JOHN
ALLBUTT
of
Hassell
by
Les J. Parkinson
This
is a fancier that I have known for many years and his performances over
those years has not really varied from top class and I have also worked
with John when I was secretary to the Mid Cheshire Fed while he held
the position of Chairman. So one way or another we have had plenty of
contact over the years.
John
lives in a delightful place to be with a team of racing pigeons out
at Hassall Green where John successfully races his excellent team of
pigeons out there in the country side with no neighbour problems. With
the exception of the family visits John and Janette can enjoy the benefits
of keeping pigeons as a hobby. Now that John is retired through ill
health to be a professional pigeon fancier they can enjoy life all the
more. A few months back I did a piece on the legendary Jack Bate who
is one of the many top names from the Sandbach and it really is extraordinary
how so many good winning fanciers have come from the Sandbach area of
Cheshire over the years. Some might say the position helps, maybe it
does but on the other hand there always appears to be a number of fanciers
whom seem to work that bit harder at the sport and are constantly there
amongst the prize winners no matter what type of competition or distance
flown. It could just be down to the fact that for many years there has
always been fanciers within the club who have won at all levels of competition
and created a club of fanciers who have had to work harder to get to
the top. Each season appears to surpass the rest but that can never
be the reason being that there has always got to be a season when everything
works out perfect.
To
put you in the picture on the fancier that you are reading about here
are some of the performances achieved over the years starting with the
National races. Let's in 1993 10th sec L 324th Open Pau. 1994 6th Sec
100th Open Pau. 1997 4th Sec 246th Open Pau then in the YB Nat 1st 12th
13th Sec L 36th 176th 177th Open. 1998 4th Sec L Nantes. 1999 5th Sec
L Nantes. 8th sec 103rd Open Pau. 3rd Sec 48th Open Saintes. 20005th
Sec 157th Open Nantes. 3rd Sec 37th Open Pau. 10th 21st & 31st Sec L
77th 251st 443rd Open, 31st Sec YB Nat also winning Section L Grand
Ave. then for the 2000 season John decided to join the MNFC and achieved
the following results, 18th sec 58th Open Le Ferte Bernard. 14th sec
46th Open Nantes. 1st 18th 41st Sec 6th 114th 257th Open Picauville.
The last three seasons at club level have seen John win in 1998 20 x
1sts 14 x 2nds club. 5 x 1st, 4 x 2nds at fed level. 1999 12 x 1sts
14 x 2nds. 2000 won 14 x 1sts, 15 x 2nds. 5 x 1sts 5 x 2nds fed plus
a whole host of trophies over the same period at club and fed level.
So you see whether it's short or long distance old or young bird racing
John is amongst the winners.
This
last 2 years has seen the name of John Allbutt on the National results
many timers and when you reach that level you are there in the pigeon
world no matter how you look at it. Lets go back to the beginning when
John was a young lad and very keen on the sport in fact he is today
all these years later. The teenage years were the ones when John and
a group of youngsters competed against one another in a race of their
own with the reward being generally about 5 shillings or to the modern
day teenager 25p. Not much at today's standards when most youngsters
get notes as their pocket money and don't have to earn it if it was
not a few bob then a regular fancier from the club would give them a
pigeon to keep their interest going. What these lads used to do was
send their pigeons to the individual race with the North Staffs Fed,
the Fed would liberate first and some 15mins later the teenager's birds
went into the sky through an official liberator. It was a learning curve
and was always keen competition in those days because even though it
was there for fun the competition was keen and nobody wanted to be at
the bottom of their own private sheet. The late Roy Smith of Middlewich
told me a similar story some years ago but as John pointed out it certainly
doesn't happen today John first raced these pigeons to an allotment
before moving to Newchapel in 1972 then on to his present address now
at Hassall.
We
were talking about the prices of pigeons today and although the top
pigeons have gone up leaps and bounds John used to pay what was a King's
ransom for his stock in the 50s when he bought in the H W T cross Gits
pigeons at �4 each mind you they did race well for him winning some
good prizes. He brought in the Alf Baker stock off Red Admiral and champion
Mick. These pigeons did well with the prestigious sentinel cup going
back home with John and he was also r/u on two occasions in those days
this was just about the hardest cup to win. Those were the days when
pigeons were trained on the railway from Dudley Port approx. 45 miles
twice per week as John pointed out in those days fanciers used to feed
far heavier than they do today because they trained for the job at hand.
When the move to this very nice location was completed in 1983 John
brought in the Robert Venus pigeons from Merlin Hudson of Doncaster
who had some of the best at that time and they proved to be a good investment
with many winners originating from them. The best thing about these
lines was that they bred winners from 60 miles right through to the
40 mile plus events. One of Johns most noted pigeons comes from these
lines being the excellent 'Lee', winner of many prizes the name came
at the Sartilly race when this pigeon topped the Fed for John as the
pigeon came his grandson came down the garden hence the pigeon being
named after him. This very same year "Lee" won a meritorious award for
John has not only did he win Sartilly but was also 5th Rennes before
going on to top the Fed out of Nantes and was also 7th in the big Catteralls
race of the day. Since then a lot of winners have come down from these
lines and they have proven to be a good all rounder.
The
present day the team consists of the Litherland Van den Bosche the excellent
winning Verheys of Tommy Shaw who's performances into the potters have
been way above average for many years. Then theirs the staff Van Rest
from Dean Pallet plus the Busschaerts from his best friend Tommy Hulme
who is also one of the best fanciers in Cheshire. John has blended these
pigeons together well and finds that they all perform well from the
shorter to the longer distances races including Pau. More recent introductions
were the SVR lines from Dean Pallett which have been performing well
in the sprint to middle distance events up to Nantes. There is also
one very good Busschaert cock off Gary Hodkinson that has won 2 x 1st
feds at Nantes and Newton Abbott. 3rd Sec Saintes NFC. 3rd Middlerwich
2B Vire. 1st Cheshire 2B Nantes. Another good pigeon is the "Denson
Cock" that has performed well with four good races for John out of Pau.
John only has 2prs of stock nowadays, because his race team of about
40prs are reproducing themselves there is no need for a big team in
the stock loft.
There are about 50 youngsters reared even though he has so much room
the numbers are still limited showing that the fancier can keep the
numbers down and win. The lofts are a 32ft w/h loft split into three
sections for the old birds and 16ft for the y/sters divided into two
sections. All lofts were made to be correctly ventilated for the winning
fancier and must not be over crowded. John also likes to clean the race
team out daily and uses loft white but the young birds are on a deep
litter of "Ossi Loft". John did tell me that he has been having a bit
of chest trouble therefore after the season had finished he spent as
little time in the loft as possible and felt better for it. The birds
are all vaccinated in November and are treated for Canker and Coccidiosis
before they are paired. Then two weeks prior to pairing they are treated
for respiratory. All the birds are paired up together around the 16th
January. After close on 50yrs of racing pigeon John is one of those
fanciers who has in the main stuck to the widowhood system but as he
points out it is a far different system today than it was when he first
took system all those years ago. Widowhood is by far the easiest but
it is one that has to be right or you are wasting your time it takes
some sorting out but when you have the widowhood it takes some beating.
However John does re pair the birds after Pau so they go to the Saintes
National as very keen paired pigeons sitting between 8 & 10 days.
The
training system that John uses is also quite simple starting with 6
tosses before the first race in mid April. Then no more that is with
the exception of the odd toss when the channel races are approaching
quite simple whereas if you are on the natural you have to go up the
road far more frequently. They are exercised for one hour both morning
and evening but when the channel events are approaching they are exercised
a bit more. The feeding is normal for the system, which is on their
return from the race they have a light feed also twice on Monday. The
Mon. Tue and Wed again the light feed with a good widowhood mixture
at all other times except Friday where it is slightly changed to half
light and widowhood mix. The cocks are always fed separately in their
boxes so that John knows exactly what each pigeon is having. John is
very fussy about the corn so uses so because of the standard they set
he uses Versele-Laga all the year round plus a bit of Red Band and the
only other thing that they get in the water is a good tonic twice per
week. The w/h hens are kept in individual boxes and fed on a depiurative
until Wednesday when they are changed to a w/h mix. The hens are shown
the cocks every week for between 5 & 10mins for all races, by the way
the cocks are not exercised on Saturday or Sunday. The cocks are sent
to all land races but when the distance comes the channel candidates
miss one week before their selected races. With racing the w/h they
hold their flights well so this does not cause any problems with selection
for the longer races. A point that was raised was the excellent race
that John had with the NFC Pntorson when he entered 15 young birds and
14 returned giving a great result. John's Ambition is with the NFC where
he want's to improve his performances but after winning the grand Ave
for Sec L in a brilliant season he is going to have to go some.
To
enhance his National racing John Joined the Midland National for the
2000 season and also had a good season there as you can see he does
set his sights high. John called in with four of his latest winners
for photographs, when I say his latest that is an understatement because
the Chequer Cock known as "Denson" has to date won many prizes including.
4th Sec 246th Open Pau NFC 1997. 8th Sec 103rd Open Pau NFC 1999 then
3rd Sec 37th Open Pau 2000.The Blue Pied Hen "Donna" was 1st Sec 36th
Open YB NFC 1997 and has since bred fed winners. The Red Cock "Julee"
is a 2000 young bird and winner of 1st Sec 6th Open MNFC Picauville
and has a great future in front of him being a half brother to "Denson".
"40" the Blue Cock is only a yearling but to date has won 1st club 3rd
Fed Mangotsfield, 1st club Swainswick, 3rd club Yeovil, 1st club 1st
fed Swainswick. 1st club 2nd fed Yeovil. 4th Sec 111th Open W.Region
Le ferte Bernard. All good pigeons to show you and after seeing and
discussing John's winners we are going to take a few more for a future
article and show you more of the winners that John has in the loft.
Also included are a few photos of the lofts both inside and out. John
does like to keep the pigeons content and to help achieve that goal
he does let the race team single rear a youngster after the season is
over and then they are parted for the winter months. During this time
they are hopper fed on Versele-Laga winter mix, a point that many should
follow because the pigeons need to be looked after all the year round.
As
a long time writer I have seen many lofts fall after a good season because
they have put the pigeons on cheap corn over the winter months. This
is good advice for the younger members of the sport that they should
adhere to. Feeding is such an important part of a race team and it is
a known fact that fanciers move on to cheap corn for the winter months
and in fact feed a cheap home grown bean straight from the farm and
they have not even been dried. These same fanciers then wonder why they
are behind the following season. It's the same with fanciers who do
not treat their birds for the usual ailments prior to the start of the
season, they can have the odd good season but it soon catches up with
the pigeons and brings them down. No matter what the competition health
is of paramount importance and without it you win nothing and health
and fitness do not come naturally. All fanciers will give some good
advice somewhere in a report and some will be honest and as in this
case admit to not having a clue.
The
subject is eye sign and John does not have a clue and said, "If it was
the only means of selection why do fanciers who practice it keep so
many pigeons". As a fancier who does believe that there is something
there I can well understand John because if you do not follow this in
a family then as in John's case you would have no idea. But there is
more to the subject than many fanciers realise and this has been proven.
The point that John makes about numbers kept is also a good point but
it does not apply to all who do follow the system. There are some good
lofts around who keep less than the average numbers following eye sign
theories but there are far more lofts about who do not follow the system
and keep even more pigeons and still do not win. Admiration in the sport
for John falls with his own club members and I for one can well understand
that and why. As many Cheshire fanciers will know, about 25yrs ago Sandbach
was one of the best clubs in the County but over the years has fallen
drastically in membership. However those who are still there are there
to keep on racing in all types of competition right through to National
level and they succeed because they are committed to winning at the
highest level. John Woodward is another fancier who has taken John's
eye over the last couple of years and then there's the ever consistent
George Litherland for his excellent performances with the Nationals.
As always when we go to visit this top class winning loft there is plenty
to see and with John's commitment to the sport there is always plenty
to talk about.
Click
here for further information on John Allbutt
