Notes

Use no drugs on youngbirds, use weakens natural immune system. If you breed from birds that had illnesses as ybs, and you cured them from some malady, chances are the parents will pass this trait of getting sick on to their young. Young birds should cure themselves of illnesses. Survival of the fittest is the only way to develop a healthy and winning team of birds. Drug resistant strains of bacteria which affect birds and humans are on the rise due to the misuse of drugs. Use no drugs and only the strong will survive. Keep your loft secure, safe, sanitary, spacious, good air transfer, and dry.

Happy pigeons are winning pigeons. The fancier must know his pigeons and the pigeons must know the fancier; use barley; use rice, especially for hot weather as it holds moisture - also high in carbohydrates; use wine, apple cider vinegar, honey, safflower; be consistent in the loft; be happy around your pigeons -never go into the loft when you are angry; your pigeons can sense your mood and react accordingly; pigeons are small, a little of anything causes a reaction, maybe good - maybe bad; feed according to what you want them to do; fat contains moisture; protein absorbs/robs a bird of moisture, birds race on carbohydrates and fat; only one egg slows production of crop milk. If you want to win young bird races and specials - breed out of pigeons that produce good, fast maturing young birds. Mate youngsters of brothers and sisters together (cousins); put yourself in the place of your pigeons and see if you would race home like they do.

Train young birds out to 5 miles at 10 or 12 weeks of age, never later. All animals learns best and retain their learned skills longer if taught at the youngest possible age; hand feed a treat seed to each bird every day to tame them; tried and proven race birds should be used for breeding; mark the first egg if your breeding pairs are not in individual pens, second egg might be fertilized by a different cock, keep the birds locked in their nest boxes between first and second egg to ensure parentage; don't let widowers sit on 10 day eggs before removing hen, 7 days only; after old bird races - pre mate breeders if changing mates - let them lay, then separate after 7 days.

Only 10% or so of birds bred make good racing pigeons. It must equated with genetics. As some colors are recessive to others in pigeons - then likewise racing ability is recessive to loser pigeon. Genetics is why the breeding of two racers does not always produce a racing pigeon. If racing ability is recesssive, then you must mate two birds carrying the recessive traits together to produce a racer. It must take two recessives to make a racing pigeon. Is that why the majority of pigeons sent to races are blue? Since blue is a recessive color - does recessive color equate in any way with racing ability? Lack of racing ability ( only 10% or so really have it) and overcrowding have something to do with youngbird losses.

Young bird losses occur because of poor genetics (lack of homing ability) and overcrowding. Take for example what pigeons do when there is not enough food for them in the wild. If you take two groups of pigeons and feed them both the same amounts - the size of the groups will remain the same. However, if you decrease the amount of food in one group and add it to the other group, one group will shrink, and the other group will grow in size according to the amount of food available. This example also works when the amount of space each pigeon has is taken into account. Pigeons know when there is not enough food and space for them in the loft and will naturally thin their ranks until the correct amount of food and space is made available to them.