Signals (18-09-25)
I have never said it in so many words, but most of my columns are not meant for the better fanciers, but for fanciers who want to get better.
Because all too often you hear that the most normal things are a revelation to them.
HOPE
Which fancier never had to deal with the fact that a good or perhaps his best pigeon of a race was not only too late, but also not home on the day of liberation.
Then you can hope that the wind will change quickly. In this respect I once quoted the '019' of the Bros Janssens.
On a bad day with SE wind, their best bird (019) was not home in the evening.
Janeke then: 'To-morrow (Monday) you can forget, but if the bird will not get home on Wednesday it will never get home.
And yes, he was there on Tuesday. Later Janeke would say that his suspicion was prompted by the wind that would turn.
Not home with a southeast wind the same day? Then you have to hope for a wind that turns to the west or northwest. In all races with losses, you have to hope for a changing wind. Hope for the return of a lost pigeon is also allowed when suddenly there is a lot of noise in your loft. Or in the morning after getting up a stray bird on the landing board.
RIGHT AND WRONG
Nowadays you can see how things are, right after your first pigeon. Just look at your phone. But it wasn't always like that.
Before the ‘E era’ you had to pay attention to the way the birds got home. It was significant.
Shortly after Bart van Oeckel started with pigeons he often came here to watch the first races. Sometimes with father Jan. So it once happened that we hardly saw that arriving pigeon, only heard whizzing. We just saw his tail when he dived in. I remember the 702, mother of the later 3rd National Ace Pigeon KBDB. A day later I was able to email Bart. The fastest bird over all.
But it could also be different. Like the day that the first pigeon immediately landed on the shelf but stayed there for a while. I never emailed the results of that flight.
'The bird was not greedy', were the memorable words that Bart would later say.
LIKE SNOW
Ay serious fancier looks at the weather forecast early in the week. And also looks for signs that indicate form or no form.
Training is an important clue, but not an infallible one. You can be fooled by it.
And you can do that with more.
So it can happen that you come to your loft in the morning and think 'what happened here?'. A pile of down as if it has snowed.
Now we all know that down plumes indicate health and shape. Therefore it is a hopeful sign.
Many pooled some extra money on the birds for the next race after such a ‘snow shower’.
But what a disillusionment later.
Excessive down means no prize. It indicates pigeons that are recovering from something. The prizes will come about three weeks later.
TOES
What became a kind of automatism for me before basketing is to quickly check the toes, or the sole of each pigeon's foot.
If there are flakes on it, it means 'keeping it at home', it doesn't win a prize. The toes should be clean, preferably also feel a bit warmer. And while we're on the subject of toes. Some can tell whether you are dealing with a cock or a hen. Nonsense !!!
TOO LATE
I hardly dare to write the following because of shame, but I have experienced it twice that one morning, each time in warm humid weather, I came to the loft and most of the pigeons had left the nest. Even with young of about four days old and even there were once dead. A look in the nest immediately makes everything clear. Lice. Those mobile little round things that are incredibly annoying when jumping over on your body.
Can you imagine what it does to pigeons? The fact that a dead young is often so skinny is because it has been sucked dry by those vermin, as it were. So better take precautions.
TRICHO
Tricho is far from what it used to be. There was a time when I couldn't raise a youngster if I hadn't cured beforehand. It was the time when even scientists feared for the future of pigeon racing. Even a double dose of the drug sometimes proved insufficient. That's how resistant the protozoan had become. The turnaround came for me when veterinarian Marien (also a very meritorious racer) confided in me that he had not cured his breeders in years.
I knew him pretty well and took him serious.
Now you hear and read more and more about fanciers who have not cured their breeders for years. Often not even their racers. The latter is not recommended, too risky. In my younger years, a yellow excrescence in the mouth was a sign of canker. Now the bird is mainly feeling weak, has a throat that is too reddish and especially mucus threads in the throat.
SLIME THREADS
I only open throats in case of doubt. In my village you used to have Connie. A fine fancier and his hobby seemed to be 'looking at throats'.
He did that with every pigeon and in case of slime he had something for that. Salt. When pigeons sneezed out the mucus, he was satisfied.
'You have to remove the cause Connie', I would say. "Not the symptoms." You with your learned words', he would say. 'Sintoon is nonsense.'
He was a special one, by the way. He was once here with his friend Jos. I handed him a worthless pigeon. 'He looked at it, then held up the bird and said to Jos: 'This is gold. I've never seen faster pigeons.' I couldn't hold back and said 'that's the worst I ever had, Connie'. He again: 'Maybe, but then it doesn't fly straight home... I maintain that it is a super fast one.'