Dagenham South Road Article 4

Wiley · June 22, 2020

Dagenham South Road Marking Station

Another week in the dagenham and the buzz in the club seems to get stronger and stronger as the weeks go on. We are just off the back of a very successful week of hope and glory in the marking station.

Following last weeks littlehampton in the Thames, as you may remember there was some controversial conversations in the group and online regarding the decision to put back the marking 24 hours. The marking stations very own Terry Green took the bronze medal in the thames taking 3rd open against a very respectable just under 2,000 pigeons, which is a very strong birdage considering the race was set the same week as the BICC's opening channel race from Falaise.

One thing that is noticed by the members who all have raced north in the past, is the huge difference in milage between the shortest flyers in the thames and the longest. I remeber having conversations with fanciers in the East London federation about them having to give away 2 miles maximum in club and federation. The north road mentality thankful is something that our members have banked in their pasts as they are getting a better understanding of the south road at local level, where the amount of overfly can be anything upto 45 miles.

As stated a few weeks back the marking station currently has 17 members on our books, and since then we have had a number of people declare their interest in joining the Thames and our marking club. On the last marking night Micky Connolly made a good comment that the club feels like the good old days in the custom house. There is a good variety of characters, where the banter is flowing continuously not only at the marking station but within the Whatsapp group chat, and every member is willing to help each other out.

There was a lot of talk of squirrels in the group chat this week, which exploded from a statement of some group members being secret squirrels. This lead into even bigger banter with photos being sent of flying squirrels, and how many squirrels are the members sending this week. I think that conversation was put to bed by one of the members of the group saying we was all NUTS.

Onto this weeks race from Purbeck on the 20th June. Many predicted a quick race during the week when looking at thw forecasts as a good day was set with a South westerly wind.

On marking it was the first week of marking station members using the ETS, which lead to alot of interest from the fanciers who havent seen it yet, as I have stated before locally in the east london area, to my knowledge we are the first to be using it. Many of the members were amazed how quickly marking of the pigeons are, and not having to fill a race sheet, and getting a record of how the birds have come on race day is a bonus.

The Purbeck birds were released at 10am in a South West wind. The predictions for the Thames to hit massive speeds fell slightly short, but a race over 1600 ypm was still achieved, which on the old north road into east london would still be classed as a quick day.

Taking 1st and 2nd this week is Tony Giordomania, or as he is known locally as Taxi Tony. Tonys first 2 pigeons won the marking station clear by 11 yards per minute, so very deserving winners who was on the task at hand. Tonys first pigeon is a 2 year old Blue Chequer Hen, who is a heinz 57 of Tonys own variety, who was raced widowhood and then put onto the natural system, where she was racing home sitting. Tonys 2nd pigeon is yearling Blue Cock, who was a gift from Van Sanchez, another member of the marking station, some readers may know him as the Romford flyer on Facebook. Tonys 2nd marking station was also 6th marking station on his first race this season, so a very consistent pigeon especially for a yearling, he might be the one to watch in the future.

3rd this week was thw hard working partnership of Andrew Foster and Lee Finan. These guys have the marking station at heart and really put in a big effort for all of us, so before i go into details of there pigeon, just want to say hats off to you boys. There Blue cock was a previous winner on the north road, and has only been lightly raced the last few seasons.

4th marking station, was Ardy Santos, a fancier who has not been in the sport long, but who is a very keen fancier, and always willing to help anyone out. Ardy (Edward) timed a latebred having its 3rd race of its life. His sire was a London north road combine hall of famer from Thurso for GiovanniSanchez, and the dam was direct from Mark Evans.

Many stated that the race came in waves, with droves of pigeons followed by periods of quietness. Many of the old east london federation fanciers put it into comparison of when the east london federation joined the essex and kent amalgamation the first 3 races, in that organisation could only be described as drips of blood. However talking to other fanciers in essex, it would appear that was the case for the majority, but with that the majority of the fanciers locally and deeper all said that they had excellent returns.

One thing I would like to mention about the marking station which is an interesting observation, from 3 races in the thames we have 3 different winners, not only 3 different winners but different names each week in the top 4 of the marking station. In my opinion this shows the strength of the marking station, and long may it continue, as we hopefully grow from strength to strength.

The talk in the group has set the focus on the next BICC race from St Philbert a distance of 284 miles to my loft, where we mark on the Thursday for a Saturday race. Whitey has a few pals fishing in france on the day some 30 miles south of the race point, so we have nominated him to pester them for regular and update weather reports. For those in the marking station and in the thames I wish them to be successful.

As well as the BICC we also have a race from Honiton in the thames on friday. Many of the marking station members are excited about this race point, as for the marking station it is one of the longest races we can get inland racing south, a distance to my loft of 145 miles. As a marking station, we would love for the Thames to consider having a lot more Honitons in the program for next season.

The season with its late start is moving on with pace, and many of the marking station members are considering starting their young bird training, as officially we are only 2 races away from the official first young bird race. The last race from Purbeck had birdage over 2,500 birds, it will be interesting to see how big the birdage will be once the young birds are entering the baskets too. I think you can all agree like the song from yazz, the only way is up.

Sayonar for now....

Grasshopper