Club boundaries and membership requirements

I haven't blogged for months. I've been busy with other things, with family, with the house, etc. But honestly, I guess I haven't really thought about anything meaningful to blog about either. The other day, I called a fellow member to tell them about a positive contact I had with someone wanting pigeons. They would be a good prospect for future membership. Then I was informed that there were members of another club that wanted to join our pigeon club. Not a problem because we pretty much do not have any boundaries as long as you a someone of good character and standing. We had a member from another club join ranks with us last year and he has been loyal.

When we wrote our constitution and by-laws, for membership, a fancier would have to belong and compete for 1 year after which there would be a vote. That vote was required to be unanimous for membership. At the time, there was a purpose for that wording. I personally feel that time has passed. But now comes the problem. The new member, does not want to let he other two prospective members join. Why not? Because they are often top competitors in their own club and quite frankly, he does not want to get beat.

Well, that kind of steams me personally. After all we gave this new member a chance and it worked out. Now however, he wants to stand in the way of other people switching to our club. There are ways around him such as to amend the constitution to remove the unanimous wording (which by the way DOES NOT require a unanimous vote).

Well, I don't know hot things will shake out on this. I was steamed and wanted to vent a little. What do you think about this situation? Should a club be open to membership regardless of memberships in other clubs?

Finding a system for a 12 hr work schedule

The challenge this year is finding a system for a 12 hour work schedule. I leave the house a 5pm and get home about 6:30am. With the price of gas and feed skyrocketing, I decided to try open loft. The birds would fly between 5pm and 9pm. They were in good shape for the last 400 miler. My first bird got 3rd club and 12th in the IA/NE combine and I was quite pleased. That same hen took 2nd place club on a 600 miler last season.

The down side. Something got into my loft. I found the wing of a young bird on the floor and with some looking, found the head. I also found the carcass of a 2nd pigeon outside. I have "Blast Doors" that I put down at night that totally secures the loft. With the open loft, I've had to keep them open because I leave for work before the birds are done exercising.

So now it's back to open loft when I am home and keeping a sharp edge to their appetite so they will all be in before I leave for work when I feed them. When I work on race day the wife will have to close the blast doors.

It was a good try, but that system isn't going to work anymore.

Nuff said!

Pigeon Racing in Sports Illustrated

Here is a recent article in Sports Illustrated titled The Birds. I don't subscribe to Sports Illustrated but was made aware of this article due to negative comments regarding it in the pigeontalk.com forum discussion groups. While it's great that pigeon racing receives a mention in a true sports magazine, it seems that the article put down our sport and had negative connotations. Review the article and post your opinion.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/more/01/23/the.birds0128/index.html

Is racing pigeons becoming a rural hobby?

This is an article that has played out in many different places around the racing pigeon world in the last few years. This is especially true here in the United States. First check out the link:

http://www.columbusdispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2008/02/15/FLYAWAY.ART_ART_02-15-08_B2_OT9C92B.html?sid=101

What's your opinion? How often do you see the same battle in your area? Has this same situation affected your club?

Breeding for Colors and white birds

I have posted on http://www.pigeons.biz/forums/index.php the sale of the barless blues, barless browns and blacks. Not is the time to decide on color matings for next year. Surprisingly there has been a number of request for the barless blues. There was one request for either a brown with spread or a dilute black. Unfortunately, I have a pair of blacks that throw a dilute black (dun) once in a while, but they always get lost in training. In the browns, I have nothing other than barless at the moment.

Brown/Khaki is the most recessive of the three color groups that also include black/blue, and red/ash. My brown is a hen and therefor, no matter what I mate her to, it will not be brown as the color gene is carried on the sex chromosome which the hen has only one, she gets from her father and the cock gets two, one from each parent. Since the hen has only one, quite simply "she is what she is". Now, the only way to get the brown back is to mate her to a direct son. Any son of hers will carry both the gene for black/blue and brown/khaki. The hen will either pass on the brown/khaki gene to a son, or she will pass on the sex chromosome which will produce a hen and that hen. The result will be; 1/4th black/blue hens, 1/4th brown/khaki hens, 1/4th black/blue cocks that also carry the brown/khaki gene and finally 1/4th brown/khaki sons which are homozygous for the brown/khaki gene. For these later sons, they will ALWAYS produce a brown/khaki hen regardless to whom they are mated.

If anyone is interested, I will still be setting orders for barless blues, possibly barless browns, blacks and recessive reds. Still in the works are recessive yellows. You can reach me at domanskifamilyloft@dishmail.net

End of the Racing Season

It's the end of the racing season. Time to decide who to keep on the team and who to eliminate. It's time to take a hard look at the breeders and evaluate their performance. It's time to think about frozen waterers and feeding pigeons in the freezing cold. The super cold may not be here yet, the mother nature is giving us the warnings that she soon will be here.

Rare Colored Homing Pigeons

Within the homing pigeon fancy there are two divisions. First there is the racing pigeon fancier who's primary focus is racing performance. Color is almost never a factor in breeding. In the show breed color and genetic factors of the phenotype are the main factor, and performance may not be a factor at all. Both types of fanciers though enjoy the same special homing pigeon but with two comletely different goals. Occasionally there are the fanciers who specialize in one but dabble in the other.

Within the two types of fanciers there are two types of shows. In the show breeds, the birds are separated into color classes and any flaw within a color will easily disqualify a bird or the bird will be moved to the "any other color" (AOC) class. In the racing community shows have a diploma class in which performance birds need to have earned a diplomas by scoring in a sanctioned race to enter the show. Within the show, the birds are usually divided by sex and by distance class. Both shows will stil demand a high quality pigeon, but it's very interesting to see the difference in judging.

Within the racing pigeon lines, many rarer colors still are present such as, self or spread, dilute, opal, faded, recessive red, whites and indigos. I'm sure there are others, but these are the one's I've personally seen the most of. I personally have self (black), opal, indigo, recessive red, barless (in both blue and brown) and dilute. Thanks to Randall Carney for the barless birds. Using mulitple traits, I would like to have the rarer colors that score up to the long distance. In addition, I am working towards creating a family of recessive yellows, yellows, browns, barless and blacks.

Regardless of which type fancier you may be, what color types of homing pigeons do you keep? If you are of the show breeds, do you work with a racing enthusiast to maintain color classes which also maintain a racing performance? If you are a racing enthusiast, what genetic traits have perhaps accidentally shown up in your breeding program?

For an excellent reference for understanding rare colors in homing pigeons check out Ron Huntley's website: http://www.angelfire.com/ga/huntleyloft/