UkPigeonRacing

I agree with the goose to a large degree. Top fanciers who are totally dedicated to winning spare no effort to get the extra 1% here and 1% there which all add up to constantly being at the top. Give them any high quality pigeons, they will get high quality results.

But.

Some families of pigeons are better and keep producing better results. My mate David Cox has about 24 pairs of breeders. All high quality. But he has one cock bird, Hawkeye, that is a super breeder. Last year he won a couple of combine races, several Fed races and most of the club races. The Fed and combine winners were all children and grandchildren of Hawkeye.
I have 3 of his children. Billion Dollar Baby leaves winners in every nest paired to a random cock. Now she's with the Grizzle Thon'e and, Wow!
Roadrunner left a winner last year as a yearling paired to a random hen he fell in love with. This year he's mated to Trillian Baby, another daughter of Hawkeye. Beautiful babies.
I had been giving youngsters to David, but now he's just taking the youngsters off the Hawkeye children. As he says the others aren't good enough. He's got 9 sons and daughters in his stock pens.
It's just natural to move toward what works. Common sense. Based on results, a strain that keeps producing winners is rapidly forming.

goose1 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 11, 2025 10:07 pm Anyone can breed a family of pigeons that is easy, but very few can breed a family of winning pigeons. I'm not sure a family is all that important for sprint racing as the top lads change pigeons regularly for various reasons and win. Let's use Neil or Mike on here, two top sprint fanciers (who would no doubt win from further if they were that way inclined) you could give them well bred pigeons from any family or line and I would bet good money they would win with them. However when you get to 500 mile plus and possibly even a little less given the difficulties in racing now I feel a family of proven performers at the distance are golden. But there are very very few genuine family's of distance pigeons about now. I think when Brian Denney was at his peak, lets say from around 2005 through to 2011 that was as good as you could get a family of pigeons to perform. 730 ish miles, team performances at racing velocities. 40 plus years of breeding and working on a family, to me pigeon racing doesn't get any better than that. The one who springs to mind today who has a genuine family of winning distance pigeons is Mark Bulled. I've turned this into a distance post just because if you aren't into distance racing I definitely wouldn't get too hung up on creating a family I would be more concerned with refining my methods and management to gain every yard I could.
But like everything in this sport if the fancier is happy doing what he's doing then that's all that matters.

Very kind of you for the mention Goose
I totally agree sprint birds should produce by year 2 I believe Mike thinks this should be year 1 so either way pretty instant results
I add a few birds each year I am no stockman that’s able to create a family to be honest
possibly it’s not vital for me a with what I’m doing I just need toprotect a few lines
Not really creating a long term family as you say there isn’t the same need
maybe limited space means I don’t put enough pigeons away from stock at the peak breeding period and I act a little late plus my patience isn’t the best

I find system / time keeping vital in sprints , as you know more than most Mark would always say blood matters for the distance which is proved every year pretty much by his family
I do need to learn some patience and create a family for middle distance pigeons as I’m sure I will go south in time once the north road is finished locally (as it’s going that way ) and there are plenty of 250-450 mile options in the nationals to here so I will be trying a few a bit further on the north road to see if I have any lines to go and perform at 350/400 before I end up south in time

It’s just a case of going through your birds at the end of each season and clearing out those at the bottom of the list. The ones that aren’t performing either in the stock loft or in the race team. You don’t need to worry about those that are performing, they select themselves. Over time the bottom of the list should keep getting better. I had a team where apart from a few yearlings being tested, never had much interest in young bird racing or results, my stock birds, never more than 2 or 3 pairs, and widowhood hens were only ones that were breeding winners and all the racing cocks had taken cards in the top 3. Unless your team is getting very inbred I don’t think there’s any need to be constantly bringing in new stock, none of which you would have tested or been on your system.

Andy wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:28 am It’s just a case of going through your birds at the end of each season and clearing out those at the bottom of the list. The ones that aren’t performing either in the stock loft or in the race team. You don’t need to worry about those that are performing, they select themselves. Over time the bottom of the list should keep getting better. I had a team where apart from a few yearlings being tested, never had much interest in young bird racing or results, my stock birds, never more than 2 or 3 pairs, and widowhood hens were only ones that were breeding winners and all the racing cocks had taken cards in the top 3. Unless your team is getting very inbred I don’t think there’s any need to be constantly bringing in new stock, none of which you would have tested or been on your system.

I do that Andy I move on every pigeon that hasn’t arrived in the top 2-3 per cent of the fed 3 times in old birds 10/11 races although this year I gave a lot away that had fed cards etc as I was going to change route this year but my fed are still going north with a extra club joining , by then 2 fed winners were gifted and a few good old breeders I only have 3 old cocks and my yearlings team now

So judging on results is simple for me but putting birds away for stock for the future not so easy I just put winners away but I know top fanciers are gifted at selection as d find breeders I believe Mike picked a pigeon off Lee Painter by looks he didn’t even handle it and it was a top breeder for him . If I did that 9 times out of 10 I would be moving it on in 2 years
That’s what I mean by a stockman compared to my way which is just results and method based

NeilA wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:58 am

Andy wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:28 am It’s just a case of going through your birds at the end of each season and clearing out those at the bottom of the list. The ones that aren’t performing either in the stock loft or in the race team. You don’t need to worry about those that are performing, they select themselves. Over time the bottom of the list should keep getting better. I had a team where apart from a few yearlings being tested, never had much interest in young bird racing or results, my stock birds, never more than 2 or 3 pairs, and widowhood hens were only ones that were breeding winners and all the racing cocks had taken cards in the top 3. Unless your team is getting very inbred I don’t think there’s any need to be constantly bringing in new stock, none of which you would have tested or been on your system.

I do that Andy I move on every pigeon that hasn’t arrived in the top 2-3 per cent of the fed 3 times in old birds 10/11 races although this year I gave a lot away that had fed cards etc as I was going to change route this year but my fed are still going north with a extra club joining , by then 2 fed winners were gifted and a few good old breeders I only have 3 old cocks and my yearlings team now

So judging on results is simple for me but putting birds away for stock for the future not so easy I just put winners away but I know top fanciers are gifted at selection as d find breeders I believe Mike picked a pigeon off Lee Painter by looks he didn’t even handle it and it was a top breeder for him . If I did that 9 times out of 10 I would be moving it on in 2 years
That’s what I mean by a stockman compared to my way which is just results and method based

Also thinking about if you fly as well as say Goose does in the longer ones that selection at the end of the yearling stage would take more skill than my results based selection there is every chance the birds haven’t yet raced the distance the selection is based on

NeilA wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 10:09 am

NeilA wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:58 am

Andy wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:28 am It’s just a case of going through your birds at the end of each season and clearing out those at the bottom of the list. The ones that aren’t performing either in the stock loft or in the race team. You don’t need to worry about those that are performing, they select themselves. Over time the bottom of the list should keep getting better. I had a team where apart from a few yearlings being tested, never had much interest in young bird racing or results, my stock birds, never more than 2 or 3 pairs, and widowhood hens were only ones that were breeding winners and all the racing cocks had taken cards in the top 3. Unless your team is getting very inbred I don’t think there’s any need to be constantly bringing in new stock, none of which you would have tested or been on your system.

I do that Andy I move on every pigeon that hasn’t arrived in the top 2-3 per cent of the fed 3 times in old birds 10/11 races although this year I gave a lot away that had fed cards etc as I was going to change route this year but my fed are still going north with a extra club joining , by then 2 fed winners were gifted and a few good old breeders I only have 3 old cocks and my yearlings team now

So judging on results is simple for me but putting birds away for stock for the future not so easy I just put winners away but I know top fanciers are gifted at selection as d find breeders I believe Mike picked a pigeon off Lee Painter by looks he didn’t even handle it and it was a top breeder for him . If I did that 9 times out of 10 I would be moving it on in 2 years
That’s what I mean by a stockman compared to my way which is just results and method based

Also thinking about if you fly as well as say Goose does in the longer ones that selection at the end of the yearling stage would take more skill than my results based selection there is every chance the birds haven’t yet raced the distance the selection is based on

I agree with what you’re saying Neil. You can’t select distance birds from yearling results. But good distance pigeons, although may not score as yearlings they won’t let you down even on hard days. They won’t be far away each week.
As far as selecting stock birds that’s why I also breed from my widowhood’s so that I get the earliest opportunity to see which ones are capable of breeding, especially the hens that won’t race so no racing results to go on. So just as important to me when making my selections at the end of the season it’s just as important to evaluate the hens as the cocks but on what they have bred. I want my widowhood hens to be breeding winners.

Yes I see what you mean
I should really breed off my racers as I have had a decent percentage of good ybs from them the ones I slip eggs from although they would be the decent ones to have the eggs moved in the first place really
Not sure about the others and this year with 21 yearlings I could end up with a lot of dumb heads

NeilA wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 11:11 am Yes I see what you mean
I should really breed off my racers as I have had a decent percentage of good ybs from them the ones I slip eggs from although they would be the decent ones to have the eggs moved in the first place really
Not sure about the others and this year with 21 yearlings I could end up with a lot of dumb heads

I know that you’re worried about breeding duds, but why wait until birds have finished racing before finding out they aren’t any good at breeding. I know I’m only testing 2 youngsters per hen per year, apart from the odd late breds, but I still think it’s worth it.

Sorry for the delay in replying

Thanks for taking the time to explain Andy

We're all pigeon men and there's no one set way to race a successful pigeon.

I agree with Goose. Anbody can breed a pigeon. You just put open a door between cocks and hens and they'll breed. It's not rocket science. Breeding a pigeon that can win is nice - breeding a pigeon that can win multiple times is even nicer. Breeding them that can win Awards and Titles at Regional and National level of the RPRA is even nicer still. I know because I've done it.

I've won with pigeons that have been gifted to me.

I've won with pigeons that I've purchased

I've won with pigeons that I've bred myself and pigeons that I've bred have gone onto become the backbone of many a good loft.

To me, there's no difference between them. Every winner is treasured and makes you feel 10 feet tall on a Saturday. I don't dwell on who bred it. It was me that conditioned it. Me that got it right and healthy and motivated to race. It's my pigeon and I don't give a monkey's chuff where it originated from.

You see if I was offered a choice between being 2nd with a home bred pigeon or 1st with a pigeon that had been gifted me or purchased in I'd take the winner every time. Winning is all that mattered to me and that is what spurred me on. I don't enjoy losing and of course it happens to us all much more than we'd like. But when it happens you can rest assured I'll be sore all week until I get chance to put things right. There's no "gimme's" where I'm concerned

As for the distance part of your post Gavin, I totally agree. I was fortunate to watch my Dad - one of the best 500 mile racers in the West Midlands develop a family that were superb every time they were asked the question. Birds like that are few and far between

NeilA wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 9:11 am

Very kind of you for the mention Goose
I totally agree sprint birds should produce by year 2 I believe Mike thinks this should be year 1 so either way pretty instant results
I add a few birds each year I am no stockman that’s able to create a family to be honest
possibly it’s not vital for me a with what I’m doing I just need toprotect a few lines
Not really creating a long term family as you say there isn’t the same need
maybe limited space means I don’t put enough pigeons away from stock at the peak breeding period and I act a little late plus my patience isn’t the best

I find system / time keeping vital in sprints , as you know more than most Mark would always say blood matters for the distance which is proved every year pretty much by his family
I do need to learn some patience and create a family for middle distance pigeons as I’m sure I will go south in time once the north road is finished locally (as it’s going that way ) and there are plenty of 250-450 mile options in the nationals to here so I will be trying a few a bit further on the north road to see if I have any lines to go and perform at 350/400 before I end up south in time

For sprinting Neil this is my approach

My YB's would be like yours they'd get maybe 5 or 6 races. I wasnt' hell-bent on them needing "every" race

They then get say 12 races as a yearling - they compete inland every week

At the end of the yearling stage if you've got a pigeon that's scored once out of 18 occasions?

That's not a ratio I'm prepared to work with - I'm sorry