“Carpe diem” or “Seize the day”
 

Latin proverb written by the Roman poet Horatius.
Who, more than me can talk about this?

The Lost Son... he looks and sees that it is good ... and enjoys it.

Hens that lay an egg… Didn’t you notice that yearling hens and those of two years old, which have to race more than 40 weeks on the Heavy middle distance, are eager to start a family.  So these hens lay much easier than their loft-mates.  In fact we understand this because the hens can only come with eggs a few times and very shortly. So when these hens get on the breeding loft, they start to lay very fast and when their youngsters only just have their rings on their paws, another egg is already in the nest-bowl.  The cocks didn’t have to chase them and still there are eggs, probably not fertilised.  This is not very clear to us because we always immediately take away the eggs because we don’t want them to get on a second nest. Even separated hens, which get with their youngster every day, will lay an egg soon.  As much as we try to avoid them to lay a second time, we don’t always succeed.  That’s nature and in fact this gives a good feeling to the fancier because it’s a sign that his pigeons have a good condition.  When something is wrong with the hens, we all know that they don’t lay that easy.

Mysterie Lady

Here an example
The story of our “MYSTERIE LADY”, our love and pride with 12 x Top 100 national and 6 x Top 30 National and also Olympic Ace-pigeon in Poznan, Poland in 2011.  She won over 40.000 kilometres prizes, which is the same as 38 x Barcelona.  This NL07-1821757, ended the season of 2009 and then moved to the open aviary to get a good moulting period and then move on to do winter breeding. After checking her results, we soon noticed and mostly a bird of 4 years old don’t have to race any longer (this has nothing to do that they’re burned out).  We learned by experience that pigeons, which have to race three years in row, every week, from half of April till half of September, on the little long distance and the heavy middle distance, have so much experience that they just race on their own rhythm.  In fact it’s almost impossible to motivate them any longer, they’ve created routine and a lot of experience till they became long distance pigeons, which just try to get home.  In 2010, “Mysterie Lady” had to join the racing team again.  She still had to show some stunts to get a chance to belong to the Olympic Ace-pigeons in Poland. She represented Belgium in the Olympiad, Category C. : 6 races over 500 kilometres.  But before it came that far, it has cost a lot of sweat and tears together with a lot of fear on top of this all. It all started after 5 weeks of total widowship. The week before the national race from Chateauroux when she didn’t want to be locked inside any longer. She was restless and wanted to let me know that something was wrong.  I didn’t want to believe it (she still was closed) that an egg was coming on.  But when I let her free, she immediately started to grabble in the box with the little stones, she laid down immediately and I knew what was going on. I slowly took her away and brought her to her cock and turned the nest-bowl.  And surely… after an hour she laid her first egg and 48 hours later her second. This was Wednesday.  We took both eggs away (surely fertilized) because the next day she had to leave for Chateauroux. It didn’t do anything wrong, on the contrary, she won a prize per 100. Of course there was nothing that let us know that all of this was going to repeat itself and this on a very important moment. Imagine: on Saturday she comes back home from Salbris, she stayed with her cock and her little one for a couple of hours and then moved to her daily staying together with all other hens, where she got locked up as always.  So another race to go, the national flight from Gueret, everything seemed to be fine… Till on Tuesday, the week before Gueret, again she asked to be out of her box and all my dreams fell apart. I called out for my wife…don’t say it’s true…she agreed and I saw the fear in her eyes too. What to do now?  Another egg on its way? I couldn’t believe it, I didn’t want to except. This meant that she had to lay her second egg the day of basketing for Gueret and who would put in a hen on 576 kilometres, for the last time after a hard season, 24 weeks in row if you have to wait to put her in the basket before she laid her second egg?  We let her walk again one more time to her box with her cock and her 20-day old youngster.  She made herself fat, pushed the little one a bit to the side and yes… a bit later there was an egg.  We kept our fingers crossed, trusted her and put her in the basket and… she still did very well with 8 Prov. against 459 p., 70 Nat.against 2970 p. and 15 Nat.Zone C against 1221 p.. Afterwards the next good news was that her two eggs were fertilized.  But… the story goes on…and how?  Now you already know that after the season has passed, we have the habitude to separate our pigeons immediately.  The racing hens go to the open aviary and the cocks remain on the loft where they raced.  After a few days, they already started to moult and so did “Mysterie Lady”, she dropped all of it, not nice to watch.  My wife told me that it was too cold in the aviaries and she asked me if there was no space for her on the loft above.  We took her there, all alone with just some water and some food and fresh little stones. When I passed the section where she was staying, all I did was talk to her. And you don’t have to believe it but a few days later she was scratching in the box with little stones.  I didn’t believe it and called out for my wife. 

My coordinator, not only at night, but as you can see for yourself, also during the day... here with our 2011 youngsters, our exchange on the future.

To a woman it’s a good sign when you ask her for her help, it’s a token of love and my wife is always happy to help out.  In fact, pigeons are like women : the more you cherish them, the more love they give back. But this time, also my wife couldn’t believe what she saw.  We went to look for a cock on the breeding loft and in no time the fertilisation was finished.  In the evening, she dropped her first egg and 48 hours later the second.  The first wasn’t fertilized but the other one was. This was a new experience to me; the eggs can still be fertilized till two days before they’re dropped. What did we learn here? Everything can and nothing has to. Suddenly it all becomes clear, you never have to regret what you did but you can regret things you didn’t do.

Question of a reader
“When the pigeons fly with their beak open, which antibiotic should I use?” 

Answer
First of all, you must know that when a pigeon flies with the beak open in winter time, it’s not a sign of an infection on the bronchial tubes or with ornithoses.  In fact it’s a sign of a less good condition. Let this be clear for once and for all.

THE LOST SON