TERRY ROBINSON

of Goff's Oak

by Keith Mott

My good friend, Terry Haley, arranged a mini loft tour of Hertfordshire for me in August, with the view to doing some articles and I must say it was most enjoyable, with us visiting two of the very best fanciers in the area. I had a good run up the M25 Motorway and after picking Terry up at his home in Abbots Langley, we were so on the road to our first visit, the ultra-successful loft of Terry Robinson of Goff’s Oak. Terry has been in the sport nearly 50 years and has had big winner at all distances on both North and South roads.

Terry resides at Gary Ross Farm and has lived in Goff’s Oak for 16 years, and owns a very nice house set in several wonderful acres of land. He finished North Road and started South Road racing about six years ago when he introduced long distance stock from Brian Denney and Chris Gordon, but the main family raced is his original Busschaerts with different cross introduced through the years. He like all racing from 80 through to 600 miles, but gets his real buzz from long distance National and Classic races. Terry first phoned Brian Denney in 2003 with the view to obtaining some of his best 750 miles lines and purchased several direct from his champions, including Champion ‘Tuff Nut’. Terry’s good hen ‘Ruby’ was bred down from a daughter of ‘Tuff Nut’ and she won 2nd open BICC Perpignan National (630 miles), 5th open BICC Perpignan National and flew 600 miles six times.

The pigeon loft set up at the Gary Ross Farm is outstanding, which compliments the stables that house several horses owned by the Robinson family. Terry has several lofts, but two main racing lofts, with the old birds flying to a smart six section loft. The loft has slatted floors, electric nest boxes, a tiled roof with big air vents and the birds are trapped through open windows off landing boards. He thinks ETS is a good idea and has owned one for six years, but has never used it! The young birds are housed in a nice spacious 20ft loft with a tiles roof and they also trap through open windows. Terry races 40 cocks and hens on the widowhood and roundabout systems, and mixes his own feed which is widowhood mixture. He never breaks the racers down and as an extra gives the birds ‘Gerry Plus’, peanuts and sunflower hearts. The racers start at the shortest race and fly through the programme to 600 miles, with only the hens being repaired for the longest races. The race team are paired up on Terry’s return from the BHW Blackpool Show in January and he likes the yearling to rear a youngster or two, but the old birds are raced dry, and do not rear at the start of the year. Terry tells me that the birds exercise so well around home that some years he doesn’t train them before racing starts and he shows the hen on marking night, but most times it is just in and out. The long distance racers see the hen for an hour and on their return stay with their mates for several hours. Terry says in his opinion South Road racing is really West Road racing and to be fair the powers that be should centralise all race points on all organizations.

When I asked Terry how many stock birds he owns he said, ‘too many’. The best stock birds are kept in individual flights, so as to guarantee parentage of the youngsters, but the bulk of the stock birds are housed in big barns on the property. They are paired up the same time as the race team in January and some of their eggs are floated under yearling racers to establish them to their nest box. The breeders are fed the same corn as the race birds, but with extra maize and protein added. When bringing in a new stock bird he has a type, but the bottom line is performance and has no interest in strains, just good winning pigeons. Terry is a very keen eye sign man, but only in the stock loft and maintains you can’t pick out outstanding racers on the eye sign. Arthur Beardsmore and Alf Baker were both premier eye sign fancier and a bit of the method rubbed off on Terry and they maintained that any eye will win races, not any eye will breed winners. Terry has a son of Brian Denney’s Champion ‘Tuff Nut’ and his fantastic eye sign has been admired by ever one who has visited the loft at Goff’s Oak, and he is the sire of many outstanding winners. One of Terry’s premier breeding pairs in recent times is the blue chequer cock, ‘Robbo’ and the dark frill hen, ‘644’, and they bred many top racers including ‘Ruby’ and ‘Wine’. ‘Robbo’ had a brilliant racing career, including 4th open London NR Combine Stonehaven and ‘644’ had a sensational eye sign, the like of which I have never seen before. A perfect matched breeding pair! Terry breeds about 60 young birds to race and tells me 2013 is his last year he is going to put them on the darkness system, as he is convinced it is detrimental to them in later life. The youngster are given lots of training up to 30 miles and not being interested in young bird racing, Terry gives them several races for education, but likes the young hens to have one National event in their first year.

Terry was born in Euston in London and his uncle, Billy Robinson, was good pigeon racer many years ago. He got his first pigeons in 1969 at the age of 15 years old and when he got married he joined the Hyde PH pigeon club and started racing North Road with the Dordin pigeons. He had his own car tyre business and the late great Alf Baker used to go in to his shop, so he got to know the North Road ‘master’ very well. He obtained some top quality racing pigeons from Alf, but the main stock birds were from the late Gus Allen and Sid Jones, who at that time were two of the best fanciers in the area. He won his first race with a Sid Jones pigeon from Essendine (73 miles) and in 1979 Terry visited the loft of Arthur Beardsmore, and purchased a wonderful pair of Busschaert pigeons, whose bloodline still run through the Robinson loft today. Terry told me, that they were the best pair of pigeons ever! He maintained that Arthur only had a small team of pigeons, but they were fantastic. Terry has won it all through his years in the sport, but in the early days was the first fancier to win two Combine races on the trot on the North Road. In 1992 Terry won the ‘Tommy Long Cup’ and in those days, he told me, you had to beat 22,000 birds to win that wonderful North Road trophy. The winners were ‘Blue Hawk’ 1st open Combine Thurso (500 miles), ‘The Kestrel Cock’ 1st open Combine Stonehaven and ‘Sparrow Hawk’ 5th open Combine (10,000 birds). His best pigeon was the great champion ‘Motivator’ and this handsome blue chequer cock won the London NR Combine ‘Order of Merit Award’, and won a long list of premier positions including: 2nd open Combine Stonehaven, 4th open Combine Thurso (500 miles), 25th open Combine Berwick, 4th open Combine Thurso for a second time and was 1st open London Federation (twice). Terry says ‘Motivator’s’ best performance was when he was clocked after 16 hours on the wing from Thurso (500miles) in a south east wind, with only five birds clocked on the day and he recorded 4th open Combine. A fantastic pigeon!

Terry has had many racing and breeding champions in his time in the sport including: Champion ‘Motivator’: the champion ‘Merit Award’ winner and breeding cock: ‘Robbo’: winner of 1st Federation, 1st section, 4th open London NR Combine Stonehaven. The ‘ace’ breeding cock, being the sire of many top racers including, ‘Ruby’ and ‘Wine’: ‘Mr. Reliable’: winner of 1st club Whitley Bay, 1st section, 2nd open, 6th Amalgamation, 10th open London NR Combine Thurso (500 miles), 62nd open LNRC Thurso, 82nd open LNRC Thurso, 60th open LNRC Stonehaven: ‘Ruby’: winner of 1st section, 2nd open BICC Perpignan National, 630 miles (1st open hens), 14th section, 60th open L&SECC Tarbes, 5th section, 5th open BICC Perpignan National, 630 miles (2nd open hens), 5th section, 74th open L&SECC Tarbes, 1st section, 1st open Federation Eastbourne (963 birds): ‘Wine’: a fantastic racing hen and winner of 1st section, 53rd open (Hens) BICC Tours, 5th section, 165th open BICC Falaise, 4th section, 44th open BICC Falaise, 2nd section, 16th open BICC Hens National, 6th section, 19th open L&SECC Guernsey (Old Hens), 18th section E, 21st open NFC Old Hens National, 38th section E, 148th open NFC Tours (3,693 birds): ‘Misty’: winner of several premier positions in the NFC and Classic including 1st section, 23rd open L&SECC Tarbes, 53rd section E, 129th open NFC Bordeaux: ‘Rosie’: winner of 5th section, 42nd open London NR Combine Thurso (500 miles), 3rd section, 25th open London NR Combine Thurso. A fantastic loft of champion racing pigeons!

That’s it for this week! I hope my readers have enjoyed our feature on Terry Robinson, he is a very special fancier and it was a great day out at his home at Gary Ross Farm! The second loft visit of our mini tour, Peter Wells of Dunstable, to appear shortly. I can be contacted on telephone number: 01372 463480 or my new email address: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

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