Keith Mott writes about winning fanciers past and present

TOMMY GUMBLE

OF PUTNEY

Nineteen-eighty-one was a very successful season for the Putney ace Tommy Gumble, being top prize winner in the West Middlesex Federation, winning 1st Federation three times and being beaten on a decimal for 1 st S.M.T. Combine Bergerac.

Tommy first became interested in pigeons at the age of nine, when he used to keep pigeons in orange boxes on top of his father's stable. He had a collection of tipplers, racers, fantails and anything he could catch in the park. He started racing in 1973 with birds from here, there and everywhere and although these birds won, he thought that for the time and work he was putting into them they should be doing better. In 1976 he went to Dave Fitch of Bookham and obtained five pairs of Delwiche Jets which is the family he raced with outstanding success. Dave Fitch, who is now a good friend of Tommy's, gave him a lot of sound advice on how to race the Delwiche pigeons. Tom said a lot of his success he owes directly to Dave Fitch and his Delwiche Jets.

His all time great pigeon is his seven year old blue Delwiche cock 'Gumble's Leader', which in his racing career won: 1st club, 1st Federation Dorchester; 1st club, 2nd Federation Dorchester; 1st club, 2nd Federation Exmouth; 1st club, 3rd Federation Dorchester; 1st club, 5th Federation Dorchester; 2nd club, 5th Federation Dorchester; 2nd club, 4th Federation Dorchester; 3rd club, 4th Federation Seaton; 3rd club, 8th Federation Weymouth. This champion cock was retired to stock and was always raced on the natural system. Tommy raced four cocks on widowhood as a try out in 1981 and topped the Federation with two of the cocks. Tommy said what would Gumble's Leader have done on widowhood?

Tom had three lofts, a 14 ft. natural and young bird loft, a small widowhood loft and a small closed-in loft where he kept his widowhood hens. He thought the most important factors in loft design was good ventilation and a suitable trapping system. The mistake he thought many fanciers made was they start with sub-standard birds and keep them year after year, never culling or sorting the wheat from the chaff. He maintained widowhood is the system of the future and anyone who likes inland racing and stays on natural will get left behind. One of the stars of the widowhood loft was the three year old blue chequer cock 'Gumble's Boy' and he won in 1981: 1st club, 1st Federation Plymouth. His son a two year old blue cock called 'Gumble's Topper' was also an inmate of Tommy's very select widowhood loft and he had chalked up, 1st club, 1st Federation Weymouth; 2nd club, 2nd Federation Plymouth (beaten by 'Gumble's Boy'); 6th club, 10th Federation, 24th Combine Le Mans 238 miles.

The Gumble loft contained only three pairs of stock birds, all retired racers which had excelled on the road, such as 'Gumble's Leader'. He kept to 12 pairs of old birds and breeds 25 youngsters, believing in quality not quantity. As his stock birds flew out to the racing loft he paired the whole loft up on the nearest weekend to February 14th. Tom was so pleased with his four widowhood cocks' performance in 1981, topping the Federation on two consecutive weeks that he intended to increase the team to nine cocks in 1982.

Tommy considered the main factors behind success with pigeons are good stock, contentment in the loft, good food and plenty of hard work. He reckoned the Delwiche Jets to be a super utility strain of pigeons winning from 60 miles up to 500 miles. Tom's most thrilling experience was as a novice when he won 1st Bordeaux (457 miles) with a broken pigeon that he purchased for 10 shillings. This bird was well up in the Federation and Combine and was 1st of only three day pigeons in the old Earlsfield club.

His 1981 Bergerac pigeon was his good Delwiche blue chequer hen 'Gumble's Magic' and her full performance list is 1979: 2nd club Exmouth. 1980: 3rd club Exmouth. 1981: 5th club, 20th Federation Plymouth; 2nd club, 2nd West Middlesex Federation, 2nd S.M.T. Combine Bergerac (beaten by a second decimal). Another outstanding distance hen in the Gumble loft was his dark chequer 'Gumble's Expected' which had chalked up 1980: 3rd club Dax, 5th club Le Mans. 1981: 5th club, 9th Federation, 23rd Combine Le Mans; 4th club, 12th Federation, 49th Combine Bergerac; 5th club Exeter.

Tommy started training two weeks before old bird racing commenced and the birds went to 14 miles every day regardless of the weather and once racing starts they went to the same training point three times a week. Youngsters were trained by the same method except they were trained every day through racing from the same 14 mile training point.

Tom said he fed a good quality corn with no beans and didn’t make the common mistake of overfeeding. All birds, young and old, were made to fly the programme and a few late breds were bred from the best racers which were just trained up on selected days as young birds. He didn’t show at all and said his birds get in the winter what they have earned in the summer, a nice long rest. He believed in inbreeding and line breeding and stated the thing to remember is that this will magnify the bad points as well as the good and they won't all be champions. When selecting producers he always looked to his champion racers, but has found sometimes the nest mates to good racers were good birds at stock. Tommy's loft contained many winners, but another outstanding racer was the blue pied cock 'Gumble"s Captain' which won 1st club, 11 th Federation Seaton in 1980 as a youngster and 1st club, 1st Federation Weymouth, 6th club Exeter in 1981 as a yearling.

There you have, Tommy Gumble of Putney. I can be contacted on telephone: 01372 463480. See yer!

TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT