Keith Mott

Writes about winning fanciers past and present

BILL HARRIS

of Elton

This week we are going to have a first profile on a former N.F.C. officers and good friend of mine, former President, Bill Harris of Elton. He tells me that he held his first position when he was elected as the Chairman of the local Boys Club at 15 years old and learnt a lot. He served a long term on the NFC committee and was elected President at the 2001 AGM and says it was an honour he is extremely proud of. He believes that club racing has only a few years left. Classic and National racing is, in his opinion, the future of the sport. Many clubs have grievances with other local clubs and he can't ever see this type of problem being resolved. He feels that for the N.F.C. to stay as the premier club in this country it has to move forward and not stagnate, as some members seem to want. The committee has to look to the next 10 years, minimum and try to visualise what the membership is going to want from National racing. He thinks transportation has to be looked at, not only by the N.F.C. but by every single member when we train our birds. The Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is already looking at out hobby and we have to be seen to be doing the correct thing for the birds. They must come first and foremost. He has had several years first-hand experience of ALF and if you think you will persuade them with words, forget it, they do not and will not listen to what you have to say. It's their opinion and only their opinion that they care about.

Bill Harris was born in Chatham, Kent, and when he was two years old, moved house and was brought up in Portchester in Hampshire. His late father, Bill senior, raced pigeons, as does his brother, David, who lives In Gosport and races as Mr & Mrs D. Harris. Bill says he can't remember a time when pigeons weren't around. He joined the Portchester Boys' Club as a 9 year old and remembers with affection those days in the early 1960s, as he and David followed in their father's footsteps. Bill remarked to me, 'You could say pigeons were in our family's blood!' His first birds were bred out of his father's race team and were no particular bloodlines or strain. Bill senior was a very good friend of Cyril Lowe of Guernsey and Cyril sent birds over every year for Bill senior to try out. Bill can't remember his first winner but a good performance he recalls was when he was about 12 years of age and this was with a white cock bird from the La Rochelle race. Scrubbs & Laurel Harvey had the only bird on the day and Bill got up early next morning to see if any thing had arrived home. At about 7am he had to go and deliver papers on his regular round for a local newsagent. Halfway around he saw his only entry, the white cock, coming out of the west, heading for home. Bill threw the papers in to a hedge, raced off home about 2 miles away, got the pigeon in the loft, took off the rubber and then had to cycle 3 miles to Laurel's house to clock in his arrival, He didn't have his own clock in those days and took 2nd. club in the La Rochelle race.. After clocking in he went back and completed the paper round, with a few I people moaning that their Sunday morning papers were late. The young Bill was very keen on football and thought he was quite good as a centre forward, but sadly the local clubs didn't see his potential, He tells me that, despite that, he still supports the best football club on the south coast, Portsmouth. . In the early days, Bill remembers the late Jack Inch of Portchester putting up some brilliant performances. One memory Bill has was when he was about 8 years old, seeing the late Ran Mitcheison of Winchester at the NFC Oxford I marking station. He says he will never forget him with his lumberjack style shirt sleeves rolled up over his biceps, a most formidable man and brilliant fancier. Bill started racing in 1960, joining the Portchester Boys' Club, formed a partnership with his dad in 1965 and flew as W. Harris & Son. Brother David I took over the 'Son' role in 1969, when the young Bill got the bug for the other type of non-feathered birds. Bill got lucky and married his wonderful wife, Julie, in 1970, but didn't keep pigeons of his own at this stage, but visited his dad's loft on race days. He started up again in 1987 and joined the NFC in that year. He classes his novice days as when he started up in 1987; prior to that he was serving his apprenticeship under his father.

Bill's present loft at Elton is 24ft long, 8ft wide, split into three sections and is of wooden construction, with a tiled roof. He has open-door trapping, maintaining it can't be beaten, but has stall traps for the young birds to steady them down. One section has nest boxes for pairing up, the second parting is for the young birds and the third is for the hens when they are on the roundabout system. He tends to use deep litter in the winter months; this is usually barley and straw and is just for his convenience, because of the short days and, with his work commitments, not having much time to clean out. He thinks a loft has got to be practical and has to be constructed to fit in with your system and lifestyle. It has to be dry and well ventilated. The loft also has to be of a standard where neighbours see it as part of the garden and not an eyesore. Bill uses the roundabout method to race his old birds. He has 15 nest boxes, so keeps up to 30 old birds for racing and pairs up early to mid-

February, when he can have a few days off work to be there in case of any problems. They rear a youngster each and some are under laid from other pairs. When they have gone down on their second round and sitting about 10 days, the hens are taken away to let the cocks sit for as long as they want. Usually after 2 or 3 days the cocks desert the eggs and that's when the system starts. The flying time around the loft is increased and training starts. At their peak his birds fly for an hour easily, morning and evening. The hens are usually better than the cocks and a couple of training tosses anywhere during the week sets them up to start the season. He feeds a good mixture during the racing season and has no preference of brand, but it must be dust free. Motivation is the key to his system. Bill maintains that a bird can be the fittest in the loft but if the motivation is not there you might as well save your money and not send it, because it won't win. He tries all weird and wonderful ways of motivating his birds. One off-beat method that Bill used ended up with him winning 1st club, 1st Berkshire Federation, 1st Open UBI Combine (3,000 birds) from Sartilly. He says that, for this, he must thank Gerry Mason of Amcotts in Lincolnshire, who told him what, when and how to do it. Bill trains the birds during the racing season, with a couple of tosses during the week, and likes single-up training. He quite regularly drives down to Portsmouth early in the morning, leaving at about 4am and leaves his birds with his good friend, Cyril Hallett, who singles them up for Bill, this being about a 100-mile fly to the Elton loft.

Bill loves long-distance racing and says he wants to win every race he enters, but is always prepared to shake the hand of the winner. Sportsmanship is something that he feels is lacking within our hobby. He likes Classic and especially the NFC racing and, with the way the National races were set up for 2002 and previous years, his birds go to Nantes and Pau on the roundabout system and are then re-paired for the Saintes National. He prefers Nantes, Saintes and then Pau. The reason for this is that it's a natural stepping-stone for the ultimate race, the NFC Grand National event. In Bill's case, it's 318 miles, 428 miles and then Pau, which is 593 miles. He says it is like a marathon runner; they build up for the big race, with smaller runs before entering the main event. All his birds go to the first and last races; that doesn't mean he sends every week but he picks out the races for them and they must fly certain distances before being entered in any of the Classic or National races.

Bill says he has been lucky enough to win some good positions over the years including: 1st Open UBI Combine Sartilly; 1st NW Section, 144th Open CSCFC Rennes; 8th Open NFC Saintes; 9th Open NFC Saintes; 1st Section G, 21st. Open NFC Guernsey (old hens); 1st Old Hens Championship; 2nd NW Section, 3rd Open CSCFC Bergerac, with the only bird flying over 500 miles on the day, plus many other premier positions. A good team performance was when he sent 25 birds to Saintes, 428 miles, with the NFC, got 22 home on the day, clocked 18 birds and recorded 12 of them in the National result. He says that was a good day! Bill smiled when he told me that his most thrilling experience was in 1989 when he timed in his good slatey hen, ‘Wilma’, bred by his dad in 1987, to win 1st NW Section, 13th Open

CSCFC Pau. This was the year when Avis & Son won the race with their good pigeon, ‘Maddy’. The birds were held over until. the Sunday, with a late liberation, and there was a strong north-east wind on the birds faces. Bill was working in the garden and saw her coming from a long way off, clocking the game hen at 9.40am on the Monday. Bill says he still gets excited when he thinks of that day. He keeps about six pairs of stock birds and usually obtains a couple of birds each year from a winning loft. Bill will breed from these birds and underlay the eggs under the race birds to get a few extra youngsters off them to try out. He usually pairs the stock birds up around mid-January and generally gives the first round away to his friends. Bill breeds approximately 40 young birds each year and tries to bring in half a dozen from a good racing loft each to try out. The darkness system has never been tried for no other reason than he hasn't got the set-up for it. His youngsters are trained well and only lightly raced but he splits them and races on a form of roundabout system. The following year they are expected to fly Saintes, 428 miles.

Bill is a projects manager for the Ministry of Defence, based at Abbey Wood, near Bristol, and says his wife, Julie, and two children, Keri and Steven, are not the slightest bit interested in pigeon racing. Sounds to me like they have got some brains! He believes that the British fanciers put too much faith. into pedigrees. If they obtain birds from a fancier, by all means give him the credit for the original stock, but within three years or so years it's the second fancier's breeding and racing techniques that are keeping the bloodlines in front of the others. He is not interested in the eyesign theory. An eyesign fancier came to his loft after he won the Combine race from Sartilly and asked if he could have a look at the Combine winner's eye. Bill showed him six birds, all winners, including the Combine winner, and he looked at them all and told Bill in what order he liked them. The Combine winner was last in his rating and in fact the fancier said he would not have the pigeon in his loft. Bill tells me he goes on the feet theory; the first pair of feet through the doors on race day are those of your best bird! He breeds the best to the best and the basket is the yardstick he uses for pairing up. Latebreds have been produced in the past and he has had only minor success with them. As soon as the racing season ends, his birds are split to carry on with the moult and all the best of corn is fed at this time of year. As the winter progresses, barley is increased and by the end of December they are fed 100% barley. The feeding stays like this until he introduces a breeding mixture, about mid-January.

I asked Bill, if he was allowed a free hand with the sport of pigeon racing, how would he push it forward? He said he would stop federations going to the Continent and only allow the Classics and the NFC to convoy pigeons abroad. He would make small clubs amalgamate, with a minimum number of fanciers allowed in each club, and when the membership fell below this number, the club would have to throw in its lot with its neighbouring club. He would throw out all puncture clocks; only modern printers clocks would be allowed. He would stop the bickering and jealously in our sport. He said he has known pigeon fanciers who have held grudges for more than 20 years. Bill says he would bring in the ETS tomorrow. He used to ride a bike to clock in when he was a lad and now has a T3 clock, but says we have to progress. If you don't want ETS, then don't stop someone who does! With the National Flying Club

he said he would purchase the very latest transportation and make sure the National birds came first. He thinks every race should be self sufficient. Why should somebody who is only interested in sprint racing subsidise a long distance fancier? With Federations only holding inland racing, he would increase the NFC programme to about eight old bird races and have two or three young bird Nationals. As well as the west coast of France racepoints, he would have races down the centre of France and all races would be about two weeks apart.

There you have it, Bill Harris, former President of the National Flying Club. My phone number is: 01372 463480. See yer!