“ON THE ROAD” WITH KEITH MOTT.

Looking back at London & South East Classic Club winners (Part 6.)

Joe & Helen Deville of Camberley.

It always pleases me to see one the sports worker enjoy so good success with his pigeons and I was highly delighted to see Joe Deville win the last L&SECC young bird race from Vire. Joe visited my home in Claygate two weeks after his Classic win to have his champion hen photographed and told me he had had a golden young bird season, which finished up with him recording his fourth L&SECC winner. Joe said on his visit, ‘the young birds were pretty average for the first three weeks of the season, not winning very much apart from a few club prize, but on the fourth Saturday they hit brilliant form winning the last five races and on the last three weekends won 1^st Berkshire Federation Exeter, 1^st, 2^nd, 5^th Berkshire Federation Kingsdown, 1^st, 2^nd Berkshire Federation Wincanton and 1^st open L&SECC Young Bird Vire (2). On the last Saturday we won the Berkshire Federation and the L&SECC on the same day’. A fantastic three weeks for the Camberley loft!

The final race of the 2012 season for the London and South East Classic Club took place from Vire, in northern France and the birds were liberated at 08.30hrs into a light variable wind. A good steady race was expected and judging by the majority of the fanciers spoken too most had excellent returns. It was to be another game of chess, with anticipated easterly winds in France forecasted and before we had even put a pigeon in the basket we all thought it was going to be a hard job. Although the Saturday was predicted to be a good day, the worry was the east wind at the liberation site, but on the day everything turned out good and the membership enjoyed one of the best races of the season. A great end to the 2012 young bird Classic season, with our members enjoying a great race with good returns! Joe had a brilliant race by sending ten birds and clocked nine! His Young Bird Classic winner was his blue hen, ‘Dame Kelly Holmes’,  sent sitting 12 day old eggs and was bred from his family of ‘TOWIE’ / Huybregts obtained from his brother, John Deville of Essex. This game little hen won a couple of prizes in the Saturday club and being sent to the first L&SECC Vire race in August, she made hard work of it, but this set her up for her Classic win in September. Her sire won the Federation this year and the dam won 2^nd open Combine from Poitiers. Joe was so impressed with John’s family of ‘TOWIE’ pigeons he obtained some to try in 2011 and they have hit in to his own family of Jan Huybregts straight away. They are winning out of turn from their introduction and have topped the Federation, with one hen recorded 2^nd Combine for Joe, with it being beaten by a loft mate.

Joe normally breeds himself 40 young birds to race each season and these are all put on the ‘darkness’ system. When I asked Joe about his young bird system, he said, ‘it is pretty basic, with the youngster being on the light for office hours, 9am to 5pm and are started on the ‘dark’ at the end of March and come off the system the second week in June. They are exercised around the loft for three weeks after coming off the ‘dark’ so they can adjust to the normal day light and then they start training at ten miles. I give them lots of tosses, working down the line to 25 miles and they are kept at that point until the first race, which is with the Federation. The babies race the programme and I still give them a mid-week training toss during the racing season. I like them to pair up, although I don’t purposely pair them up, as I think this is a bit of an incentive for the young racers, especially on the longer races at the back end of the season. I feed the youngster on ‘Arrow’ mixture, which is a fat diet, which I think is important if the birds are putting work in on the road and I don’t like to see youngsters broken down. When they come home from the race they eat as much as they want and from Tuesday until marking night I hand feed the youngsters. As I have already stated my young bird system is basic, but for good results with youngsters they must go on the ‘dark’ system’.

Joe’s racing loft is a self built 16ft x 8ft structure, with drop board trapping for his ETS clocking and during the breeding season he uses Tesco’s finest cat litter on the floors to keep then dry. The old birds are raced on the roundabout system, being mated up in late January and the hens kept on poles and are housed in a different loft. At the beginning of the year the racers rear a pair of youngsters and the hens are taken away, with the cocks being left to finish the rearing in the race loft. Joe uses the roundabout system while training the old birds and he tells me he likes the middle distance channel racing best. Joe has about sixteen pairs of stock birds and these are paired up just before Christmas. The stock birds are all bred from direct Jan Huybregts and some were bred by Alan Ingleton of ‘Oak Villa’ Lofts, who was one of the first fanciers to bring the Huybregts into the UK. Joe says, he and brother, John have obtained the very best of the Jan Huybregts and they have produced some wonderful results. When I asked Joe what he looked for when bringing in a new stock bird he replied, ‘first of all it has to be a good Jan Huybregts bloodline, but having said that it has to conform to what like. I like a real good handling pigeon and it has to have the right type of eye. I don’t do the eye sign method, but it must have the rich eye I require. I don’t buy to pedigree; I buy to the type I like. I have seen well bred Huybregts in the past that are not my type, so I would not entertain them, but if they are what is right in my mind, they will be introduced in to my stock loft’.

He first had pigeons when he was a young lad and first member of the Deville family to introduce them into the Hillingdon garden was his brother, ‘Dodger’. The brother flew north road with some great fanciers in the Heathrow Airport area and he introduced the young Joe to the late great Ken Hine of West Drayton. Joe started racing on his own at the age of eighteen, when he got his own place in West Drayton and the first birds were from Tom, Dick and Harry. Joe’s brother was a very good racer on the north road and won the Federation out of Thurso two years on the trot. Joe told me that Ken Hine was the top fancier in the area then and although in recent times he is famous for his great performances on the long distance in the Pau Grand National, in those days he raced north road and competed from 80 miles through to 600 miles. Joe says, Ken was a great man and pigeon fancier! He was Joe’s mentor and gave him so much help in the early days. Joe’s first club was the Yiewsley HS and won his first race from Leicester, with a Derek Smith of Great Ayton young bird. Joe was one of the first members of the London & South East Classic Club and won the Classic’s first two races from Sartilly and Nantes in 1987. He tells me his first his first two Classic winners were both ‘Tom, Dick and Harry’ strain! Joe was very successful for many years with different families in his loft but says he would never go back to that way and for many years has only kept one successful family of pigeons.

Joe lived in Sandhurst for several years and at that time raced in the Central Southern Classic Flying Club and came close to winning it on a couple of occasions and won 1^st open BBC Young Bird Rennes in the 1998 season. On moving out of Sandhurst in 2004 he had to pack up the pigeons for a brief time and his good friends, Dick Trussler and Peter Sabba looked after his stock birds for him so he could restart when he got relocated. Joe mover into his Camberley address in 2007 and started racing with young birds that year. He is a four times winner of the L&SECC and last won in 2007, when he recorded 1^st open young bird Guernsey (1715 birds) with one of his Huybregts. The Deville loft has won 1^st Combine three times in the last four seasons, including 1^st and 2^nd Combine Poitiers in 2012. A fantastic racing record! He is a great worker for our sport, running the L&SECC Sunningdale clock station and is the secretary of his local club at Sunningdale. Joe runs a clock station for the NFC and BBC and was the secretary of the Berkshire Federation for a number of years.

Joe has a big problem with Sparrowhawks where he lives and has had many pigeons killed by them. He has tried everything to try and keep them out of the garden and has found nothing works, apart from exercising the birds around the loft at different times of the day. He maintain that if you let the birds out at say 10.00hrs regular every day the hawk will get dialled in and turn up to attack at that time every day. He has found if he lets the birds out of the loft for exercise at different times each day the attacks have reduced considerably. Joe’s wife, Helen, is interested in the pigeons and tells me jokingly, she is the person who answers the telephone when he is in the pigeon loft most of the day! Joe has a great admiration for the late Ken Hine and says it a shame they’re not more fanciers like him, as he was a wonderful worker and pigeon racer.

Packer & Clarke of Grays.

The London & South East Classic Club held its second race from Tours at the back end of May and 1^st North East Section, 2^nd open were Packer and Clarke of Grays. Derick and Brian’s first bird on the ETS was a yearling M. & D. Evans / Gaby Vandenabeele bred from their Champion ‘Shadow’ Bloodlines. She was raced on the roundabout system and this method of racing has consistently brought success to the loft over the years, including 1^st section 8^th Open in the recent BICC race, again with a Gaby Vandenabeele pigeon. If the Packer & Clarke loft had won the open from the  Tours Classic, it would have of been their fourth L&SECC winner, which at that time would have of been a classic club record! Derick said after the race, ‘the Gaby Vandenabeele pigeons are very new in the Packer & Clarke loft but are already showing great promise’. Derick and Brian had enjoyed a good old bird season racing in the L&SECC and BICC, winning several premier positions including 29^th open L&SECC Alencon, 2^nd open L&SECC Tours, 10^th open L&SECC Tarbes and 23^rd open (provisional) L&SECC Bergerac. Fantastic pigeon racing in the very best competition!

The 2009 Alencon race attracted over 2,500 birds, which were liberated at 09.35hrs in a strong south west wind and most of the early pigeons were recorded on the east side of the country. Derick Packer and Brian Clarke recorded their third L&SECC winner from Alencon and to see Derick Packer at the top of the classic result sheet again was brilliant, as he was one of the really hard workers in our club, being I/C and clock setter at the South Ockendon marking station. This station was our second biggest, sometimes processing over 500 birds and he had run it since it started up. Derick had been on the classic committee for many years and had a hell of a journey from Essex to Leatherhead to attend meetings in the winter months. Derick and Brian’s latest classic winner was their good four year old blue chequer hen, ‘Michaela’, and she was bred from the Jan Aarden and Gerry Clements / Busschaert bloodlines. This game round about hen was no stranger to winning, previously recording 2007: 4^th open L&SECC Alencon, 2008: 32^nd open L&SECC Bergerac and then in 2009 1^st open L&SECC Alencon. ‘Michaela’, named after Brian’s daughter, had only had about six races in her life and in the 2007 Alencon classic, the first race of her life, she came with her nest mate, which was clocked first to win 2^nd open and she won 4^th open. Derick visited my home in Claygate to get ‘Michaela’ photographed and he told me that he and Brian Clarke are half-brothers, having the same mother, which is a fact never knew and I have known these two Essex lads a lot of years. The brothers liked to race their birds long and short distance and had two day pigeons from the 2008 L&SECC Tarbes (just under 600 miles) race, to record 12^th and 26^th open with two Demeyere pigeons. Derick and Brian’s other two wins in the L&SECC were with young birds, recording in 1995: 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd open Guernsey (1,381 birds) and 1996: 1^st open Sartilly (1,218 birds). The pigeons raced in the mid 1990’s were Gerry Clements / Busschaerts and the day they took the first three in the L&SECC from Guernsey they also won the first eleven positions in the local open race. Brian says when it’s your day, it’s your day and when the birds are on form there is no stopping them!

Derick races the pigeons at his home in Grays and the loft 50ft x 8ft, with five sections, tiles roof and all clocking is on ETS. The very big breeding set up is in Brian’s two acre garden at his home, 35 miles away, in Braintree and these premises has loose dogs running around 24 hours a day. Brian has two big stock lofts with massive aviaries, which are so big the inmates have to be caught in the dark at night and he tells me the 30 pairs of stock birds really keep well because they can fly around in the fresh air in the flights. The partners maintain the aviaries are the most important fact in keeping stock birds in good health and their flights at Braintree are so big it is almost as good as flying the inmates out. Derick told me, because Brian dose all the breeding he doesn’t have to worry about pairing up to early and the main families kept are Jan Aarden, Marcel Demeyere and the Gerry Clements / Busschaerts. Packer & Clarke made several trips to the continent for pigeon visits with their friends, Ian Crammond and John Tyerman, and they purchased the last of the Marcel Demeyers pigeons and shared them with Ian Crammond. Derick Packer has been a great friend of Gerry Clements of Manchester for over 30 years and says he is the best pigeon fancier he has ever met! He says he is a terrific man and a terrific fancier, winning classics in the morning and winning combines in the afternoon with his fantastic Busschaert pigeons. Derick said their children used to play together all those years ago and when he first knew Gerry his lofts were on an allotment and he was so dedicated, he used to take water for the pigeons in buckets. Brian said, the partners have spent a small fortune on stock birds through the years, but always purchase direct children of champions and are not interested in off spring to far removed.

The 30 pairs of race birds are paired up on 1^st March and rear a youngster for one week before being split, so as not to take too much out of them. The partners don’t fly in a Saturday Federation club, so the racers get training tosses off the south coast and exercise around the loft really well, with the racing hens sometimes running off for over two hours at a time. Derick lives in a bungalow and the birds never land on the roof, so he has total control over them, and they fly really well twice a day. On their round about system they race the cocks and hens in the same race, never having problems with trapping, and they never break down, feeding a first class widowhood mixture. Packer & Clarke like the long distance races and tell me their ambition is to win the NFC Tarbes National.

Years ago the partners concentrated a lot of effort on young birds racing, but these days don’t take it serious and consider it to be racing for the boys. The 70 young birds get lots of good training down to Portsmouth (70 miles) and then go straight into the Classic or National races, with no Saturday Federation build up racing. Derick says he isn’t really bothered if his young birds are raced in their first year, as long as they are trained well and many of his best pigeons have come on this way, including ‘Michaela’ who had her first race from Alencon as a two year old.

Derick has been in the sport for over 60 years, starting at the age of 17 when he first met his wife, Rita. She was a pigeon fancier when he met her, flying in partnership with her father, Ed Meads, and in those days Derick had a motorbike and started training his birds, while courting young Rita. Eventually Derick got a car and they all used to go out training the pigeons together and Ed liked a drink, so the training took all day because the training session turned into a pub crawl, as he wanted to stop at every pub they pasted. They became good friends and eventually raced together as Meads & Packer on the North Road for a few years and Derick won his first race in 1958. Brian started racing when he was 14 years old and the Packer & Clarke partnership was formed in 1991. Derick has lived at his present address 38 years, with his father in-law, Ed Meads, looking it over from the pigeon racing angel before moving in and in those early days he liked sprint racing, and took the first ten positions in the local club races many times.

Derick says he would like to see more young people come in the sport of racing pigeons and says he thinks the ETS is great and defiantly the way forward. He is not too keen on the anti-ETS brigade as it is progress but maintains everyone will be using it in a few years’ time. Derick told me over the years he has looked up to his friend, Gerry Clements, and he has told him lots little twists in pigeon management which have won races. One of the nicest people he has met in his years in the sport is Ian Crammond of Fontwell and says he has spent many happy hours looking at premier pigeon lofts in Holland and Belgium with him over the years.

Gordon & Delia Marsh of Southwater.

Gordon Marsh was a great worker for the London & South East Classic Club for many years and won many premier racing positions over the years, including 1^st open (twice). Gordon and I served on the London & South East Classic Club committee together for many years and we were both vice President and President of that great club. He maintains that too many people join committees just to pursue their own agenda and leave when they are unable to do so. Members empower you to manage! It is for each of us to ensure we make decisions that will move the club forward, whilst keeping it on a sound financial footing. I second that!

Gordon had the good fortune to take early retirement from work and use to races as Marsh & son, but his sons don't take part in the running of the pigeon loft, they prefer football and computers. His wife, Delia, is now his pigeon partner and is known by many fanciers, as she started the C.H.A.S.E. Charity Show, which was run every winter at Horsham. Gordon says, she is an excellent stock woman, having spent her life with horses and can pick out a fit pigeon in the basket, and tell him which one will be the first to the loft. Delia is very much a dog lover and Gordon told me, ‘Delia and her rescue dogs participate in a big way in dog agility. Qualifying for finals with the Kennel Club and U.K. Agility takes them all over the country. ‘Megan’ has won many first prizes and reached championship status, and both dogs have qualified for U.K. Agility finals several years running. It’s amazing how much pleasure you can get from dogs thrown out by irresponsible people’. In the time that they have been married, they have had pigeons and she has built lofts, cleaned out lofts, trained pigeons, and taken care of them when Gordon has gone away, clocked winners, chased cats and looked good on presentation nights. Gordon says, could I ask for more?

Gordon Marsh was born in South Wales, but only lived there for a year and has now spent most of his life, living in West Sussex. He from a racing pigeon family, his grandfather had pigeons, as did his father and both his brothers. Gordon says, he was born into pigeons and as far back as he can remember, he was always in the pigeon loft with his dad. The loft was up on 6ft poles, with double door trapping and it had a cabin, with easy chairs and paraffin stove to make tea on. He spent hour up in his dads loft and it was in 1965 that Gordon got his own place and started up his own loft of pigeons. His first stock came from his father’s loft in the form of a complete round of youngsters and he recalls that Jed Jackson gave him a really nice pied hen, which was surplus to his requirements. Gordon's first major success was with a young blue cock, which recorded 2^nd club, 3^rd Federation and was well up in the S.M.T. Combine result from Avranches. When I asked Gordon, who was the first fancier who drew his attention to their performances in the early days? He quickly replied, without question my boyhood hero was Jed Jackson of Worthing. He would wait outside Worthing station just to see Jed get off the bus, with his dog in one hand and his basket of birds in the other. Gordon told me, that even 50 years ago Jed was a hard man to beat and of course went on to win the Pau Grand National. Gordon's first pigeons were mainly Logan's, Barkers and Kirkpatrick crosses, as raced by his father and his father before him, and they won at all distances. He joined one of the best clubs on the south coast, the Worthing & Dist. H.S. and his loft was set up for the natural system, with just two sections. He wintered ten pairs of old birds and bred only 12 youngsters, which had to race the programme. Gordon maintains, he was a well-trained pigeon fancier long before he was ever let loose on his own but has made many mistakes since and hopefully learnt from them. His two biggest mistakes were undoubtedly, in the 1970s, making winning his one aim, forgetting that he loved to be around pigeons and being impatient.

Gordon’s present loft set up is three sections for racing and a small section for stock birds. The loft is a traditional wooden structure, with a pan tile roof and has stall and open door trapping. He maintains, the most important factor in any loft design is good ventilation and getting rid of the warm, stale air is a must. The pan tile roof provides an excellent way to ventilate pigeon lofts. Gordon uses deep litter in his loft because it suits his management and he has never had any problem with it. He says it comes cheap; he just pinches Delia’s horse bedding! The old birds are flown on a basic roundabout system. Years ago some of his best results were won on the roundabout system up to 300 miles and then re-pair for the long distance events, but he never re-pairs these days. Racing his birds on this method has been very successful for the Marsh loft, having won 1^st Open London & South East Classic Club (twice) and 1^st Kent & Sussex Palamos BBC on this system. He feeds a basic mixture with peanuts, linseed and Hormoform added to suit the requirements of the season and the condition he wants to get them in. Gordon says, feeding is an art, but you need to watch your birds at exercise, as they will tell you when you have got it wrong. He never breaks his pigeons down.  Most of his yearlings go to Tours (300 miles), with some going on to Bergerac (450 miles) and all the old birds go to the longest race points. Years ago when on natural he tried to discover how individual birds do best at the longest races and set them up that way, but the norm going to marking sitting 10 to 14 day old eggs.

He likes all pigeon races and enjoys winning at any distance, but in recent years has only really raced club racing in the Horsham RPC. He told me, one of his best pigeons ever was a dark chequer cock, bred down from the old Marsh pigeons in the 1970s and he flew Thurso seven times (twice on the day), winning on three occasions, also winning 2^nd and 3^rd  on two other occasions. His first London & South East Classic Club winner was also from the old Marsh stock and she was a yearling chequer pied hen sent feeding her first ever youngster. Over the years you own many good pigeons, but some you never forget. Gordon says, he has had many thrilling experiences with his birds, but one of the best must be seeing his pigeon on the loft at just after six, on the day of liberation from Thurso and half an hour later seeing his hen arrive, to take 1^st and 2^nd club, only two birds on the day. Winning 1^st open London & South East Classic Club twice ranks highly in his most thrilling experiences category.

I recently had an email from my ol’ mate Gordon Marsh, up-dating me on his recent racing success and I must say looking at the photo he sent, it was great to see him looking in such great form. The partners won ten firsts, eight at the Horsham Flying Club and two at the Worthing 5 bird club in the 2017 racing season and won: ‘Ace Fancier’, ‘Ace Pigeon’ and ‘Old Bird Average’. Gordon and Delia Marsh have been good friends of mine for a number of years and I wound describe them as two of our premier good workers in our sport, but they have also been very successful racing their pigeons for many years. They race in one of the strongest clubs in the south of England, the Horsham RPC and are very proud of the fact that have been top prize winners in the club in the 2016/15/14/13 racing seasons. A wonderful achievement! The club has some big birdages, up 500 birds some weeks and only the member’s first two birds on the clock count in the prize list. Prior to the 2017 racing season Gordon and Delia lifted 25 club trophies and two South Coast Federation trophies those four seasons. The partners told me they intended to take a step back from club racing in 2017 to concentrate on building a team of birds to compete in the longer races, but cur come to temptation and raced on their usual weekly basis. They say the Horsham club has a fantastic membership and will continue to support them as much as possible.

Gordon and Delia race on the ‘roundabout’ system and their small team of old bird racers are paired up in early January, and they are allowed to rear one youngster per pair. The first round in the race loft is quite often eggs transferred from the stock birds. Ten days after the second round of eggs are laid the birds are separated, with the cocks remaining in the breeding section with the nest boxes closed and nest pans turned over. The females go into a section with a gilled floor and ‘v’ perches. Gordon tells me, ‘the roundabout system is very simple, but very affective for the cocks and the hens in races at any distance. My hens go out, then the cocks go along the corridor to the hen compartment and then the empty nest box section is cleaned out and food is put in the pots for the hens. After an hour or so the hens are called in to the breeding section and fed. The cocks are then let out for an hour of exercise and the hens go back to the ‘v’ perch section. All the birds are exercised twice a day and fed in the nest box section. I only train if I think they need it and both cocks and hens race most weeks, and on marking night the hens are allowed to go in with the cocks for a few minutes. On their return from the race I let the pairs stay together for about an hour or may be a little longer on the long distance events. I never repair the birds in the racing season. Prior to pairing up the stock and race birds are vaccinated and treated for worms, canker and salmonella and the young bird get the same prior to the start of their training and racing. My young birds are raced on the ‘darkness’ system’ and get about 30 training tosses before racing the full young bird programme’.

There you have it, three great workers for our sport and three premier pigeon racers! I can be contacted with any pigeon ‘banter’ on telephone number: 01372 463480 or email me on: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT (www.keithmott.com)