Ronnie

i had a youngster back today from two weeks ago covered in mud and race rubber still intact apart from the muddy feet it was in great condition.

Roland the system makes a lot of sense to me and like you have said before contentment and motivation are linked and i honestly believe you wont get proper condition untill you get contentment. As for the youngsters i want to try full widowhood next year for the young cocks i beleive the darkness makes them mature much earlier and its a weapon that could be used .Now if the sun heightens condition and i have no reason to doubt it does then surely there is room for a full spectrum bulb in loft with artificial daylight hours .But i can see this only being helpfull in the early part of the season due to molting the flights also maybe need a heater or two to get the full effect of summer but not to sure on that. Now all my thoughts are just speculation and i havnt had the birds or time to try these ideas as of yet but i will implement a few for next years programme for sure providing i can get my new loft designed the way i want it space being at a premium. Thanks for the info Roland as usual common sense put into practice with a few insights thrown in for us Newbies.

By the way Roland i think you would do extremely well with the above system.They would be motivated by love of home and youngster they could be flown like widowhood round the loft twice aday say.Then the added bonus of youngster learning of the parent.The only downside i can see is you couldnt put the youngsters on Darkness but if your not worried about darkness youngsters then i think this system will have a lot going for it.

Could be a system where by you let pairs rear young and seperate the hen and one youngster when youngsters are ready for weaning(preferably the cock if able to decide) into another section of exactly the same layout so they would have there own boxe's still and let them fly for the box but being seperated from the cocks they still regain the fitness lvls and vigour of a widowooder?? Just an idea but am hoping you will share your system with us Roland.

Also mate the club members have lost birds as well they may say they havnt but i bet they have.I fly into cheshire and round our way losse's have been terrible the last two weeks.

Had this happen to me last year lost the lot of em.Had some great results of the offspring this year as well.I was gutted when i lost them and still gutted when the birds offspring started doing the business.Hope you get some back racer Fingers crossed.

And for the last time using antibiotics does not harm any animals imnune system why can't some of you "experts" get that through your heads. No one is saying Antibiotics kill the immune system what they do is the germs they dont kill they allow to get there own resistance against future antibiotics and that is where your so called supebug's come from so before you know it the Immune system can no longer fight the said disease because it has mutated and become resistant to most cure's .So then we pour more antibiotics in and the cycle is repeated over and over again .But the overall problem what a lot of people have missed is most if not all Illness's pickeds up in the basket and round the loft are due to stress and the best fight against stress is Vitamin C witch hardly anyone gives birds because birds are able to make there own but only if they are healthy and if there stressed there not healthy. In reply to the original question Vic all losses are not due to illness i lost 8 young birds last week from 120 mile race(out of a team of 24) i still took third in the club and i will be in the cards this week as well and i havnt lost any today .which leads me to think the birds i lost where not ill they just wernt up to the task. As usual this is just my opinion and like ive pointed out before i am new to the game so i will prolly get lots of replies telling me different

Must be a really really good idea if its taking him this long to think of it

Is the bull box a way of using one cock with a lot of different hen's?I have an article on my pc somewhere called the Bull system i can post on here if anyone wants it.

Thanks John

Thanks alot for the replie's.It wasnt a planned thing just curious to know if it could be done .Would be nice to have a round of youngsters all hatching in the same week or two of the same pair of bird's.

Wellcome to the site.Never be afraid to ask it was this site that sorted me out with my birds. All the best Ronnie

Yes you would .I think maybe i over reacted a bit in this post but the point is still a valid one.Sorry if i upset a few genuine scribes i know you can only put in your write up's what you are told.Incedently how does one become a scribe its something my better half has shown interest in.

If i was to remove some egg's from a stock pair how long could i keep them before i put them back under another pair and in what conditions must they be kept? Could i say take a pair of egg's from a stock pair today(within an hour of it laying its second egg) and keep them till december when i pair up my racers?

I dunno if this is the right place to put this.But here go's Why are scribes in the pigeon press aloud to right about positions and results and not put the birdage sent it would stop alot of false bloody advertising and aint it funny how when the scribes arnt in the running no article is in the local press that week?I wont mention names because this post will just get removed by mod's then but ive just read an article where the scribe is more or less saying another winner is mob flying(scribe wasnt in the running).Then hark on about how he took such prize money in an average race when there was only about 30 birds went and he sent most of them.He go's on about how he took so many birds on the night but fails to mention the other fed he sent to where he didnt clock in.I know this is just a rant but it dont half get my back up surely the pigeon press should make all results contain birdage and members sent to each race then we could see whether the scribes birds wich are going to be up for sale over the winter season are actually worth buying.Dont get me wrong this isnt aimed at all the pigeon scribes the majority seem to be well written informative articles and if youve taken offense by this i appologise but then again if the cap fits wear it. Ronnie

i bought some chickens the other day 1 pound each the guy said he had to get shut of em.Lol i felt like a right plonker when i asked if he had 5 he started laughing and said yeah no prob's i got 10'000 to get shut of by the weekend.

started racing with 25 down to 15 after this week lost 8 yesterady Maybe it was just to hot for them.

Yes percy is a contributing fact but what Vic says bears thought. Ok the ets ring may not carry anything but a bar code but the pads do and we dont know what effect them radio signals have on the birds as they pass so closely to an ETS pad.What about the weight of the ets rings do they not bear thinking about?They may not weigh much to you and me but we are not racing pigeons flying 400 miles .I dont think Vic is knocking the ets he is just providing food for thought and all things should be looked at and thought about before idly dismissing it.Just because someone has been doing something for years does not mean they are doing it right.

Damian i dunno where in cheshire you are but i am in Winsford.Have you noticed how many more Hawks there is around near us now? I am not saying thats the problem just saying it could be.Ive been pretty lucky up to now with training but this week the birds seem to be struggling a bit on traing with me beating them home most day's.But i do throw em up in full cloud cover and they are at a new training point this week.

Ok i'm on my third young bird race this week and i reckon now is when they start racing.What tips and Tricks will you use to try and get an edge?. I will be putting in two nest boxe's tomorrow to try and get a bit of extra motivation. I also have youngsters on egg's for this one as well. Anyone else want to share a few tips ?Maybe if they change the feed and stuff?

1st race lost 2 out of 12 took 3 and 4th and 6th club 2nd race lost 1 from 23 took 1st club 4-5-6th club (i think deffo won it not sure on other cards) The real racing dont start till this week though birds should be starting to get in the swing of it and hopefully mine will keep coming good.Incedently ive clocked the the same two birds in first and second both weeks and both nestmates.Coincidence maybe? hopefully not but time will tell.

Lost the plot?? How can you lose something you never had??

Just got an email from winning magazine(online mag) linking to this article its very interesting and may explain what happened to me this weekend from Lessay. http://www.winningmagazine.nl:80/articels/redactie.asp?Id=5757 Hope it helps

well sent 7 to lessay got one back 6 still missing 270 miles to me and all been to fourgeres before thats 340 mile to me .The wind has been against them today but i did prepare for that. Still its sent to test us ,its how we deal with it that makes us better or worse should all home tonight or tomorrow.

Well done Peter .Its more than luck to come from that distance must love its home and owner . Well done mate