Darkness

[geordie1234]

One for the darkness guys

 

 

Quite a few folk reckon the darkness youngsters go down like snow off a dyke as yearlings? However ye have the supermacs who darken the full team and have no probs at yearling age...

 

 

So what's your own opinion?

[walterboswell59]

why would anyone want to put there yb through this to win a yb race is beyoned me to me yb racing is about education if they win its a bonus imo

[geordie1234]

Walter with you breeding as early surely your doos are on natural darkness?

[jonl6280]

Split your YB,s early round darkies later natural, yes to finish the programme your more than likely to need some darkies because by end of august there baldy as ! As yearlings never noticed any difference . only thing that drop as yearlings is the late breeds

[geordie1234]

Cheers John

[jonl6280]

If you don't have darkies then you've no chance of beating the likes of Eadie/kelly or the macs, (in the later races), and if you want to enter the YB nat its very hard to have any left the got good feathering

[lenton1163]

1 guy in our club had a yearling this season win 6 1sts club 1st fed 2nd fed and lots of other top fed positions in fed that pigeon is in the bhw this week he won 3rd under 300 mile homoform challenge that pigeon was on darkness as a youngster also only had 2 yb races and stopped cuz of yb sickness so that tells me that neither yb sickness nor darkness has any affect on the pigeons as yearlings but you can make up your own minds.

[andy Burgess]

I wouldn't say it affects them at all Geo . that's my honest opinion , I read many different answers to all the questions I ask .fanciers will tell you (honest answers ) what works for them ,and those answers often contradict anothers . I have come to the understanding , you do what "YOU" think is right , and if it works for "YOU" then that's the way to go . 1 man will stick with natural and is happy , another will fly roundabout and darkness and he,s happy too .

[Guest Owen]

I darken my youngsters every year and fly them in every race through the programme. I also fly them as yearlings in about half the races available. My pigeons win as youngsters and as yearlings. I don't have one as good as the one mentioned above but I have some that have done a lot of winning for me.

If you want to be successful at racing pigeons you really need to develop a team that can handle the work. I reckon that many people try to protect their birds from doing too much work and end up with powder puffs that get lost.

[TheHigg]

I darken my youngsters every year and fly them in every race through the programme. I also fly them as yearlings in about half the races available. My pigeons win as youngsters and as yearlings. I don't have one as good as the one mentioned above but I have some that have done a lot of winning for me.

If you want to be successful at racing pigeons you really need to develop a team that can handle the work. I reckon that many people try to protect their birds from doing too much work and end up with powder puffs that get lost.

so what youre saying owen is if they cant stand the heat keep them out of the dookit

[walterboswell59]

Walter with you breeding as early surely your doos are on natural darkness?

i suppose you could say that george im not knocking darkness ive just learned through the years that yb racing is not important to me yes i like to win but its secondary to the birds education and most of my early bred yb have to be stoped after 3 or 4 races if it was not for the combined ave id just stop after 3 races and send the crosses to try them out natural suites the way i work my birds so i stick to what i know best and as far as i know darkness dont make them fly any faster just gives you more to send and lose just a thought but could this be adding to the yb losses pushing on birds because they have good feather to many ifs and buts with darkness for me but everyone to there own as andy says if it works for you and your happy with it then stick with it but anyone that thinks they are going to clean up just because there on darkness is kidding them selfs you must have good birds first and formost with any system you use but thats just my opinion for what its worth m8 and like any system you only hear of the ones that win

[Guest Owen]

I think it is a case of all roads leading to Rome. There is no right way or wrong way to manage a team of racing pigeons and we are all looking for different outcomes. I want early maturing birds that can win at every age and I want to win young bird races just as much as any other races. I certainly will not make excuses for my birds such as they don't mature until they are this age or that age. My corn bills have to be paid no matter what age the birds are so they must bring in some money to help out. I suppose that whereas some people are purists in that they set their stall out to win certain types of competitions, I am not fussy. I will try to win any race I enter and I expect my birds to be capable of doing just that. In my opinion the days of the long distance races are over because they are very poorly supported these days. I am the treasurer at the marking station in this area and I see the entries first hand. As each year passes the entry gets smaller. Some of the specialist long distance flyers overcome this by sending very big teams to these events and their losses are huge even though they may have the glory of winning. These specialist will spend very large sums of money to enter their big teams and are in effect buying the results they get. To be honest I would not be prepared to put that sort of money down knowing that I will lose much of it. The big names are usually able to overcome this financial deficit by their sales. As I have said, all roads lead to Rome.

[Tony C]

IMO some fanciers darkness youngsters fail as yearlings because they pair them up to early. If you look at a darkness youngsters life, in a 8 month span they body moult twice, are trained & raced covering a total of well over a 1000 miles (heavy trainers nearer 1500) in-between moults. Fanciers that pair them up early do so in many cases whilst they're still growing their last flight. I feel in these cases the darkies haven't benefited from rest & time to get into breeding condition before they're asked to raise a pair of babies, (They say that breeding a pair of babies is equivalent to a 500 mile fly). IMO pairing them up the end of January is plenty early enough.

[alex young]

IMO some fanciers darkness youngsters fail as yearlings because they pair them up to early. If you look at a darkness youngsters life, in a 8 month span they body moult twice, are trained & raced covering a total of well over a 1000 miles (heavy trainers nearer 1500) in-between moults. Fanciers that pair them up early do so in many cases whilst they're still growing their last flight. I feel in these cases the darkies haven't benefited from rest & time to get into breeding condition before they're asked to raise a pair of babies, (They say that breeding a pair of babies is equivalent to a 500 mile fly). IMO pairing them up the end of January is plenty early enough.

A good point Tony.

[Guest Owen]

Well said Tony. Just for the record I do not pair my yearling ex darkness pigeons at all.

[paddymac]

IMO some fanciers darkness youngsters fail as yearlings because they pair them up to early. If you look at a darkness youngsters life, in a 8 month span they body moult twice, are trained & raced covering a total of well over a 1000 miles (heavy trainers nearer 1500) in-between moults. Fanciers that pair them up early do so in many cases whilst they're still growing their last flight. I feel in these cases the darkies haven't benefited from rest & time to get into breeding condition before they're asked to raise a pair of babies, (They say that breeding a pair of babies is equivalent to a 500 mile fly). IMO pairing them up the end of January is plenty early enough.

Good post Tony, a case of taking a look in the mirror before blaming the birds. What they look on the outside does not necessarily reflect how they feel on the inside and that after being pushed hard as babies through moults and too many races, its no wonder some do fail at the yearling stage.

[Guest big50cal]

I have no probs with my yearlings some of my best results are yerlings and I swear by the darkness yb I think it gives them a better chance in life

[geordie1234]

That's my thoughts too

 

Better feathering equals more training more racing meaning more EDUCATION

[Chris Little]

Our three national winners were darkness babies, so it done them no harm in later life.

 

Regarding yearlings, cant say darkness had a detrimental effect on them

[C WRIGHT]

i started racing young birds this year which i purchased from local top flyers (not top sellers)

all were put on the darkness system and raced every race with good results/wins

best young bird club averages and lochgelly fancier of the year

i choose nine of the youngsters which had flown every race and on darkness for yb national returns were 2 on the day and 6 first thing next morning

\1 loss

they now have all come through the moult are are looking very well

till now the darkness in my opinion has benifited them

i would sugest a big reason for so many losses is down to breeding/selling not darkness

just look at any pigeon site /paper champions champions champions for sale many from lofts that dont even fly just sell

the only way any sport survives is with new ideas techniques lets be honest everyone wants to win

if its down to the darkness that so many are lost ect the guys who oppose darkness and dont do it have nothing to worry about

and if they believe that the darkies wont fly good as yearling then non darkies should be taking all the yearling/old bird trophies

although this doesnt seem to be the case

i think its a matter of opinion and certainly dont believe it cruel in any way if the birds are looked after properly