KEITH MOTT

A TRIBUTE TO MERVYN PATT OF BIDEFORD.

I received a sad phone call today from Jill Fisher, telling that her father Mervyn Patt had passed away at the age of 86 on the 30th July. What smashing man Mervyn was! I have known him for many years, in fact he has visited my home in Claygate and he was always the first one there to help any one out. In the later years, I had a nice catch up with Mervyn at the annual ‘Duchy’ show in Cornwall, when Terry Haley and I went down to judge. Mervyn loved his pigeons and was a first-class fancier at both codes, showing and racing. Our sincere condolences from Betty and myself to the Jill and the Patt family.

I have known Jill’s father, Mervyn Patt, for well over 30 years and when I asked her about his past, she said, ‘Mervyn was brought up with pigeons in the family and his very first birds were a couple that his father gave him when he was just a toddler! Mervyn and his father kept pigeons for a few years until the War and moving to a new house meant that they had to give them up for a while but just a few years. Later Mervyn was back into pigeons, starting again firstly with a few Tipplers and other breeds, before he started to develop a small racing team. Mervyn remembered that at the time corn was rationed to just 7lbs a week and having to supplement the birds' food with a little rice. Being a businessman in the making, a young Mervyn was over the moon when his Granddad suggested that he had could sell one of his Tipplers for a princely sum of £3, after he had only paid one shilling and six pence for it! Timing in the birds was a challenge in those early racing days as the only clock was owned by a neighbour and so a sprint down the road to the clock was also required on race days. As a 14-year-old Mervyn started to race in his own right as a Junior and had a particularly good start, winning five out of the six races available to juniors. Mervyn's good mate Peter Kendall won the 6th of the juniors' races that season. After a stint in the Army doing his national service, my dad continued with the racing, although he laughed that his father did manage to lose a lot of his pigeons while he was away in the Army.

Even though his dog chased her cat and he was truly in the ‘doghouse’ for that, Mervyn married Margaret, the girl across the road, in 1955. Mervyn continued to race his birds until they moved to a new house in 1964. At the new house, the position meant that racing was never easy and, although he continued for a while, involving all the family, my dad steered himself more into the Showing side of things and developed a good team of Show Racers. One particular breeding season during the mid-1960's was a very fraught one for my dad when his little girl, Jill, decided that it would be good to try and help feed the show racers by herself and then, while the birds were off their nests eating, she took all the tiny (un-rung!) youngsters plus any un-hatched eggs for a nice little trip around the garden in the empty corn bucket.  Jill could never quite understand why her dad did not seem that pleased when he came home & discovered what had happened!! My dad encouraged all four of his children, Jill, Jeanette, Michael and Denise into pigeons; each were given their own “pet” pigeon which they could enjoy taking along to the shows and entering in the Children’s class. Not all four children were totally “pigeon wise” in those early days ?when something happened to a young Michael’s red chequer cock “Steve”, it was quietly replaced by a dark chequer hen.  When Michael questioned his dad as to why his ‘Steve’ looked different, he was told that it had moulted of course and had changed colour. Dads are always to be believed, so it was quite a few years before Michael realised that something very strange had happened during that particular moulting season! Extra pocket money was also to be earned by the children in helping to clean out the lofts.   Dad was always ready with an up-turned bucket for them to stand on if the traps or perches were too high to reach with the scrape!

The 1970's were a decade when Mervyn was showing in earnest with a young Jill doing her best to follow in his footsteps. Margaret was often heard to say that they could never go anywhere without a pigeon being on the end of it! The 1970's also saw the start of the ‘Ven Lofts’ Racing Stud, with the purchase of Van Hee Busschaerts and later the Stichelbauts and Kirkpatrick lines too. Mervyn's successful racing stud was behind some very well know birds, including his good friend, the late Freddie Elliott’s 1st open NFC Nantes winner, Champion ‘Euro Lad’. ‘Ven Lofts’ bred Fred Elliott’s 1st SMT Combine Rennes winner, ‘Euro Bird’ and in turn he was the sire of Champion ‘Euro Lad’. The 1980s / 1990's had seen my dad concentrate on the Racing Stud, but when I developed the showing bug again in 2000, and me and hubby Dave decided to give it a go. My dad was not far behind in getting back into showing and leading the way. Even though he was in his eighties, he still enjoyed the showing side of things, especially when he could enjoy a piece of cake or bowl of trifle (or both!) at the show and then had a red card & rosette to go home with’. Mervyn Patt RIP.

KEITH MOTT (JULY 2019)