A white falcon takes AED 1.5 million at ADIHEX, the highest price of the 2026 auctions
There is a particular hush that falls over the auction floor at the Abu Dhabi International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition when a genuinely rare bird is brought out. On Sunday, in the fifth round of this year’s sales, it lasted rather longer than usual.
The bird in question was an Ultra White Pure Gyr Garmousha chick, and it went for AED 1.5 million, roughly US$408,000, making it the most expensive falcon sold across the whole of the 2026 edition.
What the money bought
The chick was bred at the Mark Moglich farm in the United States, one of a small number of operations working at this level of the market. It weighs 1,000 grams and measures 16.5 inches in both length and width.
Those numbers matter less than the plumage. A pure white gyrfalcon is among the scarcest things in falconry, and the Garmousha designation places this particular bird in the upper tier of an already narrow category. Colour of that purity does not arrive by accident; it is the product of deliberate, patient breeding programmes measured in generations rather than seasons.
For collectors, a bird like this is closer to a commissioned work than a purchase. It is also, unlike most objects that command similar sums, alive, and will be flown.
Why the price is read as a signal
Humaid Matar Al Dhaheri, Managing Director and Group Chief Executive of ADNEC Group, described the sale as evidence of the standing ADIHEX auctions now hold internationally, and of Abu Dhabi’s position as a capital of falconry.
The record sale underscores the emirate’s role in supporting efforts to preserve authentic Emirati heritage for future generations.
That framing is worth taking seriously rather than treating as courtesy. Falcon auctions are one of the few markets where the emirate does not merely participate but sets the reference price, and the figures achieved on the ADIHEX floor are watched by breeders on three continents.
Heritage as a working market
The wider argument the organisers make is about continuity. Falconry in the Emirates predates the federation by a very long way, and the sums involved here are, in the official telling, a mechanism for keeping the practice alive and funded rather than preserved behind glass. A market this liquid sustains the breeders, the trainers and the veterinary expertise the tradition depends on.
ADIHEX runs at ADNEC Centre Abu Dhabi until 6 September, under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Ruler’s Representative in Al Dhafra Region and Chairman of the Emirates Falconers’ Club. Further auction rounds are scheduled before the exhibition closes.
Whether AED 1.5 million stands as the high-water mark of this edition remains to be seen. There is a week still to run.
Jordana Lynch, Contributing Editor