PHILIP & MARIA DUNSTALL OF TAPLOW

1st OPEN L&SECC VIRE YBS 2011

by KEITH MOTT

With the pressure of running his successful haulage business, Philip Dunstall has not had time to race his pigeons properly for about ten years, but he made a comeback with his young birds this season with a big ‘bang’. Phil tells me he brought in eight pairs of the Leo Van Rijn of Holland pigeons through Brian Hawes and Adrian Duggins about three years ago and these birds have set his success story alight again. The Dunstall loft sent 25 young birds to the first London & South East Classic Club race from Vire (184 miles) and won the race with their good Van Rijn blue chequer hen, ‘Dorney View Summer’, which was raced on the partners' own celibate system. The two sexes are kept apart all week and are allowed to run together for an hour on marking afternoon. Looking at her pedigree, I notice she is full of the very best of the Van Rijn champions and on her build up to her classic win had the first two Federation races, then two training tosses from Winchester before going to Vire. Phil and Maria clocked their birds on a T3 clock from Vire and recorded eight young birds in 150 seconds, to record 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 12th, 13th, 14th and 16th open. The partners' second bird on the clock from Vire was their good blue chequer hen ‘Dorney View 961’ and she had previously won 8th BB&O Federation Seaton when they took the first ten positions in the open result. She is another Leo Van Rijn pigeon bred down from a long line of premier winners.

The husband and wife partnership had three young bird races with Berks, Buck & Oxon Federation prior to winning the L&SECC from Vire and recorded: 4th, 11th, 13th, 14th, 15th Federation Honiton (2634 birds); 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th & 10th Federation Seaton (2366 birds); 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 15th, 17th, 18th Federation Exeter (1906 birds). The Seaton Federation winner was their good blue chequer hen ‘Dorney View Dream Girl and she was also bred from the very best Leo Van Rijn bloodlines. This game young hen was also raced to the perch on Phil’s celibate system and after her Federation win was entered in the Dorset Federation ‘Madhatters’ Guernsey open race to record 6th open. Fantastic young bird racing!

The partnership of Philip and Maria Dunstall have enjoyed some wonderful success in past seasons, racing in National and Classic events, with their young birds. They had a brilliant season in the Federation in 2000 and from the London & South East Classic Club young bird Guernsey race had ten drop on the loft together to record 2nd, 4th, 6th, 11th, 12th, 15th, 18th, 19th, 20th and 22nd open. A brilliant performance! I visited the Buckinghamshire loft in the winter of 1999 after the Dunstalls had really set them alight that season with their youngsters, including winning 1st section E, 1st open National Flying Club Vire (5,850 birds); 1st open Berks, Bucks & Oxon Federation Weymouth (3.403 birds); 2nd section, 2nd open L.&S.E.C.C. Guernsey (1,723 birds), all with young birds. Their 1999 Young Bird National winner was a Hartog blue hen named Champion ‘Misty’. She was bred down from the ‘Green Ring’ lines, which have been very successful for the Dunstall loft. On her build up to her Vire National win Champion ‘Misty’ was trained with the young bird team, put into Guernsey with the L.&S.E.C.C., to record 80th open, then in to the National, after a few short training tosses. She was sent to the Vire National playing around with some young cock birds. This game hen was a darkness youngster and took 3 hours 40 minutes to fly the 185 miles from Vire in France to win the premier young bird event in English pigeon racing. On the day of the Vire National, Philip was working and Maria had the job of clocking the bids in. She says Champion ‘Misty’ took for ever to trap on her arrival, flying backwards and forwards, from one loft to another, trying to get a drink of water off the roofs. Little did Maria know that she was clocking the National winner!

Philip’s father, Frank, was a fancier. Once, while on holiday at Selsey Bill, he caught a stray on top of the caravan and presented it to Philip, who was only 4 years of age and since then Philip has always had pigeons, flying in partnership with his father for many years, with outstanding success. The Dunstalls are very much a pigeon family, with Philip and Maria’s children taking part in the hobby. Maria’s parents are Mr & Mrs Czaplewski, the highly successful Slough racing partnership. Philip likes to race sprint and middle distance, winning the Federation many times, although he has had good success in the long distance races including; 1981: 17th open N.F.C. Pau (6,066 birds), 1982: 61st open N.F.C. Pau (6,928 birds) and 1994: 140th open N.F.C. Pau (5,976 birds). The Dunstalls race 24 cocks on the widowhood system and 20 pairs on the roundabout system, with all the old birds being paired up at the end of January, if the weather is good.

The partners keep 80 young birds each season and they are all put on the darkness system, when weaned, and come off it just before the first young bird race. Although Philip is very successful with youngsters, he says he is not a great lover of young bird racing, but likes to send them all the way to 190 miles. They are not paired up, but if they want to they are allowed during the racing season. The babies are trained every day and fed twice a day on breakdown and widowhood mixtures. The main family kept is Leo Van Rijn, obtained from Brian Hawes of Hendon and Adrian Duggins of Derbyshire. Phil told me Leo Van Rijn is an up and coming fancier in Holland and his family are outstanding from 70 miles and right through the programme to 560 miles. The Buckinghamshire stock loft now houses 48 pairs of direct Leo Van Rijn pigeons and Maria tells me Philip is now set up for many years' good racing with his retirement from work coming up very soon.

Just a little footnote comment from me about the L&SECC Vire race. I would like to say that it was the most puzzling event I’ve ever known! You must say it was a very good race with some members clocking seven and eight birds in just a few seconds, but after that initial surge the birds seemed to stop coming and returns were quite poor in the final count. But why? Apart from a few showers in mainland England in the afternoon, the weather condition were perfect for racing young birds out of France. Derick Packer rang me on the Monday morning and he had really bad returns! He informed me that there were eleven liberations at Portsmouth on that Saturday and he had a bird reported up in the North of England, so you can draw your own conclusions from that bit of information. How about we have our young bird Classics on Sundays next season? There you have it, the Philip and Maria Dunstall story, one of the best young bird racing partnerships in the U.K. today!