This year’s Eagle Festival took place in Nukht on Wednesday. The Civil Representatives’ Assembly of Bayan-Ulgii province and the local council in Ulaanbaatar have been jointly holding this festival since 1999, with support from the Ministry of Nature, Environment and Tourism. The goal is to increase the number of tourists during winter and so the event was some years ago moved from Bayan-Ulgii to near the capital.

Twenty eagle trainers from Bayan-Ulgii traveled 1600 kilometers with their eagles for this year’s festival. Apart from seeing how trained eagles hunt, tourists also learnt about Kazakh culture and saw handmade artifacts. Eighteen-year-old S.Bavarjan was awarded the title King Eagle and won MNT 400,000 for his outstanding performance.

A Board member of the Mongolian Eaglers Union, M.Keibish, said the success of the festival is encouraging the younger generation to carry on the tradition of training eagles. B.Aidag, with long experience of eagles, says the fierce bird grows to be very loyal to the master and does not care for anybody else. Eagles are caught young and then trained. The eagle he had brought to the festival was the seventh he had trained and it caught 42 foxes two years ago, Aidag said.