Keith Mott

Writes about winning fanciers past and present

Emsworth & Havant Homing Society Open Show

I was invited to judge at the Emsworth & Havant open show held at the Emsworth Community Centre just after Christmas and I must say what a good day it turned out to be! It was a brilliant hall for staging this new event, with good light and plenty of space, and the eight classes on the day were quite well supported. My ol’ mate Terry Haley drove all the way from Watford to judge two classes and other judges on the day were Sasha Mott, Brian Goodwin and John Cudmore. I noticed several familiar fanciers walking around the show hall, including Clive Turner, Gordon Marsh, Tony Cowan and Peter Hookins, and had a chat with the local champion Brian Wall, who has been a member of the club for many years. Dave Cave and Kevin Bakes sponsored the four handling classes with £25 for each of the first prize winners and Brian Wall of ‘Gem Supplements’ sponsored the through the wires classes with bags of corn. A vote of thanks to these gentlemen!

Best in Show was won by a beautiful young blue hen owned by Maurice Collins of Southampton and she was a late bred youngster, and not raced in 2011. Her breeding is crossed with Tom Gilbertson, Dordin and Delbar bloodlines in her pedigree, but was out of one of Maurice’s best stock pairs, which have bred several good winners.

Maurice Collins lives at end of the main runway of Eastleigh Airport, near Southampton and has been in pigeon racing about 65 years. When he was a lad he worked in a timber yard and used to pick up the squeakers that fell out of the nests in the workshop shed roof trusses, and take them home for safety. One day a local fancier offered him some Vic Robinson pigeons and that kicked off his life long interest in pigeon racing and showing. His first loft was a self built 4ft x 8ft structure and started his racing career at the age of 17 racing north road in the Old Hants NR Club. He raced his birds through to Thurso in Scotland, but won his first race from Exminister in Devon, on the south road. He likes all racing, but really enjoys racing from France, with most of his best performance being from the middle distance National events. He has won many premier prizes through the years with the highlights being: 1965: 2nd open NFC Nantes, 1972: 3rd, 4th, 12th, 25th open NFC Nantes, 1974: 4th, 9th open NFC Nantes and in one season was runner up for the NFC ‘Langstone Gold Cup’. Maurice tells me his best pigeon was his old ‘Mealy Pau Hen’ and she won 9th open NFC Nantes, 30th, 49th, 74th, 350th open NFC Pau, lifting the NFC ‘Wilson Trophy’. This wonderful champion hen was the old John Taylor ‘News Lad’ family and died at 20 years of age. Maurice says, this great old pigeon was a once in a life time pigeon for racing, but in the stock loft never really bred too much any good, with her nest sister being a fantastic breeder.

Maurice in the present day has several lofts, with the main one being a 20ft double decker brick built structure and says he keeps well over 200 birds. His main family of racers are Staf Van Reet, bred mostly from a daughter of the legend himself, Champion ‘Toey’, and she was a fantastic Mardon breeding hen. He races 40 cocks on the conventional widowhood system and pairs up in January directly after the BHW Blackpool Show. Most of his racing cocks don’t rear youngsters and go on the system dry, with only the very best racers have the odd baby before racing. He feeds a general racing mixture, with the racing cocks getting ‘Diet’ mixture during racing and are broken down three days a week. Maurice likes to train his widowhood old birds a lot and they are given two 20 mile tosses during the week right through the racing season. He likes racing from Bergerac (450 miles) in his club and has won it several times including: 2010: 1st club, 8th Federation, 12th Combine Bergerac: 2011: 1st club Bergerac. The Collins’ 30 pairs of stock birds are housed in a 16ft square loft with aviary and these are paired the same time as the widowhood cocks in January each year. The breeders are hopper fed a general mixture and are scrapped out every day. Maurice doesn’t like channel racing with his 60 young birds, but races them inland through the full programme to 160 miles. His babies race natural to the perch and has never used the ‘darkness’ system. They are fed ‘Gem’ Young Bird mixture and are trained every day, weather permitting, to Highcliffe (30 miles) which is on the south coast near Christchurch.

Class winners at the Emsworth & Havant open show were: Old Cock (Handled): 1st M. Collins, 2nd A. Blake, 3rd K. Bakes, 4th P. Priddle, 5th M. Collins, 6th I. Lowden, 7th A. Blake, 8th T. Cowan: Old Hen (Handled): 1st K. Bakes, 2nd T. Leggatt, 3rd M. Collins, 4th W. Budd, 5th C. Turner, 6th M. Collins, 7th D. Cave, 8th C. Tuner: Young Cock (Handled): 1st I. Lowden, 2nd K. Bakes, 3rd I. Lowden, 4th D. Cave, 5th M. Collins, 6th D. Cave, 7th C. Turner, 8th C. Turner: Young Hen (Handled): 1st M. Collins, 2nd C. Turner, 3rd P. Priddle, 4th J. Good, 5th C. Turner, 6th K. Bakes, 7th M. Collins, 8th B. Mellis: Old Cock (TW): 1st A. Blake, 2nd J. Good, 3rd M. Collins, 4th T. Leggatt, 5th P. Hookins, 6th K. Bakes, 7th P. Priddle, 8th A. Blake: Old Hen (TW): 1st B. Mellis, 2nd M. Collins, 3rd M. Collins, 4th K. Bakes, 5th K. Bakes, 6th T. Cowan, 7th D. Cave, 8th B. Mellis: Young Cock (TW): 1st M. Collins, 2nd D. Cave, 3rd T. Cowan, 4th D. Cave, 5th C. Turner, 6th I. Lowden, 7th K. Bakes, 8th I. Lowden: Young Hen (TW): 1st C. Turner, 2nd M. Collins, 3rd P. Priddle, 4th J. Good, 5th T. Cowan, 6th M. Collins, 7th B. Mellis, 8th K. Bakes. Best in Show / Best Opposite Sex / Best Young Bird won by Maurice Collins and congratulations to him on a wonderful performance!

I had a good chat with the club secretary, Dave Cave, and he told me, him and the club President, Timmy Joy, had over 120 years of membership to the club between them. Timmy joined the Emsworth in 1954 and Dave in 1956, and has been the club secretary, off and on, for 40 years. A very special achievement! The Emsworth & Havant Homing Society was formed in 1902, making it one of the oldest pigeon racing clubs in Great Britain and this year has 21 members on their books. The club races both north and south road, with the Solent Federation and Southampton NR Federation, and Dave tells me, the club chairman, Kevin Bakes, won 1st Federation several times in the 2011 season racing north road. The club has had many champion fanciers in it’s membership through the years including the late Ben Duffin of Emsworth who was born in 1880. He lived to be over 90 years of age and achieved National racing fame when his pigeon ‘Smoky’ flew 645 miles in a single day from Lerwick in the Shetland Isles to Emsworth. The great Norman Southwell was a member of the club and of course so was Ned Hammond, famous for his wonderful record breaking hen ‘Duo Lady’, which flew Lerwick and Barcelona. The club can boast to having other National and Classic winner in it’s membership including, Ray Fossy 1st open NFC, Stan Bulbeck 1st open NFC, Tony Leggatt 1st open BCC Palamos, Colin Angel 1st open CSCFC Bergerac and my ol’ friend Peter Hookins who recorded 1st open CSCFC Bergerac (old hens) in the 2011 season.  A really wonderful club!

That’s it for this week! The Emsworth show really was a nice day out and talking to the member after judging, they are very keen to build it up in to a regular open event. Good luck to them! I can be contacted with any pigeon ‘banter’ on telephone number: 01372 463480.