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A microsope will pick up things, you need to be quite skilled though because we're not just talking about worm or cocci eggs today. Most diseases tend to take a few days to manifest, then you have trouble and you may have to stop the birds for a few races. I would prefer to have a health program in place. But each to their own, many roads lead to Rome! I think you have to keep your birds healthy because if they're not healthy you can't keep them fit.
The other interesting thing on this thread is the absence of comments from the many distance fanatics on this site. Is that because they don't want fanciers to know this is what they do?

Quoted from Freebird

Very interesting and very worrying post. Is it all down to winning now? What about the welfare of the birds. What about the future of the sport. What about the concequences of our actions. The pigeon, like ourselves has an imune system far more advanced than any pharmacutical company can conjure up to get your ££££££'s so for FU*ks sake and for the sake of our birds, only use if nessesary. Is it so hard to comprehend. If you get it wrong then the only thing lost is a couple of pigeons. Keep doing this and the birds ( hopefully only the birds ) will be wiped out, But the un-treated ferals will be in full bloom. I'm worried and I don't know sh*t.

Why are you worried? Be more worried about yourself and your fellow men. Life expectancy is going up and up so is the use of all different types of medication. People who would not have lived past childhood 50 years ago are living in to their 70s babies that would have died at childbirth with the aid of medicines have a good life expectancy. Are you saying we shouldn't be doing this because we are losing immunity? Most people are happy to lose immunity and live to 80 rather than have immunity and die 20 years earlier

I think if you use medication during race season wisely you are ok when problems arise is year round continued usage


I bet if you were to check 99%of the winning lofts are using some type of respitory product I use a lot of natural products but I also medicate during the races I dont medicate my breeders though and havent given them anything in about 5 years now

on the above post im in pigeons to win and ill try my best cant see how for a few weeks a year medication can harm them once as its not overboard

and as he said in his post i dont know sh*t

Quoted from Albear

Why are you worried? Be more worried about yourself and your fellow men. Life expectancy is going up and up so is the use of all different types of medication. People who would not have lived past childhood 50 years ago are living in to their 70s babies that would have died at childbirth with the aid of medicines have a good life expectancy. Are you saying we shouldn't be doing this because we are losing immunity? Most people are happy to lose immunity and live to 80 rather than have immunity and die 20 years earlier

O.K. Read my post and that will answer your first question, Yeh. I am worried about my fellow men ( you ). Life EXPECTANCY is going up, why? Sanitation, Hygene, Diet bla bla bla. Are you doing this to enhance your pigeons life expectancy? I totaly agree with your point re medication (£££££££'s)? How can you claim people who would have "died 50 years ago" etc. etc. would be o.k. now???? You've missed the point completely. To save a life is one thing. To win a race is another. To blindly use medication is another, and to me totaly insane and irresponsible. Answer me this, Why? are you routinely medicating your birds. Clean loft, best of feed, crystal clear water, fresh air, sunlight, ESSENTIAL vitamins and minerals, excersize and good management will win the day. If it doesn't then we should all get an x-box and play virtual pigeon racing. I do not wish to offend, just hopefully open some eyes. After all, we all share one common passion, a wee bird that will give its all for the man in charge.

Quoted from Freebird

O.K. Read my post and that will answer your first question, Yeh. I am worried about my fellow men ( you ). Life EXPECTANCY is going up, why? Sanitation, Hygene, Diet bla bla bla. Are you doing this to enhance your pigeons life expectancy? I totaly agree with your point re medication (£££££££'s)? How can you claim people who would have "died 50 years ago" etc. etc. would be o.k. now???? You've missed the point completely. To save a life is one thing. To win a race is another. To blindly use medication is another, and to me totaly insane and irresponsible. Answer me this, Why? are you routinely medicating your birds. Clean loft, best of feed, crystal clear water, fresh air, sunlight, ESSENTIAL vitamins and minerals, excersize and good management will win the day. If it doesn't then we should all get an x-box and play virtual pigeon racing. I do not wish to offend, just hopefully open some eyes. After all, we all share one common passion, a wee bird that will give its all for the man in charge.

one problem when race day comes all that goes out the window when your birds go into a hamper with birds that have a sickness

Quoted from just ask me

one problem when race day comes all that goes out the window when your birds go into a hamper with birds that have a sickness

Yep, spot on. That's the problem in all walks of life. Who's to blame? who or what is going to suffer? I don't race so maybe a bit out of order here but only viewing my opinion as an outsider and not wanting to offend anyone. I know it is hard and we all get sucked in and paranoid. It's not easy for sure. Just trying to give a different perspective. Really commend the poster for his integrity as well.

Quoted from Freebird

Yep, spot on. That's the problem in all walks of life. Who's to blame? who or what is going to suffer? I don't race so maybe a bit out of order here but only viewing my opinion as an outsider and not wanting to offend anyone. I know it is hard and we all get sucked in and paranoid. It's not easy for sure. Just trying to give a different perspective. Really commend the poster for his integrity as well.

not out of order at all  its a open forum and we all have our opinions but at marking when u see birds with greasy wattles bad droppings u maybe have been in a competitors loft the week before and u can see water not changed general upkeep of pigeons is not great and then these pigeons are drinking from the same water as yours and the new transporters are a joke as they work on a overflow system so it only takes a few pigeons on a transporter to infect a whole transporter as the water doesn't go into the drinkers individually so it spreads all over the transporter these are just a few reasons why a routine on medication should be taken though the racing season and left alone all winter

this is just my opinion of course

Quoted from just ask me

not out of order at all  its a open forum and we all have our opinions but at marking when u see birds with greasy wattles bad droppings u maybe have been in a competitors loft the week before and u can see water not changed general upkeep of pigeons is not great and then these pigeons are drinking from the same water as yours and the new transporters are a joke as they work on a overflow system so it only takes a few pigeons on a transporter to infect a whole transporter as the water doesn't go into the drinkers individually so it spreads all over the transporter these are just a few reasons why a routine on medication should be taken though the racing season and left alone all winter
this is just my opinion of course

Is it really that bad? Is there not anyone delegated to Scroutenise ( spelling may be wrong ) as in car racing etc. This would surely make sence as we know not all are dedicated to hygene etc.

FREEBIRD  its all about winning i thought it was the idea of racing pigeons
i am pretty new to pigeon's tell me what i should do
for
canker
respiratory
worms
salmonella
paratyphoid
e coli
i was told your birds must be fit and healthy give me a programme to use next year

Quoted from Albear

A microsope will pick up things, you need to be quite skilled though because we're not just talking about worm or cocci eggs today. Most diseases tend to take a few days to manifest, then you have trouble and you may have to stop the birds for a few races. I would prefer to have a health program in place. But each to their own, many roads lead to Rome! I think you have to keep your birds healthy because if they're not healthy you can't keep them fit.
The other interesting thing on this thread is the absence of comments from the many distance fanatics on this site. Is that because they don't want fanciers to know this is what they do?

they don't tell you when the birds are sick and the wont give you information on how they keep there birds healthy
so the new fanciers are putting birds with disease in beside there birds every week i know because i probably put sick bird's in the basket a few years back then i was 30 mins behind the winner from a 90 mile race
all you here is your birds must be sick

The trick is not to use medication out of season. Using medication during racing season is a neccessary evil.

Thing is with parathyoid vaccination I can't seem to find anywhere to buy it from. Its not licensed for use in this country is it?

the thing is i would say almost every human is ill once a year so how do you know your bird is not ill if its not showing signs a human can be ill not show anything so why cant our feathered freinds be the same to keep them in tip top condition ill be following the advice my father was given on the top post and will continue to use it

Pigeon 82 Quit worrying about defending yourself almost every pigeon medicine shop has some version of this system and they DO work this is not new and has been around in some version for a while, the ones that say that it dosent work obviously havent used it because you can really up your performance in a short while with this stuff can you win ??? I dont know you still have to use good methods and have goodbirds

Quoted from Freebird

O.K. Read my post and that will answer your first question, Yeh. I am worried about my fellow men ( you ). Life EXPECTANCY is going up, why? Sanitation, Hygene, Diet bla bla bla. Are you doing this to enhance your pigeons life expectancy? I totaly agree with your point re medication (£££££££'s)? How can you claim people who would have "died 50 years ago" etc. etc. would be o.k. now???? You've missed the point completely. To save a life is one thing. To win a race is another. To blindly use medication is another, and to me totaly insane and irresponsible. Answer me this, Why? are you routinely medicating your birds. Clean loft, best of feed, crystal clear water, fresh air, sunlight, ESSENTIAL vitamins and minerals, excersize and good management will win the day. If it doesn't then we should all get an x-box and play virtual pigeon racing. I do not wish to offend, just hopefully open some eyes. After all, we all share one common passion, a wee bird that will give its all for the man in charge.

If you think birds aren't dropping dead in lofts then you I'm afraid are missing the point. Pigeon fanciers reflect society. You will ave those that are responsible and those that aren't. If everyone who kept clean lofts, best feed, crystal clear water all went in the same basket, then you could prove your point. However if they did I suspect you would have an even worse situation. Always remember seeing the video on Peter Van Eijerden (sorry can't remember the spelling). He made a decision not to treat his birds for anything and that's a few decades back when we didn't have new bugs mutating constantly. He lost a fair percentage of birds 60/80% (?) in the end he had a few birds with natural immunity. Good for him, not much good for all the birds being put in the same basket as his disease ridden ones though. Peter's plan was intentional. What about those fanciers who are in that position unintentionally?? Most of the best fanciers I know treat their birds whilst racing.
And one other point clean spotless lofts ain't the answer I had far more trouble  when my loft was spotless than I do now with easi bed in the loft. Back in the seventies in my club probably 40% of fanciers were on deep litter, rarely changed their water just topped up, they built up natural immunity. I'm afraid cosmetic cleanliness is not the answer.
This year whilst racing my old birds I treated as follows, after two seperate races had (different)canker treatment for 3 days, another race lincospectin for 3 days and another anti fungal for 3 days, can't remember the name but it's a bog standrd one. The other one I wished I'd used was cocci treatment. In days gone by it was said you needed to give vitamins after the treatment. I'm not saying that's not the case but I would ensure they had pro biotic and cider vingegar to balance the good bacteria  in the gut, my own personal preference is using cod liver oil to coat the food wth the pro biotic but that's beacuse that was used years ago, be careful with it though because it can go rancid very quickly.
Freebird I respect your opinion but until I started using a health program I struggled, that and with cracking the eye turned things around for me. I would say the one essential that should be done in every loft is annual vaccination for paratyphus, it is the greatest threat to our birds.
In my opinion there's been some excellent information / knowledge passed on this thread. Bart use it it will improve your performances. There will many who will read and disregard and say you can only damage the birds I see it as supporting the birds not damaging them, each to their own. Another good thread!

I think you can balance the two in fact I think you have to anymore  
Look back 20 years ago no one even knew what a probiotic was now they are in everything ( feed, supplements, race preperations, vitamin mixes ) I think you can build the birds up almost as fast as you tear them down with all the products we have today
If you are locking your birds down and giving crap feed ( I wont define that here ) all winter and then jacking them up in race time on antibios and other meds then yes you WILL have problems but on the other hand if you are giving probiotics and good feed with natural products and good grit all year with plenty of loft exercise you are not going to see the "DAMAGE" that is spoken of so often I think most of the fanciers that are seeing the problems associated with over medicating are the same ones who had problems before the antibiotic boom
Medication is no substitute for good birds and sound handling techniques take a guy that is flying good and give him medication that is properly used and he is nearly unbeatable
give me another who breeds by pedigree and not performance, one who culls by handle and not the basket and let him have a go at the drugs all he will do is have another excuse why he cant win

Quoted from bart

learn how to use it is the hard bit

if you had a system that that gave you a few yards on race day you wouldnt tell a soul.

i worry about the use of antibiotics long term but looking at the other side of the coin how long does a bird that is racing every week or every other week last it will be a very lucky pigeon if it makes it to three years old

Quoted from tom corrie

i worry about the use of antibiotics long term but looking at the other side of the coin how long does a bird that is racing every week or every other week last it will be a very lucky pigeon if it makes it to three years old

Tom, spot on, I kept my birds in from September til Aprl this past year because of Percy and the Sparrowhawk, in the winter months previously when let out I was losing 1 or 2 a day. Life expectancy is poor regardless when you live in a hawk infested area!

Quoted from mark

if you had a system that that gave you a few yards on race day you wouldnt tell a soul.

You think so Mark? I fly in partnership, we fly to two lofts we share our stock birds etc., I'm only really interested in the Channel, my partner wants to win every race, you can see my performances on the long distanc thread. At my partner's loft we won old bird racing 6 x1st and 1st Section NFC by nearly 100 yds per minute he used a health program more or less as above. So now tell us Mark what were you're performances you can show you are a good guy at heart and  tell us your system.
Like you even when you're actually told the truth very few will believe it, but if it came from the pen of the PR men that have sprung up in the sport then it will be spot on!!