close breeding

[Guest Owen]

I will tell you my version of the Bull System which is part of the widowhood method of flying. There are others.

Select a cock or cocks that have won races. And place him in a section on his own. He needs to be alone for around 2 weeks. It is best if he can not see other pigeons. Feed him on good nurishing food.

Put your pairs together in normal widowhood boxes. They must be separated by a spare front. This is so that they can see each other but not mate. They will pair up through the bars. After about 4 days take the hen and put her in with the Bull. He will tread her. Then put her back into her box. Around 8 days put a nest pan in with the hen as close to the bars as possible. Give the cock some nesting material. Just a small amount broken up into short lengths. He will pass this through to the hen. Meanwhile put all the hens in with the Bull for a 10/20 minute spell every day.

Eventually the hens will lay their first egg. Remove the partition and let them run together. The cock will sit the eggs thinking that they are his and rear the babies normally.

Egg laying is normally stimulated by the cock driving the hen. In this case he can not do that. The result is that the hen will take longer to lay.

A good Bull Cock will fill all his eggs so you don't need to worry about clear eggs.

If you want to mate your stock hens to the Bull you may want a second round. You do this by removing the hen and youngsters at about 14/15 days old, before the dummy cock can tread her. It works best if you can move quite a few hens and their young together because they will all join in and feed the youngsters.

If you play this right you will have a lot of youngsters all bred from your star cock. Better still they are all close in age and you can try them on the road with confidence.

In my case, I have found that some hens don't suite the cock and you will loose the youngsters from those pairings. In other cases you will find that you will have good youngsters.

My Bull Cocks must win at least 4 races to be considered for breeding. This method is the quickest way to breed very good pigeons in a short time. One word of warning. You really need to have a top quality Bull Cock because he will leave a lot of youngsters and if they are poor you have a big problem.

[billy wilson]

breeding to close has its drawbacks if you dont use your loaf,can anybody remember a pigeon called chester express a cracking racer flew in up north combine alot of years ago,it belonged to middleton and laverick it was reported in holland it was that good ralf middleton and billy laverick went over to bring it back.you have to write down things to remember while breeding,the nephew who olives beside me afew year ago had birds from it then grand children,all of a sudden up popped pigeons with 5 claws and webbed feet,this is what happens when you get to close to many times.

[Roland]

Very true Billy ... just look at the Royal family. Why incest is illegal in humans. The downside hits sooner or later, mostly sooner unless very well up dated and then very seldom use the practise.