The need for speed.

[Devo1956]

Looking at this topic, we know how important it is for racing pigeons to have the ability to race home. So here is some reading from research.

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2015-11-26-pi ... -want-lead

[Buster121]

Interesting to say the least

[Andy]

Very interesting Devo.

[Murray]

Thanks for posting that, Devo.
I can totally agree with that. In any racing sport, be it pigeon racing or dog sled racing or motor racing, the winner is always the one that completes the course the quickest. The one that is fittest for the task.
With pigeons the ones that leave the start immediately and fly at higher speed are the leaders, the winner of the race always is one of that group. The rest are followers. Pigeons can be taught to get away quickly and fly at a faster rate by constant training in smaller groups when young. They become racers rather than homers.
That's a very good article.

[Andy]

I do think to a degree that sprint racing gives true winners. Generally most of the convoy are flying to the same area, facing the same weather conditions and against the same hazards. With the distance races, especially the nationals, birds are flying different distances in different directions and conditions can be different over the route. These races are very much dictated by the wind direction. I personally think that the winners of these nationals are rarely the best birds in the race. There are some very good performances put up by pigeons further down the result sheet.

[Murray]

Very good points, Andy. At the long distance, it is a pigeon that has the favorable wind and is in the right condition on the day that succeeds.
But for the shorter racing, up to middle distance, the front bunch pigeons are the ones that dominate.
I have told the story of watching a flock of pigeons racing along the sand dunes several miles after liberation, back in New Zealand. already there was a small group, maybe 30 pigeons flying quickly, and opening a gap from the bunch of a couple of hundred birds. Then there were several small groups dropping away. It was a 300 mile race, across the water to the North Island, and I bet the birds in the result were all in that leading group. They were leading and navigating, the rest were following as best they could.
Once they learn to be followers, I don't think they can be taught to be leaders.

[Trev]

A good post and interesting topic Devo
One of our top fliers, Alan Still, is constantly banging on about leaders and followers. Although most of us just sigh and raise our eyebrows as he just doesn't stop bless him He does actually talk sense and as he has achieved far more over the years from all distances and levels, than most of us ever will, (and has even taught pigeon racing in the middle east), he probably is well qualified to do so.
I don't think you can train the homing instinct or leadership, it is all in the breeding, I think the main thing we can do through training is try to teach our birds to fly as individuals or in sprint racing in particular is to break from the batch.

[Murray]

You might be right, Trev. If you are, there is no excuse for feeding a pigeon that has failed to be on the result sheet after 4 or 8 races.
It is a proven 'follower', and has no future.
I haven't either. But imagine how much and how quickly we could improve our lofts if we did?

[Andy]

I remember back in the 70s when at Worthing we were racing along the coast. We were in about a 2 mile gap between the sea to the South and the South Downs to the North. In those days the club had 40+ members and the federation would be sending thousands of pigeons. As we had mentioned before we, myself, dad and Trev, would sit looking out of the bedroom window to the West where the birds would be coming from. They would come through in their droves. Birds dropping out in all directions to the various lofts in our area. But we know that if we didn’t have one before these batches started coming through we would be out of the result. There would always the odd few that would get out in front of the drag.

[Andy]

You might be right, Trev. If you are, there is no excuse for feeding a pigeon that has failed to be on the result sheet after 4 or 8 races.
It is a proven 'follower', and has no future.
I haven't either. But imagine how much and how quickly we could improve our lofts if we did?

When I was at my best I was hard on the pigeons. Never trained but kept a small team of widowhood’s on a regimental regime. They would go out at exactly the same time twice a day every day during the week. Let in at exactly the same time and fed at exactly the same time. When let out I would clean out the loft and go indoors as if I was out in the garden they would be looking for me to open the doors, I was on open door trapping then, to get back in the loft. When I went back out into the garden at the allotted time they would be watching me even if still flying. As soon a I opened the doors they would dive into the loft nearly taking my head off if I was in the way. Once fed, which would be 5 minutes after letting them in as I wanted them trapping for their box and not for food, they would be shut up and left alone. I rarely went back into the loft when they were in leaving them alone. I would only had between 12 & 16 cocks. These would be made up of 4 or 5 yearlings and the rest would have to at least have taken a card in the first 6 in the club. I would regularly have 3 in the first 6 so they would need to be in my first ones to achieve this. Anything that hadn’t carded by the end of the season would be disposed of. As I kept no stock birds as such, just a few natural pairs for the longest races and the odd one that didn’t race, most of the youngsters were bred from the widowhood team. So the hens that were kept as widowhood hens were the ones that bred the winners plus some yearling hens that had raced well as youngsters.