Keith Mott writes about winning fanciers past & present

PETER HARWOOD

OF SEND

Peter Harwood races in the very strong Guildford club and is one of the premier racers in the Three Borders Federation. Peter is a great supporter of the Federation and has give his own personal sponsership in past seasons. He has started the 2006 racing season of with a ‘bang’, by winning the first two races in the Guildford, including 3rd. Federation Wincanton (1,563 birds). I visited his wonderfull loft set up in the mid 1990’s, just after he won the S.M.T. Combine from Niort.

I visited Send, a quiet little village near Guildford, in Surrey, to see the 1996 Niort S.M.T. Combine winner. The winning owner was Peter Harwood, who has been in the Fancy all his life and loves Channel racing. He has put up many outstanding perfor­mances through years with recent victories being: 1995: 1st Federation Rennes, 1st Federation Nantes; 1996: lst & 2nd Federation Exeter, 5th & 7th Open S.M.T. Combine Nantes, 1st Open S.M.T. Combine Niort. His 1996 Combine winner was a Janssen blue hen sitting heavy on eggs, and she previously won lst Surrey Federation Nantes in 1994. Peter says she is no good at inland racing, but is always there across the Channel and normally likes to be sent feeding a baby. She is bred down from Massarella / Janssens, with her sire being a lst Federation winner and many of her sisters have won from France.

Peter races 50 pairs on the Natural system as he likes middle distance Channel racing, with his favourite race point being Nantes. He feeds a Widowhood mixture, adding beans as the races get longer and he gives his team very little training, as he is very busy running his own building business. In 1996 season, his racers were given two short tosses, one inland race then were sent into Rennes. He can't give his birds an open loft because he has a hawk problem and had three birds killed in the garden in 1996.

Main racing loft is 60ft long, with six sections and a flight for stock birds. The sections are nice and roomy, with massive nest boxes for the racers which are paired up in mid March. The smart set up has two young bird lofts, one of which is kitted out with nextboxes, so the older youngsters can pair up if they want to. Peter keeps about 100 young birds, which get about eight training tosses up to 40 miles, then have to race the whole programme. Peter stops good young hens after a few races, just like a widowhood man will stop young cocks, and told me generally his hens were his best Channel racers in his loft. All the birds were trapped through Sputniks. Another of Peter’s top racers at that time was a Janssen latebred blue chequer hen bred by Ken Wicker of Chertsey, which had to his credit seven firsts, plus 1st. Federation Exeter. Peter’s 30 pairs of stock birds were paired up at the end of February and were mostly direct children of Massarella Janssens.

I can be contacted with any Three Borders Federation news on telephone number: 01372 463480.

TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT (FEDERATION PRESS OFFICER)