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MATT RAKES

of Paulton

talking to Les J. Parkinson

 

After the season had finished we were looking for places to go for a short break and obviously one where we could get a bit of info for articles. Little did I know that when we visited Matt Rakes how much info would come our way? There is not a great deal of point in me going on with the intro and when you have read the article you will know why, so sit back and see what you can pick up from these well answered questions.

Q. Please introduce yourself and tell us how you got started in the sport.

A. I live in a small village called Paulton, just south of Bath & Bristol, in north Somerset. All my life I have had a passion for birds and cannot remember having a day without them. Initially I kept, bred and exhibited British birds and canaries but following the lead of my father I migrated into the pigeon world. In my final race in partnership with my father I was fortunate to win the 1st prize Central Southern Classic from Bergerac, 464 miles with a widowhood hen. Being relatively young in the sport I am not steeped in the 'traditional ways' of doing things and I have some radical views on our racing and suffer real frustration at the way the sport refuses to move with the times. In 1993 I got my own lofts in Paulton I was very fortunate to get hold of some super birds from Steven Van Breemen and they have been just unbelievable. I have at times dominated club, Open, Federation, Combine, Classic and National racing with old and young birds, cocks and hens on the sprint, middle or long distance events.

Q. Give the readers the basic results that you have achieved.

A. 1st, 2nd, 4th, 6th & 12th Section Central Southern Classic Guernsey. 1st, 2nd, 4th, 6th & 17th Open Central Southern Classic Guernsey. 1st Section, 1st Open Central Southern Classic Bergerac. 1st Section, 3rd Open Central Southern Classic Bergerac. 1st & 2nd Section, 11th & 13th Open Central Southern Classic Guernsey. 1st Section Central Southern Classic Guernsey 1,249 birds. 1st Section, 7th Open Nantes National. 1st Section, 33rd Open National Flying Club Sennon Cove. 2nd Section, 3rd Open National Flying Club Saintes. 2nd Section, 4th Open National Flying Club Saintes. 2nd Section, 4th Open Central Southern Classic Bergerac. 3rd Section National Flying Club Nantes. 3rd Section, 5th Open Central Southern Classic Bergerac. 3rd Section, 6th Open National Flying Club Saintes. 3rd Section, 8th Open National Flying Club Saintes. 4th Section, 7th Open National Flying Club Saintes. 4th Section, 42nd Open National Flying Club Nantes. 5th Section, 43rd Open National Flying Club Nantes. 5th Section, 27th Open Central Southern Classic Pau. 5th, 6th, 9th, 10th & 11th BICC La Ferte Bernard National. 6th Section, 7th Open National Flying Club Saintes. 6th Section National Flying Club Nantes. 8th Section, 8th Open Central Southern Classic Guernsey. 10 th Section, 21st Open Bordeaux National. 10th & 14th Perpignan National. Royal Pigeon Racing Association regional awards Best Young bird and 2nd Best Young bird - 5,000 lofts in my region. My Guernsey Classic team of 1995 also won me a new motor car !! 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 4th West of England Combine Plymouth 5,567 birds (11 birds arrive together!! )

1st, 2nd & 4th West of England Combine Lyndhurst 5,476 birds. 1st, 2nd, 4th Federation Exeter 1,551 birds. 2nd & 6th West of England Combine Newton Abbot 5,600 birds. 2nd & 6th West of England Combine Fareham 7,600 birds. 2nd, 7th & 8th Federation Nantes. 2nd & 3rd Federation West Bay. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th Yeovil & DHS Picauville Open Race.

Q. Amongst those results what are the real highlights.

A. - There are so many results there that are special. My 1st Open CSCFC Bergerac in 1990 when I was aged 18 was so very special as it was my first attempt on 'the big stage', but then again the CSCFC Guernsey YB Classic of 1995 was an unbelievable team performance. The following year my entire team of young birds were stolen, I bred a few later youngsters and still managed to win the section from the YB Classic, so that was special. In the last few years I have been solely focused on racing with the National Flying Club and my record from NFC Saintes is something I am particularly proud of having been 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, 7th & 8th Open in the last 4 attempts.

Q. What organisations do you race with?

A.- At club level I am quite fortunate really to have the option to race with either the West of England South Road Combine through the Farrington Gurney Flying Club or with the Gloucester Federation through Paulton Homing Society. These races are used primarily as training races to get the old birds into condition before the serious channel racing starts and also to educate the youngsters. Neither organisation have what I would term to be a 'good' program for racing youngsters but between the two organisations I can normally work the youngsters for a few weeks in order to attain some sort of racing experience. For the old birds I am very focused on racing with the National Flying Club and the Central Southern Classic FC as this is the highest level of competition around and I feel that I am competing with some of England's and Europe's best fanciers every time I basket my pigeons.

Q. Do you hold any official position and if so do you take an active part, if no what are your reasons.

A. No I don't hold any positions. I am very frustrated by the way organisations are so set against change and seem to have a blatant disregard for the wishes of the members and it seems to me that the majority of decisions have already been made before the meetings. It seems that wherever you go in the sport people want what is best for them and if only they opened their eyes and could see what is happening to the sport as a whole then maybe we could change things for the betterment of the sport. The biggest enemies of the sport are within and if things don't change then I really do fear for the sport. When you have like this year committee members of the NFC campaigning for people not to support the clubs participation in the Dax International race then I wonder how much worse it can get. The reason they didn't want Dax to happen? Because it didn't suit them and their lofts! I wonder how many of them will ever actually accept that more people voted to race from Dax in preference to any other distance race? Well I am very sorry but on a committee you are there to carry out the wishes of the membership not dictate to us what you would like to happen, that is why I am quite concerned at some of the moves afoot to stop the NFC membership voting for a race program and just allow the committee to dictate what we get every year, like it or lump it. Thankfully not enough people were poisoned against the Dax race and those that competed wrote a new chapter in the history of pigeon racing, yet if certain selfish individuals had got their way then the unprecedented success would still be a dream and not the reality it is.

Q. Do you ever think about competing for averages, if not why.

A. Not for one minute. I race each race and assess what to do next. In one month I may send to a race each weekend and every weekend in a different club, at other times I may not race for a month. With my focus on the NFC middle distance events nothing else matters to me. Every race can be different and depending on weather conditions, liberations/holdovers I will look at the birds and work them accordingly. I aim to have my loft at peak performance for the NFC events from Nantes and Saintes every year and how I get my birds to these races will vary each year and once the races have gone I will assess the team and see what (if anything) I think is possible for the remainder of the year. I have other things in my life and pigeons are just a part of it. In 2001 and we had the 'foot and mouth' restrictions in place I prepared my birds for the NFC race, won the section on the Saturday and was in Majorca on holiday on the Monday having achieved what I set out to win. The lofts were shut up while I had my week away then came back and started to work with the youngsters, in the first race I was 2nd & 6 th Combine, the second race I was 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 4th Combine. For me its about having a balance in life and if pigeons were the be-all and end-all that it is with others I wouldn't enjoy it half as much as I do, therefore in a way a feel sorry for those who have nothing else in their life but pigeons.

Q. How do you race your pigeons and how many.

A. All my old birds race the widowhood system. I think that pigeon for pigeon you get more from a widower in a season than you can from a natural. I am going through a bit of a transitional stage in pigeons at the moment but normally I would start the season with 16-18 widowhood cocks and on the odd occasion maybe 6 widowhood hens, however this year I didn't race any hens and my cocks performed better than ever from the first race to the last and I had time to really enjoy the season. Maybe this was because I had a bit more time to race the cocks not having to exercise any hens, maybe it was due to less urgency around the loft, I honestly don't know but I will give it some thought in the longer evenings and try to assess if it is really worth me going back to racing hens. I love racing them and race them well but it all takes time and if it detracts from the cocks capabilities then it is pointless.

Normally I breed around 35 youngsters for myself. I have found that I can get anywhere between 6 and 8 races on them and finish with enough quality young cocks to supplement my widowhood team. I have tried racing youngsters on the 'sliding door' system, but I do have concerns over the amount of stress we put on what are baby pigeons and so now race then natural. I don't encourage pairing but if they do then fine. Since 1994 I have used my own version of the darkening system for youngsters but now don't bother. I don't think darkening youngsters make too much of a difference until you get towards the end of August and that's normally when I stop racing so I don't think the work involved is worthwhile. The best two things for racing pigeons are sunlight and fresh air; they are both free so why not make the most of them???

Q. What are your lofts made of and how big are they.

A. I am very lucky to have some lovely lofts. I have an 18 x 6 breeding loft with aviary attached. I purchased this loft in Belgium and it is made from external plywood and has a tiled roof, sliding ceiling panels and is lined internally with plywood sheeting. Then I have a 20 x 6 widowhood loft that is made of tongue and groove boards, again with a tiled roof. This loft is split into 2 identical 9 foot sections with a 2 foot central partition. I have very little ventilation in this loft as up until now I have never had more than 18 cocks in this loft and I think that sufficient air is refreshed in this loft by way of the tiled roof warming up and drawing the air up through the tiles and allowing colder air to enter through the soffit area and drop into the well of the loft. Finally I have the loft I made myself last winter. It is 32 x 6 and made up of 4 sections. Two sections are 8 foot long and are for youngsters, the other two sections are 8 foot and 5 foot wide. The last two sections have been set-up to allow me to race hens again should I chose to do so. In the middle of the loft is a 3-foot central area I use as a bit of a store. The roof on this loft is made of clear sheeting as I said before the sun gives us warmth and light and is the basis of most everything in life. With the aid of some sliding sheets in the ceiling panels I can completely control the entire environment inside the loft. In this loft I have a mechanical ventilation system that is basically two large extractor fans (one on either side of the loft) that with the use of some 300mm-diameter ducting will control the airflow throughout the loft. Both fans operate on infinitely variable controllers and at maximum performance will exchange the air in the entire loft every 20 seconds. I think I need here to mention that it is not about air, its about oxygen and the warmer the day is the less oxygen there is in the air, so what I try to do is to keep the oxygen level constant and during the summer this requires more air than in winter. Now I have had this loft for nearly a year I am so very impressed with the health and development of the youngsters I have kept in it.

Q. Do you attach any importance to having a tiled roof on a loft, if so do you consider that are there any benefits.

A. Like I have just mentioned I have two lofts with tiled roofs, and I think for a limited amount of ventilation they are great, but I believe my mechanical ventilation is better. I have the ultimate control of the flow of what is so important in recovery after exercising and racing, the oxygen.

Q. How many stock birds do you keep and do you breed off your race team also how many pigeons do you think that you need to breed off any individual stock pair each year to see if they are quality producers.

A. During this transitional period I am in I have increased the amount of breeders I have from what was always around 10-12 pairs to now around double that amount. The breeding of pigeons fascinates me and I get just as much excitement and enjoyment (if not more) from breeding as I do from racing. Sometimes I breed from my race team, but I don't keep any, for me I have quality breeders so they breed my youngsters however my racers have bred some quality birds for other lofts. The number of birds you breed from each pair is always relative to the risks you take. It is getting to the point around here where every time you exercise the birds you take a risk with the hawks. Traditionally when I bred early youngsters they would be inexperienced flyers in the early spring and made easy prey for the hawks. I suffered numerous attacks on the birds and so lost quite a few from the loft before they could fly properly. If you are going to take these risks then you need to make sure you have enough birds to be able to get them to the first race to try to prove them. The same risks are associated with training hard during the season. My best breeders have shown their abilities from their first descendants and if they don't breed well inside the first two nests then pairing are changed, but that is a regular thing with all my breeders anyway. What I have is a family of pigeons, therefore even though I have some great breeding pairs I need to have half brothers, half sisters to carry on the genes of certain pigeons. If you have a great breeding pair how and never try them with other partners how do you know if what you actually have is a super cock with only a good hen or vice versa? And perhaps you have in the loft a mate that they have never been paired to that could result in a super pairing? I try to limit the risks and maximise the breeding potential in my loft, but we have to accept that at times pairings just 'click'. It is easy to look back with hindsight and see a good pairing but the art is in matching them. Like I say breeding fascinates me and fortunately for me being a friend of Steven Van Breemen I have one of the best mentors around on this topic. Top results come from quality breeding, if you breed a good pigeon you can race a good pigeon, but just because you can race doesn't mean you can breed! Just look at the lofts who every 5-10 years dump an entire family of birds and buy another one, maybe there are other reasons too but like they say racing is silver, breeding is the gold.

Q. When do you pair your pigeons and why then.

A. Depending on the date of the first race, I normally pair my racers at the end of January. This has traditionally fitted in with the timing to take the second round of eggs from my breeders who have normally been paired in the first week of December. However from now on I have no intention of pairing them before March. I read a very good article this year on the effect of the temperature when youngsters are reared and a lot of it made sense to me. What was said was that basically youngsters reared in warmer temperatures have the ability to cope with higher temperatures on race days. Ok we will all freely admit that better youngsters are bred during the warmer, longer days of spring and summer but on doing some research through my own records I can see that the majority of my best performances in extreme heat (which appears to be becoming more frequent these days) are won by pigeons from my third round of breeders. It is possible to say that as I have not kept many youngsters before now then I only breed a third round from the very, very best pairings then maybe it could just be the quality of the birds pedigree that counts but I think there is a little more to it than that. On this matter only time will tell if I am on the right track.

Q. Do you move the hens with the young birds?

A. I tried it once, the year we had 'foot and mouth' restrictions and I paired up a bit later. I was lagging behind a bit and thought it worth doing to try to catch up a few days. Results were OK but no better or worse than normal, but the dreaded widowhood 'dip' came early. I don't know if this was due to the cocks not quite completing the natural breeding cycle or due to pairing up at a different time but when I have a choice I do prefer though to leave everything to natures way whenever possible. I think that with the stress involved and the work expected of a widower they need to remember what they are racing for and every week they race home with the expectation to pair and build a nest. For this reason I like them to stay a long time with their partners before racing. Also I would say that maybe I did something wrong but I don't think the youngsters finished rearing quite so well just by the hens and so would not recommend it.

Q. Young bird sickness is a problem; have you had this in your loft and if so what have you treated them with.

A. I have never had young bird sickness. I have had times whereby I my birds have picked up some bug or other in the basket and have had a little crop retention but that's about it. My birds do appear to have a strong natural immunity and I do everything I can to preserve it. I am a great fan of the GEM range of products and use them routinely. When I have any problem with the digestive system of a bird the first thing I do is to put Gemthepax on the corn and Strike in the water then feed a lighter easier to digest mixture, that normally gets things going again. I cannot help but feel that problems such as the adeno virus and the like have only arisen from years of abusing birds immune systems with antibiotics and other drugs, this is not something I do and like I said before, I care a great deal for the natural immunity of my family.

Q. Do you race your young birds, if so how many races, if not why, do you think they are better off in the longer events if they are only raced lightly.

A. In ten years of racing on my own, I would say that only one year have I tried to 'race' my youngsters. I would prefer to say that in the year of their birth I 'educate' next year's yearlings. Normally I will send to 3 or 4 races but not to race, just to make sure they get home without being hurt. My birds have a normal feed on a Friday morning and then a half feed in the evening an hour before basketing. I don't look at it as feeding I prefer to look at it as putting fuel in the tank. The race may only be 60 miles but I want to be sure that if the bird makes a mistake he doesn't get hurt by it. If you look at formula one racing, when they are all obsessed about winning they put just enough fuel in the tank to win the race, but if the cars had to do another 10 laps how many would make the chequered flag?? Is this why people say pigeons don't work in on a Sunday like they used to? Hardly surprising if the birds receive very little food after Thursday! In 2001 I thought we had a very good program for youngsters and so thought that I would have a good go at racing them. I think I only sent to 5 or 6 races and was highest prizewinner in the Farrington Gurney club that year. From the first race, which was around 70 miles where I was 2nd & 6th Combine 5,600, birds. Then the following week I sent 30(ish) birds to just under 100 miles and had 11 arrive together, I timed 4 and won 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 4th Club by 8 minutes, 1st, 2nd, 3rd &4th Combine 5,500 birds by nearly 3 minutes. I just believe in making sure youngsters have a good all round education without taking too much out of themselves and getting hurt, sometimes 3 races may be enough, other years they may require more. I do think that if they have a difficult season as youngsters it does have a knock on affect as yearlings whether it be sprinters or distance birds.

Q. What criteria do you set down for the pigeons you winter with your thoughts on the following seasons racing and breeding?

A. Starting with the youngsters, all I look for is for well developed birds that have had a good education and learnt from it. I have no problems with a youngster that has made a mistake as long as I can see they have learnt from it. If a youngster makes what I would term regular mistakes or is noticeable as being one of the tail-enders most weeks they are selected out immediately. Regularly during the season if I see a youngster that for some reason is below the condition of the team, doesn't recover quickly from racing or has anything about it I don't like it is selected out. After the end of the young bird racing season they then receive a final grading but only when the moult is completed. I try not to pay to much attention to young bird results as most of our racing is quite short and I don't wish to select my birds on sprinting ability, this would be a big mistake. I think with youngsters you can easily notice the motivated birds but not quite so freely identify the unmotivated ones so I think it a little unfair to judge them to a certain rule such as performance in the year of their birth. In the widowhood loft I am very severe with my birds. As yearlings I believe I can really start to judge the birds racing qualities. I know that every bird I race is treated the same, well motivated and so has little or no excuse not to perform. A bird that doesn't perform as a yearling with no apparent reason for failing will be selected out. I would say that only half of the yearlings I finish the season with would be in the loft the following year. I don't set down specific benchmarks to measure the birds against but I do want to see a bird perform well and show real promise. For anything two years old and above the expectations are very high, they have to perform consistently or make room to give a yearling cock a chance. For this reason I don't race any birds after they are three years old. Very simply if they survive all my selections in the race loft until that point they have to be super quality and have excellent results so they can quite easily go into the breeding loft. One thing I do pay attention to when considering my widowhood team is the wind direction on the days the birds have performed. I believe that only a small percentage of birds really race hard when the wind is east and for me to collect top national and classic open prizes I need birds that will get their head down and work in a east wind so pigeons who perform on these days are invaluable but not only in the race team, these birds tend to reproduce their like when bred from. With the breeders I find it very difficult. I have a plan that I try to stick to and already I am planning what birds I would like to have in my loft at the end of next year. I look at what birds I may retire from the race team and if I haven't got the exact hen I wish to pair them with then I will try to breed them the year before the race cock retires. Quite simply breeders are there to breed and as I said earlier in this article I like to change pairings during the year, so once a breeder has been in my loft for 12 months to settle, they have 2 breeding seasons to breed me youngsters that make the widowhood loft, then the third year I look again at the parentage of those that have survived the selections at the end of a yearling stage. If inside 3 years I have not one pigeon in the widowhood loft from them they will be selected out. I think that in 3 years they will have been paired to anything from 6 to 9 mates, most of which are proven breeders so they have had most every chance to breed well.

Q. Do you have any grills fitted in the floor or in the boxes, are there any advantages to using them. Q. Do you use any floor dressing or do you clean the pigeons out daily.

A. I used to have grills fitted in the nest boxes of my breeders, but although they kept the birds clean I never thought the birds looked truly comfortable on them so for that reason I changed my nest boxes. The scraper has to work a bit harder but I do think the birds are more content on wooden surfaces. All my loft surfaces are cleaned daily 51 weeks of the year, for the other week they have to 'rough it' while I am abroad on holiday. The only exception to this is in my young bird loft, here from the day they are weaned the birds are kept on a deep fresh bed of straw, perches though will still be cleaned daily. I change the area under the perches after a week, and then the following week completely changes the entire bed of straw. Youngsters in my loft really do enjoy lying in the straw and I am a big believer in trying to keep pigeons happy and content, as these are normally the winners.

Q. What do you think about the vaccination programme for the pigeons and do you think it affects the pigeon's long term.

A. I completely and utterly agree with and adhere to the vaccination program for PMV. I cannot say as I have noticed any adverse effects to the program and if there are any they are in no way shape or form anywhere near as bad as PMV. For what it costs I cannot understand why not everyone vaccinates their birds and it is these people that will ensure that everyone else will have to vaccinate for the foreseeable future. If everyone vaccinated their birds we could in no time at all wipe this virus out in this country, but as things are the virus still rears its ugly head now or then and maybe this will allow the virus to mutate and then we will have a PMV2, a variant of PMV that is resilient to the vaccines we have and what will we do then??

Q. Do you attach any importance to grits and minerals or can the pigeons get what they want they are out of the loft.

A. I think this to be very important indeed as grit and minerals play a very important part in the role of healthy birds. My birds receive a mixture of good quality grit, pic-stones and minerals everyday and I add a little Hormoform into the feed. What I do is to mix 2kg of grit to one pic-stone and 500g of minerals, mix them all up in a bucket and at then end of each day I place an amount in each of the feeding trays. On Saturday mornings I remove any of this mixture that is still in the trays and it gets thrown away or fed to the wild birds. I do it like this now as I found that birds didn't want to touch the grit after it had been in the loft for a few days when I used to change it weekly. I was told that this may be to do with the grit getting dusty and that some lofts keep the grit in a pot outside the loft and after it has rained the birds will go back and get some 'refreshed grit'.

Q. Do you like to have plenty of room for the pigeons?

A. Very much so, my widowhood loft is 20 foot long, has 32 boxes yet I have never put more than 20 cocks in the loft, I think this encourages them to stay calm and relaxed in the loft and if a widower doesn't rest they don't tend to race very well. The new loft I made last year was used for youngsters this year and the designated young bird area was 16 foot long and has 100 perches yet this year saw my biggest amount of youngsters and that was 73. These kind of examples are echoed throughout my entire set-up, as I put a big emphasis on trying to create a quiet, relaxed atmosphere and think that pigeons relish it. Most people who come to my lofts comment on the fact that I have remarkably less pigeons than my lofts would suggest.

Q. How do you feed the cocks and what do you feed them on, a branded mix or do you buy separate corns and mix your own.

A. I used to mix my own corn, but felt that the birds were lacking something; I couldn't put my finger on whether they were missing a specific corn or whether the balance wasn't quite right. Anyway what I do now is buy the best corn mixtures I can find and that's what my pigeons get, race birds, youngsters and breeders all get the very best I can find. A big factor in my family of birds is the amount of exercising they do around the loft so in order to build muscle at the start of the season I like to feed quite a high amount of protein and the last few years my widowers keep this food all season. If I can find quite a 'heavy' widowhood mix I use that but for the last few years have fed a mixture that is 50% Beyers Premium Breeding and 50% Beyers Turbo with a small amount of Harkers Hormoform added. I am very happy with this mixture as it gives the pigeons a varied diet, and everything they need to exercise freely and replace the energy expended during racing.

Q. Do you measure the amount that you give to each pigeon, or are they fed according to the individual pigeon.

A. My birds are never rationed; they have a feeding try in front of them most of the time and can choose what they want. People try this and find their birds put on weight but what you have to understand is that my birds receive this style of management from the day they are born and know that the food is always there and so do not overeat, they quite simply take what they need when they feel they need it. Again this promotes good exercising, a regular digestion and allows for a more relaxed regime in general. All I will say is that if you try this way of feeding you must allow the bird's time to get used to it and you will find that they will adjust. Just a note here that this works well with my youngsters and maybe the fact the aren't kept hungry means they don't 'gorge' themselves when fed and maybe this helps in not getting any significant amount of crop retention associated with young bird sickness?

Q. Easterly or Westerly do you set any stall by the position and if so why. Q. Is a favourable loft location the single biggest factor in sprint racing.

A. The wind will always dictate where the winners are, dependant on the distance of the race point the effect may be lessened but will always play a part. For me in club and combine I am in about as central a location as it gets, I see lofts on every side of me achieving good results when the wind suits them and portraying themselves as something special, yet on days when there is no wind they struggle to make the result, this seems to be the same wherever you go throughout Europe. In the Farrington Gurney club there is no radius, if you are in the combine radius you can join the club so some weeks I have competed in the club against lofts up to 10 miles north, south, east and west of me. I think we all know that there are a lot of great lofts putting up great performances week after week, but how many would tell you they are the furthest loft on the east side and have the birds blown through their door every week? I don't know about the biggest single factor, but the loft location is just as important as the pigeons maybe more important on the sprint races. I don't do much club racing but when I do send its mostly inland races, and these tend to be less than 60 miles and you cant afford to lose 10 seconds let alone even begin compete against those that live 10 miles away in the direction of the wind. For these and other reasons I am not interested in sprint racing. When racing is more about the pigeon than the location I become interested. I would completely agree that I need a favourable wind direction to win a classic but when it favours me it also favours about 1,000 other lofts and that's true racing.

Q. Do you consider there to be any advantage having a racing partnership.

A. In the last few years that I lived with my parents I raced for a few years in partnership with my father. I think the partnerships that work best are those where each person has a clear defined role, maybe one looks after the breeders and youngsters, the other looks after the racing old birds. I think you need to have one person who gives a clear direction, and everyone works in the same direction without hesitation. For me though I like to be very 'hands on' ensuring everything is done to the highest standard at the right time. I don't think I could race in a true partnership again but I do receive some assistance from my fiancé who is great with the birds and helps out whenever I need a hand.

Q. To term a phrase are you a professional pigeon fancier and do your circumstances make a big difference.

A. Not at all. I said earlier I keep a very healthy balance in life, pigeons are part of it but do not rule it. I work full time and pigeons have to fit around that. I work hard with my birds and do everything as well as I can. My fiancé is very understanding about the fact that I need to do things properly and that if I couldn't do things properly I wouldn't bother racing at all but it is all about balance. The reason I stopped racing hens a couple of years ago was that it meant another hour a day down the garden that now I choose to spend differently. During the season the alarm clock goes off well before five in the morning and quite a lot of the time I am up and turn it off before it goes off. This gives me a good couple of hours before I leave for work and this is when the majority of cleaning the lofts happens as well as the widowers first exercise period. Saturday is the day I spend most time with the birds, then Sunday is the day that I spend time with my fiancé and have a bit of a break myself. I get the impression these days that the sport doesn't want those who have to work for a living. If I want to send to a national or classic race I need to take a days holiday in order to do it and over a season that can easily be a week or two's holiday that I have to take just to basket pigeons. With racing happening during the week and on Sundays its no wonder that what was the 'average' working man with a family that was the backbone of the sport is no longer quite so abundant. These days there are so many demands on people's time, and so many choices of things to do that its no wonder a sport with so many demands and expectations is dwindling.

Q. Whenever I have visited a loft fanciers always look at the pigeon's eye. Do you consider that the eye has any importance in (a) the breeding, (b) distance races (c) sprint races. (d) The pigeon's health. Or do you steer clear of the subject and if so why.

A. The eye is the barometer of the pigeon; it indicates so many things from blood supply to general health. I think the size of the pupil can be linked to characteristics associated with spirit in the pigeon and I do like to see a pupil that reacts very quickly to changes in light. The richness of colour, texture and formulation of the iris can illustrate the pigeon's blood circulation qualities. Also I like to see a very wide outer health circle when looking for a pigeon in health and tremendous form. Like they say the eye is the window to the soul. In saying all of this I see the eye as part of the pigeon, no more, no less. I would never keep or discard a pigeon on the basis of its eye formulation. I think its main value is to assist us in assessing the health of the bird. If it really was the most important thing, as some people would lead you to think then these so called eye-sign experts would win everything and they don't. Most lofts have a common problem of overcrowding so if anyone comes to your loft and tells you to get rid of half your pigeons the remaining ones will obviously fly better.

Q. Do you use any preventative medication. If a pigeon goes ill do you try to put it right or does the bird have to go.

A The only preventative medication I use is for canker, and that's not very often. When the race birds are sitting their first round of eggs in the year they get a 6 day treatment if there is a lot of fighting during the pairing process, and that's normally it for the year. My breeders haven't been treated for canker for quite some time now and it doesn't trouble them. I haven't needed to worm a pigeon for over 10 years now and never treated for coccidiosis. In my old lofts I used to get a bit of respiratory problems but working on the ventilation means I don't have any problems now. Years ago I would try to save something if it became ill but now if I have a pigeon that doesn't look right in a loft full with pigeons who look well I will normally cull the bird after a period of separation to see if the bird can overcome the problem. Every week in the pigeon books we see adverts telling us to treat for this, that and the other when most of the time our pigeons have no need for it and then we wonder why we get things such as young bird sickness! I do everything I can to minimise any risks I take nowadays, like I will not send to an inland race if there is any chance of a holdover. I do not want my birds eating off the floor of baskets and drinking water with birds that may be carrying disease; I just don't see the point. The natural immunity of my pigeons is something I take great care of.

Q. How many weeks do you think a pigeon can maintain its form on the widowhood system for both cocks and hens?

A. From my experience yearling widowhood cocks and hens in complete health and well-motivated can attain form and hold it for anything up to 8 weeks, with older birds holding form a little longer. The biggest mistake with most fanciers is they see fitness and think they have form yet there is a massive difference. In 2003 my entire team hit a real super form, maybe a form they may never hit again, yet in 2001 I had a very fit team of birds but only a few hit any kind of form. All I can say is that if you have a very fine team of pigeons, at the peak of their fitness you think it cant get much better, but then when form arrives you see a huge difference. I am far from being an expert on natural racing but think it harder to get birds in form, and see natural racing to be more about motivation and then you can only get them to peak for a couple of weeks and that may be it for the season, hence the reason I only race widowhood.

Q. Does this include channel races or are the specified number of weeks for sprint races and do you think that a pigeon can be prepared at fortnightly intervals for the channel races.

A. I don't race sprint races week after week so cant really comment. All I can say is that my season starts with three or four sprint type races then my birds get raced fortnightly and that is what my whole system is based around. I find that racing fortnightly gives me 10 days to work with the birds between races and in this time the birds can recover and find their feet again then I have 6 or 7 days for them to really exercise well and bring themselves into condition. I prefer to start the season slowly and allow the birds to come into condition as warmer weather and longer days come along. I have found that a slow build up to the season is better and is a more reliable way of ensuring the birds hit form and will be ready for when I want them in June in July.

Q. Do you treat pigeons differently with their preparation if they are to go to the bigger races whether National, Classic, Specialist club or open. Q. Do you race your pigeons every week or do you prefer to condition them for a specific race.

A. For the early club races I don't even bother to motivate the cocks before basketing, I am not trying to top combine in April and early May, just trying to slowly bring the cocks into condition. This doesn't mean I haven't done it though. In 1999 we had some cold easterly winds in April and I so I didn't train once before racing. I sent to the first race and was 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 4th quite comfortably, then the following week came the first combine race and I won 1st, 2nd & 4th Combine 5,476 birds. The following week I only sent my 6 hens and was 2nd, 6 th & 11 th combine against a even higher birdage.

In essence what I try to do is to bring my team slowly into condition through late April and early May by racing them once every week, then when I feel they have had enough preparatory racing they switch to racing once every two weeks. The only racing that interests me is in June and July, and in truth most every race I send to then is an Open, Classic or National race where birds are basketed on a Thursday morning and it would not be possible for me to send these birds every week only having them in the loft for 4 whole days between races. I don't think there are any bigger races than the ones I send to during June and July. What I don't try to do is like a lot of fanciers in trying to 'wind 'em up' beyond belief. Quality pigeons that are in form don't need it, I think people do more harm than good when they try to fire the birds right up. Good quality healthy pigeons need motivation to return but when the birds are in the basket more than one night I think the quality of the pigeon is paramount. I use very little motivation for any racing especially over the channel as when these birds are in the basket 48 or 72 hours I want them resting not fighting all the time so as they then don't have the energy to race to their full potential.

Q. Do you think a pigeon has the capabilities of racing both short and long distance races? Also what distance can a pigeon actually still "RACE" as opposed to homing from any race point?

A. I think some pigeons can race on any distance and I think mine come into this category. I have won the shortest combine and fed races and some of the longest national and classic events with the same birds. This year one cock has been 3rd Fed at 41 miles, 3rd Picauville Open race 141 miles, 3rd NFC Saintes 393 miles and then 3rd CSCFC Bergerac at 466 miles. The cock he arrived with from Bergerac has won 2nd Fed (beaten by his nest mate) Exeter 65 miles, 1st Sect NFC Sennon Cove 150 miles, and 4th CSCFC Bergerac 466 miles. Its all about breeding them to do a job though, and that's what I do. I wouldn't go out an buy a sprint family to fly Pau, likewise if I was only going to sprint birds in a midweek club I wouldn't buy pigeons from Barcelona flyers. Anything where birds get home on the day of liberation is a race, as soon as they have to night out you bring to many other factors into things. If one pigeon lands at night on a busy factory chances are that something will frighten him up and he will be in the air at first light, yet if another pigeon lands on a barn or somewhere quiet then they may take a little later in resuming their flight next day, I cant see how this is perceived as fair racing. This years NFC events have highlighted my sentiments well. Dax International saw the birds liberated and the winner was home on the day from the 500 miles in a little over 12 hours, I don't see how anyone could argue the performance of the bird was breath taking. The from the Pau/Saintes race everything was made to night out and there is one bird that either flew through the night or got a helping hand somehow and all hell has broken loose. I understand an objection to the result due to the winner's performance was lodged and I can understand why. All I can say is that had the birds been liberated early morning and the winner's home on the day then none of this would have happened. A day race is a fair race; an overnight race is a bit more to chance. I think once you get over 650 miles its more about homing than racing. I have been fortunate to be 10 th & 14th BICC Perpignan and both times with the same pigeon. All I can say is that he was more of a homer than a racer and he excelled from Perpignan.

Q. What proportion of you pigeons get better on subsequent trips to the long distance races and what do you call distance.

A . Firstly I think anything over 350 miles of racing from across the English Channel is a form of distance racing. In our area return from Nantes with any of the organisation are normally good, but get past there and over the 350 mile barrier and average birds are found wanting. With my family of birds I have had some great results from near 400 miles with yearlings but then they tend to be very quiet as two-year-olds. For this reason my yearlings go as far as Nantes (283 miles) and I think that's enough. The two-year-olds do anything up to Bergerac (466 miles). On the odd occasion I have sent to Pau (558 miles) the birds have done well but I don't send them there until they are three years old, and to be honest its probably not the best birds I could send. What I have done is to send the birds that are having a 'drink in the last chance saloon' and got some great performances. I have won the clock station on the last three attempts but it isn't really something I set out to do at the start of the season. Maybe these cocks are suited to the longer races as they have plenty of experience being three years old, maybe it is because they have lost their turn of speed and so don't use quite so much energy too early in the race and therefore can expend their energy over a longer period of time?

Q. Which is the more difficult, establishing a team of sprinter's or distance pigeons and why.

A. It would have to be establishing distance pigeons. You have to wait at least 4/5 years to fully assess them. Say you bought a few birds for each discipline. Allowing them 12 months to settle then you breed youngsters and race them accordingly, now with the sprinters you should see some signs of performance, then as yearlings they prove if they are any good or not, yet with the distance birds they are possibly not even finished developing physically and may need to get to three years old before the can express their true potential. If a sprint pigeon isn't winning by the time he is 2 years old I think its safe to say he wont. Also with sprint birds you have more chance to test them, say maybe 20 races a year, yet with the distance birds you can prepare them for one race a year and then have a blow home, or smash race and you cant fairly evaluate them for at least another year.

Q. What happens when you are racing either widowhood or the roundabout when you have a bad race and lose a few from one sex, how do you continue with those pigeons who have lost their mate.

A. This never happens to me, I don't race more than one pigeon from each pairing, and I think any widowhood pigeon needs to return home to their specific mate. I have heard it all said about the racers being satisfied with any mate on return and as long as their actual mate appears relatively soon then all is fine but this never worked for me in the early days. If I race 20 cocks then their 20 hens stay at home, if I race 6 hens then their 6 cocks stay at home. If you have 20 pairs of widowers then why not pair what you consider to be your best hens to your worse cocks and vice versa. This was you can race your best 10 cocks and best 10 hens, hopefully this will be your best 20 pigeons, surely this can be better than racing your best 10 cocks and also your worst 10 cocks if you only race all the cocks. I think it fair to say that something from your best 10 hens has a better chance of improving your results than something from your worst 10 cocks has.

Q. Sprinter or distance, there is no difference; it is all in the feeding.

A. So people tell me, but I have won most every sprint event going yet don't feed for sprint racing. I do accept though that I appear to be the exception rather than the rule. I think if I took interest in the sprint events then I would feed lighter and there are some great sprint mixes on the market now. Smaller grains are less taxing to digest and higher in energy come on the market every year. I just see no challenge in sprint racing as the system you race is more important than the pigeons, however at 400 miles on a hot day its all about honest, spirited and intelligent pigeons not just pieces of paper.

Q. Taking into account distance, which is more difficult racing to your area, is it; a case of a 600ml race is a 600ml race regardless of competition or route.

A. At the moment it seems the most difficult racing in our area seems to be that of young bird racing. Combines and federations seem to think they can liberate where and when they like and if there is any clashing the other organisations birds will come off worst, how wrong they are. When I see good fanciers who time well from 400 miles struggling to get 25% of their young birds through the program surely something is wrong. For the sake of all our birds especially the young ones we need to impose some sort of guidelines on the releasing and welfare of birds, surely it is better for us to police ourselves rather than have an external body impose rules upon us? For where I live I do see a difference between racing distance on the north and south routes. From the north the birds start off in cooler conditions and fly over land, on the south birds have to fly in extreme heat and then after 400 miles they encounter the English Channel. I sometimes marvel at the courage of our birds every time they reach the French coast and decide to go out over the water, not being able to see the land on this side. What wonderful things these pigeons can be. For this reason I think the southerly route is a harder one to fly, but then you can also race in the internationals and that's when it gets really tough. Friends in Belgium tell me that the Barcelona race is that tough that it may well be outlawed due to the welfare of the birds in another 5-10 years. When birds have to break race into England, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg that is a real test of a pigeons abilities, confidence and motivation.

Q. What families of pigeons do you keep?

A. I keep one real family of birds, the Van Breemens. Steven Van Breemen is one of the best pigeon fanciers I have ever met. Steven has had these pigeons for 40 years and they can be traced back to the 'Oude Klaren of 1946' that belonged to Valere DeSmet Matthijs. Through his friendship with Prof Alfons Anker Steven learnt how to breed these pigeons into a family of his own that have an unbelievable ability to pass on their winning genes. Stevens's first aim was to preserve the quality of this old blood and this was done with a specific breeding program to concentrate the genes of the 'Oude Klaren'. A while later Steven was in the Janssen loft of Jan Van Erp and saw a magnificent Blue hen that possessed everything his own inbred pigeons did not, needless to say he purchased the hen and this was the foundation of his family. The first youngster from the Blue Hen when paired to the 'Oude Kapeon' was the '312', a winner of:

Q. How do you go about bringing in a new family and what do you look for.

A. , If I see someone who wins 20 first prizes a year my first thoughts are negative, it may be an outstanding loft location or that they don't have enough competition, but rest assured there will always be something behind it. Firstly for me I scan the Belgian, Dutch and German pigeon books in conjunction with those here in the UK and follow middle to long distance result's, the internet is also a very good source nowadays too. I look for people who live on the western side of the majority of their competition. This means that for them to win the wind needs to be east and I want birds that can race in those conditions. Hopefully this will not be too large a set-up with their own family of birds, bred for generations in their loft. I am not interested in fancy names but a strong team of breeders is a must, like I said earlier racing is silver, breeding is gold. It has taken me the last 4 years of searching to identify one such loft and I have paid a visit, and was impressed enough to order some birds to collect in the next couple of months. The prospect excites me and only time will tell if I am right. I really don't care on the nationality of the ring on their leg but the quality has to be there. Again let me refer to this years Dax International race, how many people that are obsessed with going across to Belgium and Holland will now look and see that we have just as good pigeons already in this country? I understand that a lot of the Belgians are looking to come over and buy English pigeons, read into that what you will.

Q. When you bring in that new family do you think that they need time to acclimatise, if so how long.

A. I like birds to completely moult out in my loft before I think of them as settled, if I buy birds in the autumn I prefer to let them have 12 months acclimatisation time. Saying this I will pair them in the first year, even if I only use them as feeders just so as they feel a bit more settled, then they moult out and I think of them as breeding potential. If I buy late breds they are treated like my own in that I do not pair them the following year. I think we need to maybe take a bit of a backward step from current mainstream thinking and allow pigeons to completely develop before we expect anything from them. Following on that last comment, I used to wait until my young birds were 12 weeks of age then get them in the basket and educate them whilst they were very young, I even took 6 th Combine against 5,600 birds with a young hen only 13 weeks old but I have come to think that this is not such a good thing to do. Nowadays I prefer to let them develop more and establish a good health system before even thinking of showing them the basket and I see some very encouraging signs from doing this.

Q. Do you think that fanciers change for the sake of changing or do you think a loft can breed a winning team out and lose track of the winners.

A. There can be no doubt that the majority of lofts change for the sake of it, they believe all that is written in the pigeon books by people more obsessed about making money than supplying quality pigeons. I have raced in my own right since 1993 and had the same family of birds ever since. Don't get me wrong I have tried some different birds and will always do so as I want to improve my family of pigeons as much as I can but I never forget just how good my own birds are. Certain pigeons come into 'vogue' and go again but most of their abilities centre around what is written on paper rather than what they actually do from races and as long as fanciers keep falling for it people will keep doing it. There are without doubt pigeons for sale in the UK that are more dependent on the gift of a writer than anything else. Anyone can go and buy quality pigeons these days as long as they have a cheque book and know what they are looking for, and getting one pigeon and crossing it with another of differing ancestry can be a quick way to produce racers, but what next? Can they breed them to produce winners? Can they get results over 3 or 4 generations? This is where it all starts to go wrong and out comes the chequebook again. This is why breeding techniques for pigeons fascinate me. One consideration when pairing my birds every year is that if that pairing produces a top quality bird then how should I breed with the resulting bird the following year. Every year I put a great deal of thought into preserving the quality of my family and through a few select pairings I try to breed future breeding stock. How many people can hold their hand up and say that they honestly put as much thought into breeding breeders as they do breeding their own racers?

Q. Early in the article we discussed the wind direction, do you consider that good pigeons will win in any position.

A. Good pigeons can race in any wind direction, only the great ones win in any wind direction. I do think any pigeon can win in a west wind, but the east wind is a very harsh selector of pigeons. I said earlier that for me to win I need to have a touch of east in the wind so being the national racer I am this is always at the forefront of my mind when selecting pigeons. I have wintered pigeons that relish an east wind that have maybe not been the greatest of performers and have parted company with pigeons that have won in a west wind but are found lacking in an east wind. If I were racing solely in my combine then this would not be so much of a consideration but on a national level this is something that I feel very sure about. For me there is no greater test than a 400 mile race on a hot day with an east wind, even a 70 mile race on a similar day can be tough and this is when character, spirit and ability are all tested to the full.

Q. Some fanciers go out and purchase good quality winning pigeons but never appear to make the grade, why do you consider that this happens.

A. There seems for some reason to be some kind of arrogance around some pigeon flyers. I get people who haven't won half what I do come to my lofts and tell me how I should be racing. If I go and buy the pigeons I also look at every detail of the loft, want to know about the feeding techniques and general management yet the average fancier takes the bird home, puts it in his loft and expects it to win not paying any consideration to the loft and management of the person who knows how to get the best from these birds, this amazes me. There are so many lofts that get their hands on good quality pigeons but refuse to learn from the birds and I don't understand why. If I go to a loft and buy pigeons and the guy tells me that he doesn't train between races then I wouldn't be disappointed if I trained the birds every weekday and they didn't perform when racing. Also I think we can be tempted to buy pigeons to easily and quickly from lofts we don't know that much about. I always do a great deal of research before I even think of buying. Another thing I look at is the fact that hardly any loft in the UK has been tested for performance enhancing drugs, for this reason I prefer to look abroad and buy from lofts that have tested negative, its one less thing to worry about.

Q. Do you give any special treatments when the pigeons return from the race as a precaution against anything that they may have picked up in the basket?

A. I never treat pigeons with medicines on a routine basis. I try these days to avoid holdovers at all costs as I honestly believe our transportation systems on the whole leave a lot to be desired, but if my birds spend more than one night in the basket I may use a probiotic such as Gemthepax / Entrodex or the like to try to aid the pigeon should they have picked up any nasty bugs in the basket. Also I use cider vinegar to help make the pigeons gut area less hospitable to unfriendly pathogens. The vinegar is acidic and shifts the balance of the gut in that direction so the pathogens that rely on an alkaline system for existence just don't get chance to establish themselves. I think that through stimulating the immune system and aiding it in its actions we can achieve so much more in the long term than we can by hitting it with every known synthetic drug on the market, that is very short sighted. I think through preservation of the pigeons natural defences we can keep pigeons racing for as long as we want but when the nasty bugs become resistant to the so called 'super drugs' so many rely on now then what will people do then? I think things such as young bird sickness will be very mild in relation to what will lay ahead. I would like to think I shall have my present family of pigeons for as long as I race pigeons and that's why I care for them and do whatever I think I need to in order to preserve their qualities and their immune system is very high on that list.

Q. In your view do you think that a loft needs different pigeons for different distances?

A. There are a few families of birds such as mine that can win well from the sprint events, through middle distance and into the distance events but they are not too common. The sport has evolved in the last 30 years through lofts specialising in certain events so the level of competition has increased. I like to think that my pigeons can, on their day compete with any loft in the country and from anything up to 500 miles in combine, classic and national races they have proven this to be true. In saying all of this if I wanted to be a consistent performer at the distance then I would need to look at introducing some new blood as my birds I think would lack the consistency they show under 500 miles if I sent them further.

Q. Which of the two sexes do you consider is the most important when it comes to breeding?

A. Quality is always the most important factor in breeding. Whatever the offspring I consider them to have a 50-50 mix of their parent's genes. I have heard it said about keeping big hens and shallow cocks for breeding but I don't see anything in this at all. The size of a pigeon cannot indicate its ability to pass on hereditary traits. I keep and relatively inbred family of birds and at times I can get large cocks, small hens and vice versa and yet they all have the same basic genetic make up. At this moment in time my two best breeding hens are probably the smallest and largest hens I have in the loft. They look different to each other; handle different to each other but the only ways they are similar is in their pedigree and their abilities to pass on winning genes. We need to concentrate on understanding individual pigeons and trying to establish the qualities that we cannot see rather than the ones that are easy to see and stare us in the face every time we walk into the loft.

Q. Is there anything that you have not won in the sport that you would like to achieve?

A. I have been most fortunate to win just about everything in the sport; club, federation, combine, Sections, opens, RPRA awards and a new car and if I was asked this question a few years ago I would have said that it would have to be winning 1st Open National Flying Club, about the only thing I haven't won, however I no longer think like this. I have been very close to doing this on a few occasions (3rd, 4th, 5th , 6 th , 7 th , 7th, 8th Open NFC) against thousands of birds and it has helped me to realise that as long as I am happy with my own birds performances then nothing else matters. This is a hobby that I do to escape the pressures and expectations in the rest of my life, sure it would be nice to win the national but that really doesn't matter to me anymore as what I want to do is to simply enjoy my pigeons and if I continue to demonstrate the consistency that I have done then all the better. Keeping pigeons is something I do for my pleasure and if I didn't enjoy keeping them then I would pack them in. This year for instance I sent to Bergerac with the Central Southern Classic and the birds were liberated in a predominantly west wind along with thousands of birds heading anything up to 200 miles east of me. I think from the near 4,000 birds liberated only a handful beat me (including those from London) and the performance of my birds to put up the tremendous velocity they did with the amount of west there was in the wind to be 1st & 2nd Section, 3rd & 4th Open CSCFC was to me as good as the bird that won the classic beating me by about 7 minutes racing to a loft 80 miles south east of me. In my own mind my birds were as good as any in the race that day and getting hung up on paper prizes is pointless.

Q. Who do you consider being the best fanciers in the Country and for what reasons.

A. There really are so many, where do you start? For me I like to see lofts that are consistently at the top in the big events. In my own area we have what I consider to be some of the finest lofts in the country. Brian Sheppard, Richard Green and Anna Crowley became household names with their international performances this year but these lofts have not just appeared from anywhere. They have been routinely winning sections and opens at Classic and National level for many years. Again for their sheer consistency lofts such as Ron Ball (Northchurch), Gary Inkley (Hillingdon) and Paul Kendall (Wantage) deserve mentioning along with the likes of Jim Gibbon from Sunderland. All of these lofts have one great thing in common, a desire to put there birds into the strongest competition available and win. What more can you do?

Q. Do you read many magazines/Articles, if so which type of article do you find interesting and why.

A. I don't take any books whatsoever. It seems to me 80% of any publication you pick up these days is concerned with people making money. I do at times scan some pigeon books in the hope of a good in-depth article but apart from that I don't bother. There does seem to be a culture of withholding information and promulgating a belief in 'tricks' and 'secrets' that win races and I don't like it when I see it. Pigeon racing is simple and anyone can win with the right birds for them.

Q. Are there any special treatments that you give your birds once the season ha finished what do you recommend the readers to do with the birds

A. When racing finishes all my birds receive two weeks of herbal tea, I think this helps to stimulate the moult and certainly helps in ensuring that the new feathers grow well and are of a good quality. I like to get the birds to bath as frequently as possible all year round. All my pigeons are offered a bath up to 5 times a week; plain water mostly but on occasion's maybe some bath salts. Apart from that my birds receive a probiotic twice a week, the same as they do all year round and that's about it. Simplicity itself.

Q. When it comes to breeding do you line-breed or use a first cross or just pair winners to winners.

A. I have one family of pigeons that has one dominant line through it and two almost sub-lines. What I do is to inbreed back on one line and then cross with the other. This is almost like rejuvenating blood with a related cross if there can be such a thing. I do on occasions cross and inbred bird with one from another family of birds and this usually gives good results and the resulting bird can then be absorbed into my family. If the cross shows no better performances than my own birds then all birds descending from the 'introduction' will be removed from the lofts. I only try to bring in fresh blood to improve my own family and if they don't do it then they go its as simple as that. I am very fortunate to have the help and advice of Van Breemen who is one of the most knowledgeable men on this subject and his advice is always available to me. Steven is not someone who says he can breed a family of pigeons, he is someone who has done it and the list of people who can found a colony and keep it alive over so many generations is very small indeed.

Q. Do you breed off the top widowhood cocks after the racing has finished, do you breed late bred youngsters and what do you think of those later bred youngsters.

A. I do like to breed from the race team at the end of the season, but only from the ones I feel will be there next year, it helps if nothing else to stimulate the moult and reward the cocks for their seasons effort. If I have any doubts as to whether a cock deserves to stay next year then he probably wont be there as if he was good enough I would be sure about his qualities, not in doubt. What I tend to do is to single rear from all the remaining cocks, and the very best ones have one egg floated away under another pair. When I say the very best, I mean the very best, nothing else, maybe only my best 2 cocks. The rest of the eggs required normally come from my best breeders. In essence the birds reared are from my very best birds. I think these birds are terrific, being reared in the warmest part of the year, by healthy birds they are perfect and not stressed in any way. I would like to keep some of these birds but I just don't have the time to do them justice as by the time they are old enough to fly my personal circumstances dictate that the birds would not have the opportunity to exercise properly and if I cant do things properly then I wont do them at all as it just isn't fair on the birds.

Q. If your race team went off form during the season what action would you take to restore their condition?

A. Most probably rest them and I don't know why but that's something people are so reluctant to do it. Maybe in order to get the birds back into condition people feel they need to be doing something, but rest is a great source of revitalisation. A pigeon's body can cope with most things in moderation and I see it time and time again when pigeons are rested and then produce the goods. How many people finish old bird racing, stop training, the birds rest and then condition themselves and the fanciers say they wish there were more races as their birds are in super condition now? I would in this rest period test some droppings and do some throat swabs in order to see if there was anything else causing the problem, but even then I would be reluctant to reach for medication during the season as this can knock the birds quite hard. If in doubt I consult a vet. After a period of rest I would consider exercising the birds for a week, then giving them a short toss of say maybe 20 miles and assess them further then.

Q. Do you use the darkness system for the young birds, if so for how long and do you think it affects them later in life.

A. I have used a variation of the darkening system since 1994 and it has to take credit for helping my young bird teams to win fed, combine and classic races, plus a car, but it only helps, it doesn't turn donkeys into racehorses. I think that for racing in July and early August it makes little difference whether the birds are darkened or left to nature's devices. Only when we head into mid August and beyond does it make a difference, as birds in the moult can't race like darkness pigeons can. Due to my own working pattern the traditional darkening system as most people know it could not be practised at my lofts. For this reason I just made the loft darker all the time and it seemed to do the trick. I never used to think it made any difference at all to the birds in later life and my results have to a degree proved this to be right with yearlings winning from all distances up to 400 miles at national level. However in saying this, this year saw me head into a new direction with young bird management, I no longer darken my youngsters. In 2002 I kept half my birds natural and throughout the year they looked healthier, more robust pigeons that developed quicker and definitely had a higher resistance to disease. With my own experience I believe darkening does suppress some of the natural defence systems of the pigeons, shown by the way certain lofts are already using drugs to assist/modify the immune system to counteract this and surely that isn't right? Also in a lot of lofts I have visited I believe the absence of sunlight in the spring has meant that the lofts are just that little bit damper and then the bugs get a foothold into pigeons that are not maybe quite as well equipped to handle the problem as they should be. I think the proportion of lofts that darken youngsters has contributed to the young bird sickness diseases we see every year, don't get me wrong I am not saying it's the reason for the disease but I think it is a contributory factor in the diseases existence. As I need to be away from home by 7 o'clock every morning when it gets to late August I don't have the time to exercise my birds, get them in and feed them as I would like to so I don't tend to bother racing them then, and so if I am not racing when the darkness system youngsters really come into their own why bother darkening? Especially when it means that I have what I believe to be a naturally healthier more robust pigeon as a result. In my own area we were given a terrible young bird racing program for 2003 and so I decided to fully revert to nature and let all my birds benefit from light and warmth as and when it was available in nature. After this years experience I cannot see me going back to darkening youngsters again. What I would like to see though is for the racing season for youngsters to start and finish earlier. I think that if we started racing youngsters towards the end of June it would benefit the birds tremendously and have advantages for fanciers such as myself who have to work for a living and are unable to exercise birds in the cold dark mornings of early Autumn. This would mean that birds could be educated and raced whilst in a more natural 'condition' without any need for controlling the moult (legally or illegally). However I don't think this will ever happen as there is a very high percentage of fanciers who do not stop to think about the welfare of our feathered friends and sadly the fanciers who no longer work don't even stop to consider those that do.

Q. Are there any feeding methods for the young birds i.e. do you break them down, do you keep them hungry for control purposes, do you give them a trapping seed mix.

A. My youngsters are kept on an 'open hole' loft all day from day one until I need to start training them. The amount is only rationed for the period when I need to get control of the birds prior to training. As with most animals its all about creating habits and my youngsters are no different. I feed them in the morning, let them drink and then out they go, they fly well (for up to 3-4 hours) and then land and sit on the loft or house roof all day. I do try to discourage them from the living house roof but when they are on open hole it is difficult to say the least. When I start to control the birds it doesn't take long to create the right habits of flying and trapping and then the food is increased again and training starts. For the first 3 months of my youngster's lives they get hopper fed as much food as they want, after all they are growing and exercising a lot every day. From the day they are weaned they are fed the mixture of commercial mixes the same as my widowers get and they stay on this food until the end of the young bird season. I like to keep everything simple and like I said earlier I would have to feed different if I was concentrating on trying to compete on the sprint events but it really doesn't interest me at all. The amount of racing we have for youngsters now that is under 100 miles has without doubt been a major factor in my decision to only send my youngsters as I when I think they need to go for their education. This year I saw the Bergerac old bird classic race in July, as being the end of my competitive season and it is a little disappointing to say the least.

Q. What percentage do you consider it takes to win with racing pigeons for Management and pigeons and why.

A. I think this depends on the racing you participate in. Good management is always a huge factor but not to the same degree on different types of racing. These are only rough ideas but I hope you will be able to see the point I am trying to make; For races where the birds are in the basket less than 24 hours the fancier is the most important, say 70% management 30% pigeon, but when you get to the long races I think this is completely reversed, 30% management and 70% pigeon. When it gets to the long races its all about endurance and character and the pigeon must be born with these qualities as they cannot be trained into the pigeon at a later date whereas I believe the sprint events to be dominated by motivation and that comes from the fancier. Sure distance pigeons need to be motivated but motivation is nothing without the physical qualities to enable the bird to get home. That's why this game is all about having the right pigeons for what you want to achieve.

Q. What is the farthest distance that you would train your old birds or young birds?

A. My old birds only get trained to about 15 miles a couple of times before racing and my youngsters will be trained up to 50 miles which is typically Weymouth/Portland and that's due south of my loft and as far as I can go without getting very wet. I said earlier about the trend in my area to have all short sprint racing for youngsters and so I see it as my responsibility to give my birds as much education as I can privately. My youngsters normally get trained at intervals of 5, 10, 20, 35, 50 miles and then after they have been to Portland I will take them back there and put them up in bunches of 3 or 4s, this works well for me. Even if I decide to race our youngsters on the westerly route I still train my birds due south as this is the line they need to return on if they are going to do well in the nationals or classics. In saying this I am not obsessed with showing the birds the way home, just teaching them how to navigate quickly. Even in 2001 when I decided to really try to race the youngsters I trained my youngsters due south as normal, then raced them on the westerly route, the first race they were 2nd & 6 th Combine, the week after 1st, 2nd, 3rd & 4th Combine, both time over 5,500 birds.

Q. If random drugs tests were carried out on your pigeons, would it reveal any substance, illegal or otherwise?

A. Nothing at all. I try to work on assisting the pigeon's defences and little else. The birds get treated for canker when I think they need to be and that's about it for synthetic medication. This subject is something I feel very strongly about. I honestly believe we have a huge problem in the sport and yet no one is prepared to get a grip on it. I think we need a body set-up, independent of the RPRA to deal with this issue. I see results every week that make me question their validity and I have also heard of lofts being tipped off about testing and so they either don't send the next week or don't bring their clock in and it stinks. I think the high cost of testing makes people less reluctant to see it imposed but I would welcome compulsory random testing for performance enhancing drugs. What we need to do is to fund an organisation responsible for testing lofts and publishing all results. I have heard all sorts of rumours, some about me that are completely unfounded and do a great deal of damage to reputations and performances of clean pigeons. I applaud the move to publicise the test results of the 1st & 2nd Dax International pigeons this year as it ensured nobody could make false accusations against these great pigeons. Lets get the cheats out the sport and out keep them out forever.

Q. How do you consider that the British sport is going compared to the continentals and do they have any ideas that you think would benefit the sport in the UK?

A. The continentals are way ahead of us when it comes to racing. I don't think the gap is as large as it used to be but there certainly is one. I would love to see the English national races being run along the same lines as they do in other countries across Europe. All it needs is for the participating organisations to meet at the race point and liberate together, something along the lines of the Centenary race but not quite such a 'balls up'. The idea behind the centenary race I thought was great, and the race saw nearly 70,000 birds from all across the country competing. There appeared to be too many outside influences to consider on that day and pigeons welfare seemed to be at bottom of the list. Fortunately I decided not to send to the race for the very reasons that appeared to be its downfall but lets learn from the experience and move on, the idea was great. The prospect of being able to send my birds in my local club, maybe paying a small additional amount to enter the bird in the national race would be terrific. There would be no need for sections, just race in your club, combine and national. Its so simple yet the centenary race seems to have spoilt the chance of this ever happening. After all who wants racing that's more simple and accessible to everyone????

Q. Is pigeon racing as a hobby going beyond the average working man. Is it becoming too technical and complicated or can you keep everything simple and still win with the pigeons.

A. I don't think it is becoming too technical, but it certainly is more competitive than ever. I think simplicity is the key in most things in life and don't see pigeons being too different. I do think the sport is moving away from the workingman and as I am now just into my 30's this does concern me, especially for the racing I enjoy. I don't send to anything like every classic and national event but I have already had to use a week's holiday allowance just to basket my birds for the specialist races. Basketing normally takes place during the morning and when you get there it takes a while to get your birds through so for my line of work I need to take a days holiday. I can see it getting to a point where I will not be able to compete in the classic and national events as other things in my life will have more of a demand on my holiday entitlement than pigeons. To me racing pigeons is about racing at the highest levels and when I can't do that then I don't think I will race at all. The sport seems to be against change at any cost and I think will eventually see the demise of the sport. At risk of upsetting people I would like to see ETS approved for use. I have it now and it helps me a great already, as I sometimes am not at home to see every bird back so it helps me to know when birds returned. I really do look forward to being able to stand outside my loft and see all my pigeons arrive, as this is one of the most pleasing aspects of the sport. I completely sympathise with peoples views but I don't see how people can complain about ETS timing a bird as it enters through a trap when with the common use of a stall traps, birds are not even inside the loft the loft when the clock is struck! I personally know of one fancier whose hands are so crippled with arthritis he has to use a hooked piece of wire to get the rubber off the pigeon then take the rubber of the wire to put it in a thimble and time the bird. Don't tell me that timing is fair now when he competes week in week out against club mates with stall traps.

Q. You are successful fanciers, there are far too many leaving the sport, to encourage fanciers to either join or stay in the sport what do you think about limiting prizes to two per race per loft, if not why. If yes Why.

A. Again I completely understand what you are saying and maybe it is a good idea to encourage this sort of pattern but I wouldn't want to be third in a club race if the guy who won the race had 10 pigeons before me. I used to exhibit canaries and British birds (and will do again someday) and there was a purely voluntary three-tier system. To compete in the junior category you had to be under 16 years old and not in partnership with anyone older. To compete in 'novice' you could be any age, but you had to win a certain number of first prizes to be eligible to move up into the top category or you could if you so wished wait until you had been in the category for a maximum of 3 years but you had the option to do either. If you won 6 firsts in the first show as a 'novice' you could then show the following week as a 'champion', the highest status. I think we could take something from this, but a lot of work needs to be done. In saying all this it would be purely optional, if someone starts in the sport the can start straight into the champion category racing against every bird in the race for prizes if they wish to do so. When advertising birds for sale though, the RPRA would have to insist that all birds performances advertised would have to stipulate the category in which the prizes were won. Each club could do one result as normal but then identify the winners in each category. I think this could help as a lot of fanciers are lost to the sport inside the first few years, maybe giving them a few years in junior or novice where they could compete on a more equal footing and win prizes which would keep them interested during the early years. Maybe clubs could hold keep a few old clocks for juniors to borrow each week to try to help them with the cost of starting in the sport? I know having a 'junior' category in canaries did a lot to keeping children in the sport, a small trophy and a rosette/prize card when you are young can mean a lot and keep you wanting to compete, what have we got to lose by trying??

Q. Do you think winning fanciers should move on from club racing once they have reached a certain level of consistency? Are club performances paramount for personal satisfaction or sales purposes?

A. I think with something like the introduction of a three-tier system like I mentioned above would help to reduce the impact of having a dominant fancier in the club. Its very hard for me to answer this though as club prizes really don't mean anything to me so I do find it difficult to understand why people place such an importance in club racing in this area. The trouble is that there are a lot of fanciers who have delusions of grandeur gaining self satisfaction from racing in a weak club and dominating every week then thinking they are the best thing since sliced bread. This is then a further issue when they advertise birds for sell with unbelievable results and without doubt this is a consideration of theirs when deciding to race in such a week club. The impact of this again is carried on when someone purchases birds from them and struggles to get them to perform as in all fairness they won originally in the vendors loft due to the weakness of the club the fancier raced in, not due to their pigeons racing abilities. I see this happening time and time again and it is sickening. This is why if I see an advert with someone winning something like 20 x 1sts a season I don't even bother reading any more of the advert as I know that 90% of the time it is most probably the result of racing in a weak club or having a loft position far superior to anyone else.

Q. Do you attach any real importance to the pigeon's wing i.e. back wing, end four flights and do you look at the wing to see if they have cast before a race, any other comments regarding the pigeon's wing.

A. One of the first things I look for in any pigeon is that the wing sits nice and tight against the pigeon, you can tell this by sliding a finger between the wing butt and the body. On one of many visits to a loft in Belgium my friend told me of this theory and I was a little sceptical to say the least, and thought it was something maybe particular to his pigeons but I when I got home and looked at mine I could really see something in it and have stuck with it ever since. After this I like to see a nice curvature of the end flights, and the last 3 or four flights of equal length that's about all I look for. I see sprint type pigeons with a short back wing and am told this makes a difference but as I am not interested in sprint racing the theory means nothing to me. Just as important to me though is the overall quality of the feathering, any pigeon in my loft, or potentially coming into my loft must have a very high level of feather quality.

Q. Do you use any form of heating system in any of your lofts. Do you think it would be advantages for the birds?

A. No I don't and I don't intend to. I like for my pigeons to come into a natural form as it lasts longer than artificially gained form. If I were interested in the early races then I would probably have one section with heating but would accept that by the end of May they would probably have peaked and wouldn't be of any use for the rest of the year. As it's only really towards the end of May that the races I am interested in come along then I don't see the point. I am told by people that do heat their lofts that they tend to get respiratory infections on a regular basis and need to treat with drugs as the air is constantly dry and this is enough to put me of using heating even if I were ever to consider it.

Q. Do the pigeons need any special treatment on their return from the race to help them relax? Is any such treatment needed for the short or long distance races or the hard races compared to the easy races?

A. The only thing I like to do is to try to give the birds a warm bath after the race. If the birds are back early in the day and it's a warm day then I will allow the birds to exercise Saturday evening and put down a for a warm bath for them, it just helps them relax. If it's later in the day that they return they I may well give them a quick dip in a bucket of warm water. When we get up to 300 miles, I do look at things a bit differently and if we were to have a really difficult race and the birds returned having given it their all then I only let them see their hens for a few seconds and remove the hens. I prefer to let the cocks recover for a while and will then replace the hens back in the loft later in the evening and leave them in there all night as the cocks reward. Its quite easy to see when a pigeon has given everything and letting him chase a hens around the loft doesn't do him to much good in my opinion. I think that if a pigeon is so tired he doesn't get the pleasure form the company of the hen then the widowhood motivation will be lacking in subsequent races.

Q. Irrespective of how your pigeons have flown, what are your views on the past season whether good or bad?

A. From my perspective I have mixed emotions on the year. My focus is on the NFC races and on some of the liberations has been farcical. If the same race controllers get the job for 2004 then I shall not entrust them with one pigeon. Dax International was a supreme event, proving that the best in the UK are some of the best in Europe. Although I didn't send to the race, I do race against these lofts at most every big event I send to so as long as I am competitive with them I know that I am not doing too much wrong. Dax has written a new chapter in the sport of pigeon racing and I hope to see the momentum gained continue and not spoiled by people selfish to their own ends. Young bird racing appears to have been as difficult as ever but in this area organisations have raced what they knew would be suicidal race points and then appear to be surprised when they get a stinker of a race, I just hope all this is remembered when the AGM's come and next years program sorted but fear it wont be.

Q. With your pigeon work do you have a silent partner i.e. wife, partner or friend, if so what part do they play.

A. I do have the help of my fiancé who will no doubt be my wife by the time this comes out. Nicola is interested in the pigeons and will help me with anything I ask for a hand with. If I ask her to let birds out or give me a hand wing stamping then she is always there as she is on race days to see the birds return. I think she has become addicted to pigeon racing as not only is she in the garden on the sunny days, but from NFC Nantes this year we waiting in thunder, lightening, hailstones and torrential rain there she was, waiting to see the birds back. I think her support has been a huge factor in helping me to have such a good season this year, and I cannot imagine how difficult things must be if you on not have the understanding of your domestic partner. I think compared with most any other hobby pigeon racing take a huge amount of time and is a 365 days a year commitment but at least it's a hobby that means you are at home and with your family and this is something I enjoy.

Q. Is there anything that you do not like about the sport, something that you feel needs changing for the good of the sport?

A. I think there are quite a few things I would like to see happen. I feel strongly that we need to get a hold on the welfare of our pigeons because if we don't then someone else will and I would rather we police ourselves with workable rules rather than have impossible one imposed upon us. The idea of transporting pigeons and holding them in the lorry until the hottest part of the day to race home is not a good practice to publicise. I would love to see guidelines for the welfare, transportation, care and release of pigeons in the UK. Now that foxhunting, pheasant shooting and fishing have been targeted then pigeon racing will the animal rights campaigners target the next sport and they don't mess about. I am already aware that transporters and fanciers alike have been followed and data gathered. We really do need to get this side of our house in order as if we don't we are doomed. I think the RPRA could play a role in insisting organisations follow specific routes, and co-ordinate liberation times in order to try to stop clashing. Pigeon welfare is not always someone else's problem though, we can all help in our own little ways, how many people take their birds training and don't bother allowing them to have a drink before releasing them? As a bit of a controversial point, I would like to see that the next manager of the RPRA should come from within the sport, someone who takes the job with a wealth of knowledge about pigeons and the problems we encounter. This is in no way any reflection upon Peter Bryant at all as he is doing an excellent job, but I do think that we need someone from within the sport that comes into the job with specific tailored knowledge of the sport.

Les. I am very pleased with the informative way that Matt has answered the questions and I feel that there is plenty of material to digest. Thanks to Matt and his family for their time on this visit and we look forward to another visit in the near future.