magpie

XC Weather site predicts 20mph plus winds from the North East in the Channel over the weekend so judging by last week's returns from MNFC and NFC in a similar strength wind from the North West I would suggest you are in for a stinker. It'll be like lambs to the slaughter - better to keep them at home for next year's OB team.

Be interested to hear from any forum members about their returns last Saturday from Fougeres with NFC and if any of the mssing birds have been reported. Most people here in the South West had a very difficult race with a lot of young birds still missing - although old hens returns seem to have been good even if they made heavy going off it against the north west wind.

Day three is drawing to a close and we still haven't seen any of our ten YB entries in the Fougeres YB National. To be fair it has been drizzling with very poor visibility all day here on the South Coast and this has probably put paid to any returns for a few days. Hopefully one or two may work back later. I gather everyone in this area experienced a very poor race so perhaps it's just as well the season is over !

Not really surprised at the poor returns because I suspect anyone west of a N-S line up through the country from the Isle of Wight also had a tough race from Fougeres with the NFC yesterday. We sent ten YBs, some of which had already flown the Channel this season, and still haven't seen a feather despite being among the shortest flyers- although we did well with our old hens considering the disadvantageous wind and had four out of five back. I believe the problem was the strength of the north west wind in the Channel. The leading NFC birds seem to have hit the coast east of the Isle of Wight and judging from some excellent birds up into Yorkshire they may well have picked up some South in the wind after reaching the London area. With Falaise being further to the East than Fougeres I would guess the MNFC birds may well have been reluctant about crossing the Channel (unless they happened to be with some experienced old hens) and have gone along the coast of France and maybe into Belgium and Holland. Perhaps there is a case, particularly with young birds, for holding over if the wind is such that the race controllers know a difficult race will result. Certainly by today the wind in France and here on the South Coast had dropped and was in a more southerly direction (Something the XC Weather site had been predicting since last Tuesday) which I am sure would have given a much more satisfactory race.

You should count yourself lucky to get two out of three Cowman. We sent 10 Ybs to NFC Fougeres and haven't seen a feather. Winners were doing 1300 up the east side of the country but in this area it was a disaster. The few fanciers who did bother to send after seeing the forecast for strong west/nwest winds in the Channel were fortunate to get any at all and those which did make it were mainly doing below 800ypm. Incidentally several of ours had already been over the Channel twice in recent weeks.

Sunny with practically cloudless blue skies here in South Dorset with wind now starting to pick up to a breezy westerly. XC Weather site says northwest and over 20 mph in the Channel so it looks like a stiff test for the YBs at Fougeres with the NFC - and a result probably dominated by Sections A, B and E as was the Messac OB race this year in very similar wind. Our only hope with young birds in the west is that some of the old hens might keep one or two on a straighter line.

Looks like another north wester over the Channel for the NFC YB National from Fougeres which means another hard one for our youngsters in the West and a fair bet the winner will be somewhere in Sussex ! Bet those Ramsdean boys are rubbing their hands together !

The Central Southern Classic FC are racing from Guernsey tomorrow - that's just over 80 miles to us and we had to send them to the marking station on Thursday. Crazy or what ?

It depends where you live. For instance if you are racing across the Channel and live within 20-30 miles of the South Coast the wind direction and strength in the Channel completely dictates whether you have a chance or not in the Open result. The shorter the race the more wind direction is important. Even at the extreme distance. the wind plays a big role as you will see if you study the open results for the NFC, BBC and BICC.

P and D Clarke of Taunton were 61st - a good bird considering most of those in front of it were well to the east.

One very good early bird in Axminster, another in Taunton and a couple in Crewkerne in the top 50 in the YBs. But did these come with the leaders in the old hens race which were all in Somerset ie Bristol, Weston-super-Mare and Crewkerne ?

I shouldn't change anything at this stage in the season. The truth is if past YB Nationals are anything to go by you will need a lot of luck to win anything down in Devon, unless there is east in the wind, and from my experience over 50 years of competing in YB Nationals you can expect to say goodbye to about half of the birds you send simply because they won't have experience of being thrown in with birds going all over the country and will end up many miles from home. Being among the shorter flyers isn't an advantage because if they don't hit the coast on line they are faced with breaking away from birds going inland and flying a dogleg back to the West Country. The only time we came close to winning was many years ago when the YB national was flown in a north east wind and only a very small number of birds made over 1000ypm - I've started praying for something similar at the weekend.

Forgot to add we sent six old hens to Lamballe, mainly yearlings which had been widowhood hens that hadn't flown out since April, not raced or trained until a month ago and we had five in reasonable time and the sixth early Sunday.

BBC Lamballe was a poor race in South Dorset where we are among the shortest fliers. Some good fanciers failed to time at all while I would estimate average returns for others were only around 25/30 per cent. Personally we had four from 16 on the day, two more Sunday morning and have seen nothing since. They were all well trained and had several races up to 80 miles. The weather here cleared up after a drizzly start on Saturday and with south in the wind we were expecting a much better race. A lot of birds were liberated at Portland, I believe the Midland National and Derby Fed, at about the time the early birds from Lamballe should have been hitting the coast and whether this had any bearing on our returns or not I don't know. It would be interesting to know how the Channel Island fanciers fared for returns - from the provisional times it looks as though they struggled as well and yet they must only fly about 70 miles.

Poor returns locally from Lamballe with the BBC in spite of the winner doing over 1500. I know it's always erratic with YBs getting their first experience of Channel racing but with a South wind today most people must have been hoping for a much better race and more consistent returns. Old hen returns seem to have been better, so perhaps it's just that a lot of the young birds don't have the confidence to break away and when they are hitting a 200+ mile wide front like the English coast they can easily end up miles from where they should be.

It's started to rain now in West Dorset - not so good at the moment for anyone who sent from this area to Lamballe with the BBC. Here's hoping it clears up later.

Dorset 8 am - no sun yet, no wind, heavy clouds and some look pretty threatening.

I'm 10/15 miles south west of Blandford, Dorset and the weather, which was cloudy with drizzle, has now brightened with glimpses of the sun. Wind moderate and WSW.

That doesn't surprise me - nothing much works with the Dorset Fed these days !

Thanks for the help.

Can anyone with a ring list tell me which area GB 09 C 30908 and GB 09 V 04545 are likely to come from so I can arrange to give them a helping hand to get home.

One of the clubs we fly in was at Exeter last Saturday - but because we had a disaster from there the previous Saturday (it is only about 45 miles and the weather was perfect) we didn't send. By all accounts it was another unexplainably difficult race with lots of youngsters missing. Instead we sent 40 birds, including some previously unraced old hens, to Windrush on Sunday and had a cracking race with all the YBs back and just one old hen missing -so it doesn't seem as though they were affected by the K factor.

Stuff to use is coarse oatmeal from Holland and Barrett which is about the same size as the chopped up wheat which forms the base for Harkers Hormoform. It's only a base for the other ingredients which soak into it. I have added wheatgerm oil,(do you think pigeons would naturally choose to eat a fish oil ?) vitaminerals and then dried it off with brewers yeast which you can also get cheaply from H and B. If they won't eat it at first try and few drops of aniseed oil. I generally give them a little as a supplement when they are feeding young but once they are racing it's back to just good corn.

We've had more than ten YB training tosses from 20 to 60 miles so far and not once have they come back in a group and on most occasions all the birds which have returned have been in singles. Losses each time have been between 5 and 50 per cent and when they do return they are so jumpy it is pretty obvious they have had a fright somewhere along the line. Sorry to say the days when you could take a kit of birds, young or old, away and race back to find them all back or be just in time to see them pitch as a flock are long gone in most areas. It's tough I know - but anyone entering the sport now might as well get used to the fact that when they train their birds they are in for a lot of disappointments. For this reason we don't train our widowhood cocks once they have had one race, of course it's not so simple with young birds which need the experience.

British Barcelona Club liberated at Bordeaux at 6.15 in light SW turning W on route.