UkPigeonRacing

MIke Lycett wrote: Fri Oct 24, 2025 9:49 am

Diamond Dave wrote: Fri Oct 24, 2025 9:02 am Thanks Neil.
Cheers Mike, that's what I would normally do but just trying something different - what would you do if some of the young cocks you are moving in aren't strong enough to take and hold a box? Would you consider them inferior for widowhood racing?

In a one word answer "yes".

A cock has to be King of his territory. Normally this is his box, but on occasions, like in Neil's case he had one who was King of another area.

I never had any joy with a pigeon that was bullied out of his box or couldn't claim a box - so for me he wouldn't be in my team

Thanks Mike, as it happens, I lost those 3 young cocks on the first race this year so quite likely that they were inferior anyway but it occurred to me that it could of been because they were bullied out of the loft.

As long as it works for you Dave that’s all that matters. I’m never happy with Widowhood so I fly a natural/ chaos system. If a cock doesn’t take a box I never worry about it, same when I pair up I just leave them to it, it often happens that one or two yearling cocks don’t find a hen initially, if they claim a box and hen during the season it generally motivates them for a few races.
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Thanks for the reply Steve.
I like the sound of your system, can I ask if you fly both cocks and hens on it ?

Diamond Dave wrote: Fri Oct 24, 2025 10:29 am As long as it works for you Dave that’s all that matters. I’m never happy with Widowhood so I fly a natural/ chaos system. If a cock doesn’t take a box I never worry about it, same when I pair up I just leave them to it, it often happens that one or two yearling cocks don’t find a hen initially, if they claim a box and hen during the season it generally motivates them for a few races.

Thanks for the reply Steve.
I like the sound of your system, can I ask if you fly both cocks and hens on it ?
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Yes I race both sexes however if one of a pair is flying really well then I might stop the other.

NeilA wrote: Fri Oct 24, 2025 5:33 pm Do you pair then split for the early races Steve then repair the lot for all Nrcc or start to pair for just the longest races

I Normally let them pair mid February and let them rear a round however any that pair late miss out, I want all the youngsters out of the way by first race. After that I might remove some hens for a few weeks and fly a kind of semi widowhood, I’ve not got any hard rules really. I do like hens on a 6/7 day old baby for the longer races and if it happens that I’ve more hens than cocks then I’ll hold a few back and let them pair for the first time mid season. A favourite trick of mine is to have some hens in with the youngsters, my yb loft has a little aviary, when the old birds are out I watch to see if any of the cocks take a shine to one, if they do I let that hen out with them a day or two before basketing to see if they’ll make a pair. Had a few good turns out of cocks like that.

Absolutely - thanks Steve!

Sounds a lot of faffing around to me. I simply remove the old cocks to the yb section shut off their boxes and put the young cocks in the old bird loft. After a couple of weeks or so when the young cocks have settled reintroduced the old cocks. Job done.



That's similar to what we do we normally lock the old cocks in there boxes and the empty boxes we open for a couple of days notice what young cocks like which box and the that's there box done