Feathered Champions

Looking back and moving forward

2010-09-05T08:43:00.000-07:00

I haven't written on the blog for a while. I looked at the last title of the last post that I wrote and I almost cringed.   Has it been that long?   Did I really forget what I had written last?   How careless.

Here's what has been going on.   Several things had happened since then.   I had a loft full of more birds than I should have.   My father got out of racing pigeons and I found myself with his race team, his breeders, my breeders and my race team. I was simply over whelmed with birds.   I knew that I had to narrow this group down, but quite honestly, I just did not want to go through the task of doing it.   I had to decide who was more valuable, my birds or his.   How do you to that when you have a loft full of birds from your hero?

This summer, I finally took on the task and narrowed the loft down to just breeders.   I went through my race team, some of which only had 1 season under their belt. I narrowed them all down and chose what I feel are the very best and some colored homers (black, indigo, barless blue and barless browns).   It's like I'm starting over with a whole new base.

I'll keep you posted.   Also check out the facebook page.

Disaster Strikes -- Getting up and getting in the fight

2009-07-27T18:53:00.000-07:00

I haven't written on the blog for quite a while. I'm sure any following has disappeared. This has been a difficult year. I haven't raced this year at all. On March 24th, 2009 at tornado wipe out some of our buildings and caused major damage to the racing and breeding loft. In our nick of the woods, this was about a month before old bird racing started. There was no electricity to the loft for weeks. Unfortunately, the barn that was destroyed was in the middle of the circuit that led to the loft and required electrical expertise beyond my ability. Half the roof had been ripped off and the loft was flooded with rain. Some breeders were lost as well.

In truth, I was just disgusted by the blow that was delivered. There was so much clean up and repair to do that I just couldn't justify putting the pigeons ahead of all else. I really miss this season. I am a competitor and I want to win. I am sorry that I took on that attitude but there were other things that I'm not going to mention on here that also were taking their toll. The summer is almost over, young bird racing is starting soon. I will not be flying young birds as I didn't raise any intentionally and those that were unintentional were not banded and were sold to friends.

This post then I guess is about starting over again. A friend, Jim Brown sent me some new breeders which arrived almost a week after the destruction. I received all my fathers breeders and racers as he moved and is now out of pigeon racing. Now is the time to figure out what breeding stock to keep and what to get rid of. I also have all the rarer colored birds barless blues, barless browns, recessive reds and yellows as well as blacks, whites and duns. Do I keep them or pitch them and focus on racing?

There are a lot of questions and I have a lot of birds to take into consideration. The rest of this year and the winter will about preparing the loft to function the way I want to fly a new system. I am picking myself up and getting back into the fight. I guess if anything this post is more of an expressed affirmation to the fact. Keep tuning in, as I will be posting on this much more often.

Club boundaries and membership requirements

2008-09-25T06:15:00.000-07:00

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

2008-05-21T19:25:00.000-07:00

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

2008-02-16T22:33:00.000-08:00

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?

2008-02-16T22:04:00.000-08:00

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

2007-11-14T18:23:00.000-08:00

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

2007-11-08T19:48:00.000-08:00

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

2007-08-16T05:13:00.000-07:00

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/

Where is our sport headed?

2007-08-09T07:51:00.001-07:00

Pigeon Racing is a sport that is changing as rapidly as many other sports that were formally obscure or not as well publicized. For example, the Professional Bull Riders (PBR) is now paying prizes in excess of $1,000,000 in a single event. For us the futurity has provided us opportunities to win big cash prizes. Yet for most clubs, there is not a big cash pay out at the end of the season just for competing at the top of your game. The difference however, is prizes in the other sports, has primarily been funded by big name sponsors and by ticket sales. For us our prize money has for the most part come out of the pockets of fellow fanciers.

The world of breeding has also changed with other performance based animals. Dogs, racing horses, bucking bulls now use a DNA database for breeding stock. Why? Because progeny of these animals is as large as the single event pay outs. If someone is dropping $50,000 on a young bull, you want to be certain of the pedigree. These other breeders are now starting to look more closely at breeding and breeding strategies and in order to do this scientifically and with certainty, there needs to be a DNA database and an ability to test a high dollar purchase to ensure the accuracy of the pedigree. Will we reach a point where pigeon breeders of top birds will be doing the same?

The futurity was a concept that has greatly changed our sport. There are now so many flyers that specialize in the futurity and only young bird racing. There are now fanciers who don't have the time or the facilities to enjoy fully competing in a regular series but they are able to keep a few birds and only ship to futurities. There are clubs with quality names that have been running successful events that have grown into huge dollar events that have help their clubs and greatly helped members win decent money while enjoying their hobby.

Yes, there are cons as well. Some say the futuries and young bird specialist are taking away and killing out old bird racing and long distance racing. There are dangers of birds from all directions of the compass being brought together and that is the chance for the increase in the rapid spread of various diseases and viruses. What happens to the also rans in these events. Money spent with no return on a bird leaves it at the mercy of the handler in some cases.

It may be time to have a new concept. A concept that rewards longetivity and distance flying. Already long distance and old bird racing requires patience as it may be a few years for a super performer to surface and reach his/her prime. Do you have a concept 'out side the box' that fits the challenge to move beyond young bird and short distance racing? If so, I'd love to hear it.