges she’s faced and the people who have supported her on the way.

How and why did you start Speyside Falconry?

Speyside Falconry is the result of a lifelong passion of my husband, Darren, which I’ve been delighted to share with him.

Keeping birds started out as a hobby, which we both loved. We didn’t really consider everything involved in running our own business. We just decided to have a go and see if we could make a living from it.

The idea was simply to fly our birds every day and find out if members of the public would like to watch and get involved.

We’re glad we took the plunge and get to live this way of life with our beautiful birds.

How did you get to where you are today?

We began taking the birds to schools across Moray, where our education work helped local kids get more interested in nature. We then started hosting private experiences, which has helped us build a great reputation.

Over the years, we’ve continued to get busier. We’ve had people from all over the world coming to Speyside Falconry to learn about falconry and get hands-on flying our birds.

We’ve been quietly growing the pest control side of the business alongside our public work. We’ve been very lucky to work with some amazing local companies who have supported us and helped us get going.

We started off thinking this would be a part-time venture as we both had other jobs, but we now run the business full-time, doing work that we both love.

Who helped you?

Our three daughters, Jessica, Kate and Olivia, have been fantastic. Having self-employed parents can make for a challenging family life, and the girls never questioned any of the sacrifices we’ve had to make.

They have genuinely worked alongside us, helping build the business while being our biggest supporters.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever had?

Remember to switch off. Running your own business is all-consuming. If you don’t set a time limit every day it will take over your life.

When we first started, we were replying to calls and emails at all times of the day but remembering to switch off has really helped me get the work-family balance right.

What is your biggest mistake?

It’s difficult to judge the value of what you have, and we started out by under-pricing ourselves. We were trying to grow the business and weren’t confident or knowledgeable enough to set the right price. We were trying to absorb more costs instead of charging our customers that little bit more.

Information and support as a member of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) was really valuable as we learnt how to navigate being self-employed, how to make important business decisions, and how to increase our confidence as small business owners.

What is your greatest achievement?

Getting to where we are today is beyond our expectations. Our part-time venture is now a 10-year-old business that we both work on and manage full-time. It really is the realisation of a dream.

How are you managing the rising cost of doing business?

About a year ago we changed the direction of the business to help improve our costs and fine tune how we manage things. We were able to re-focus our efforts on parts of the business that are truly valuable to us.

What do you still hope to achieve?

I would like to continue growing the Speyside Falconry name and promote our natural approach in the local pest control industry.

How could the Government or Council support your ambitions?

Lack of support and heavy taxes makes running a small business very difficult. FSB is a great voice in advocating for small businesses on this, but the government has to listen to our concerns and act on them.

[Source: Press and Journal]