UkPigeonRacing

NeilA wrote: Fri Jan 17, 2025 8:40 pm

goose1 wrote: Fri Jan 17, 2025 8:28 pm BOP population increase, poor quality racing has increased. Don't need to look no further. Anyone who thinks BOP aren't the single biggest problem facing this sport either doesn't race or is wearing blinkers.

100 per cent
Never had birds win that have won before then just fail to arrive from 100 mils the next week
They can’t just become crap in 7 days

So they can't hit a wire? Whilst BOP is a huge problem it's NOT the only reason birds fail to return. Bad weather can lose even the best birds. Good birds were still lost long before BOP was a problem.

There has always been poor races due to bad weather and there will have also been plenty of loses due to wires. But if anyone thinks the poor racing we get now and the massive increase in the number of peregrines don't go hand in hand then they need to give their head a wobble. We've had the massive peregrine problems up here for 30 years now, it was difficult, especially when training young birds but you could live with it. The problem is as the peregrine population has spread across the land the birds are being hit numerous times from the point of lib to home. Convoyers (if being honest) will tell you many libs are hit on site. Some batches are chased back across the lib site after leaving it is destroying races. I don't mean it disrespectfully when I say those who aren't racing anymore will struggle to understand the full impact the bastard things are having. From exercising, to training, to racing it is a non stop battle just about every day.

king wrote: Fri Jan 17, 2025 1:00 pm

Winfort Lofts wrote: Fri Jan 17, 2025 12:28 pm I wrote an article on this subject on my website a few months back.

As is said on here, sometimes even we most have a bad race, others will have great races!

I say it could be considered a contributing factor, but not a sole reason!

https://winfort-lofts.co.uk/could-the-k ... g-pigeons/

Do you believe in it? And have you ever not sent when the Index is high?

Personally, I don't know what to think anymore!

I haven't been able to race consistently enough to draw picture.

However, from my own experience, I would say hawks are more a threat now than ever before!

This last year I've had birds that flew Guernsey (198mile) fail to get back from a 15 mile chuck on a clear day! That's definitely not an experience issue!