“Blue Heaven loft” : the pigeons are doing well. Didn’t I say before that they were ready to go to the national race from Argenton (540 km) And when you succeed to score with 7 pigeons in the national top 100 against more than 30.000 pigeons, old-yearlings and youngsters together, you can’t complain. In the meantime, we brought all old and yearling birds on nest, which is spectacular every year again. After Bourges National (31/7), all racers were left together to end up in the basket after 4 nights (on drift and hunting), for a race from Blois (454 km), in preparation for Argenton (550 km). On Monday, the week before Argenton, we gave them eggs. Easier said than done!  With a lot of pressure and good will, all couples started breeding, to end up in the basket again after three nights. This certainly wasn’t a good nest-position but nevertheless we had satisfying results. But then we had to convince them after they got back home, to restart the breeding on cold eggs and this took a lot of patience. Of course we succeeded but it did take a lot of energy and time. Four days after their arrival from Argenton, the day of another basketing for Blois (454 km), in preparation for the national race from La Souterraine (573 km), we gave each couple a little one of 4 or 5 days. Our feeding pigeons were brought together and paired according to a good plan. Blois wasn’t an easy race last weekend. It was warm and a lot of sun and a speed of +- 1300m/m. But again we did well. On Saturday, the day of their arrival, my wife and I put some drops in their eyes and their noses. My wife can do this a lot better but may be I’m starting to take it all easier. I feel loved and statistics show that people who feel loved live longer and healthier. The same source showed that married people also live longer than those who aren’t married. I had a good feeling when I passed through my birds; they were swollen and already ready again to get into the basket. By reading this article, the pigeons will have returned home from La Souterraine, almost the last national race for old and young birds on Saturday August 27th  2011.  In the meantime, they train very well, whithout pushing them and that’s our home for Saturday…they’ll be ready. And with a strong wind of North-Western direction, we are not yet beaten. Only a few nights to go and then we’ll know…Already twice we won the national race from La Souterraine, once with the old birds, with “Adonis” and once with the youngsters with “Christina”.  She was the best and also the fastest against all 17.500 pigeons.

De nieuwe aanhangwagen “ GERALDY – KFZ “ Germany, door ons getest en goed bevonden. Zeer handig in het gebruik. Ligt goed op de baan, is bovendien aerodynamisch, heeft uitneembare drinkgoten. Is gemakkelijk te bedienen, werkelijk een streling voor het oog!

A few conclusions:  you’ll finally succeed to give them eggs and accept these. But there are always some hens who’d prefer to have eggs of their own and certainly when their partners are breeding steady. This is nature and not easy to prevent. Even with a race between 450 and 625 km every week with two nights in the basket, you can’t prevent this. At this moment they also start to drop their big feathers; one by one on regular time. Luckily we cut the most important feathers so they will hold them about two weeks longer.  It takes some time but it’s worth it. Now about the training of the nest-pigeons.  We all know it’s not easy to keep these nest-birds in the sky. If you let them, they’ll only fly a couple of rounds and that’s it. How can you keep these birds going on? Till 2010, we always used the same system; all birds were taken of their nest and we closed a little door in their box, so they couldn’t get in anymore. After this job was done, all pigeons had to leave the compartment and as well the cocks as the hens had to train for one hour in the morning and one in the evening. Because we haven’t a lot of patience any more and because the hens became crazy to get back on their nest, without success of course but we searched for another successful system. Much easier but efficient. So since 2011, we worked like this. Once the racers are back together, after being brought on nest artificially, we put the boxes on half early in the morning. Hens on nest, can’t fly out with the cocks any longer. Around 7 in the morning, all cocks are forced to get out, to train for about 90 minutes and our young cocks (still widower) have to get out a few minutes later. When the group is larger, they remain better in the air and our balloons do their work while we prepare their food in their troughs. Once the training is done, they’re called inside, after we re-opened the little doors in their boxes so they can get back on their nest. Sometimes there are some hens who come and take a look and wonder what has happened.  In the late afternoon, we repeat all of this again but then the cocks stay in their nest boxes, closed inside half box. The old and the young hens get outside together and they have to train also +- 90 minutes. This system is much easier than the one of the previous years. Now we only have two daily training flights and before it was double. May be this has something to do with laziness? It can be, but to us it’s much easier and it also works. The pigeons are much calmer because they know that their partner is staying on the nest and so they train much better and that’s not only important for racing birds but also for nest-pigeons.

Aan huis training
Het “BLUE HEAVEN LOFT” team	Gemeenschappelijk en liefdevol overleg

A reader had a question :” How do you succeed, to let the same birds fly successfully every week, a race between 450 and 625 km?”” What’s the secret?” And in between the lines, I can read that he wants to know if we give something special and how he can do this for 5 months in a row? I can’t answer the question now but I will do so in the following article… In the meantime, my wife already called me twice to come to bed and I know by experience that she won’t call a third time…So now I close my books and go to bed…Life can be so beautiful?

THE LOST SON