New cocks for my new loft

I have recently bought 5 breeding pairs.

I have put the cocks into a new loft that has five nest boxes in it.

I was hoping that the cocks would be sorting out which cock has which box. But at the moment they don't seem very interested in claiming a box for themselves.

How long could it take before the cocks claim a box and therefore are ready for the hens to be introduced?

Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks in advance.

this is a new and strange loft to them they will start to settle down and claim thier territory as they become used to thier new home

any problems with mites ...can anything get in the loft ie mice or squirrel through vents or gaps at roof height ,be sure to mesh every gap over because they will get in I had a squirrel get into the loft once before he was getting in through the gap at the back of the loft at roof height and stealing eggs from the nest boxes I had a new loft and moved 8 cocks over and all claimed boxes in 24 hours ...may be wrong but I reckon theirs something getting in

how old are these cocks...?

Thanks for the replies.

The loft is quite secure, no chance of any critters getting in.

The cocks are only yearlings so maybe they will take a little bit longer to settle in.

I guess the answer is to make sure that everything is snug and cosy for them, plenty of ventilation and then just give them time.

Because it's getting a bit late in the breeding season, I am just keen to get started building a new family from my amazing new stock birds.

Cheers everyone.

Just give them a little time they will soon settle and claim a box mate

New loft New Environment it just takes them time to adjust

Don Webb wrote:

Just give them a little time they will soon settle and claim a box mate

New loft New Environment it just takes them time to adjust

That's about the way I see it Don PATIENCE may be worth a thought, I suspect.

blueskylotfs wrote:

Thanks for the replies.

The loft is quite secure, no chance of any critters getting in.

The cocks are only yearlings so maybe they will take a little bit longer to settle in.

I guess the answer is to make sure that everything is snug and cosy for them, plenty of ventilation and then just give them time.

Because it's getting a bit late in the breeding season, I am just keen to get started building a new family from my amazing new stock birds.

Cheers everyone.

best of luck

If they're yearlings you have to put a bit time in educating them. Have you got any spare sections in the loft, young bird end etc?
If so put 2 in how you want them paired in each section till they are happily sitting in the nestbowl on the floor together. Use the breeding section aswell, just shut the boxes and put a bowl on the floor with a pair loose.
Even leave them overnight. Once paired put them in the nestboxes with a bowl with straw in. Feed and water them in the nestbox and leave them 24 hrs. Just keep letting a couple pairs out the box while your around, keep an eye on them. try not letting adjacent boxes out together though. Then put the hens in their respective boxes and providing there's somewhere for the cock to perch he should realise where his hen is and fly to her.
Takes a while but do the same with the cocks, lock them in and the hens will go to him.
This way they all be settled and you shouldn't get them going in wrong boxes fighting and breaking eggs, but it won't happen overnight.

barnie wrote:

If they're yearlings you have to put a bit time in educating them. Have you got any spare sections in the loft, young bird end etc?
If so put 2 in how you want them paired in each section till they are happily sitting in the nestbowl on the floor together. Use the breeding section aswell, just shut the boxes and put a bowl on the floor with a pair loose.
Even leave them overnight. Once paired put them in the nestboxes with a bowl with straw in. Feed and water them in the nestbox and leave them 24 hrs. Just keep letting a couple pairs out the box while your around, keep an eye on them. try not letting adjacent boxes out together though. Then put the hens in their respective boxes and providing there's somewhere for the cock to perch he should realise where his hen is and fly to her.
Takes a while but do the same with the cocks, lock them in and the hens will go to him.
This way they all be settled and you shouldn't get them going in wrong boxes fighting and breaking eggs, but it won't happen overnight.

Good sound advise Barnie above I would suggest here, for our new comer etc    .

barnie wrote:

If they're yearlings you have to put a bit time in educating them. Have you got any spare sections in the loft, young bird end etc?
If so put 2 in how you want them paired in each section till they are happily sitting in the nestbowl on the floor together. Use the breeding section aswell, just shut the boxes and put a bowl on the floor with a pair loose.
Even leave them overnight. Once paired put them in the nestboxes with a bowl with straw in. Feed and water them in the nestbox and leave them 24 hrs. Just keep letting a couple pairs out the box while your around, keep an eye on them. try not letting adjacent boxes out together though. Then put the hens in their respective boxes and providing there's somewhere for the cock to perch he should realise where his hen is and fly to her.
Takes a while but do the same with the cocks, lock them in and the hens will go to him.
This way they all be settled and you shouldn't get them going in wrong boxes fighting and breaking eggs, but it won't happen overnight.

Thank you very much barnie - great advice - I will do as you say in the morning.

I will let you know how I get on.

Cheers
blueskylofts

blueskylotfs wrote:

I have recently bought 5 breeding pairs.

I have put the cocks into a new loft that has five nest boxes in it.

I was hoping that the cocks would be sorting out which cock has which box. But at the moment they don't seem very interested in claiming a box for themselves.

How long could it take before the cocks claim a box and therefore are ready for the hens to be introduced?

Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks in advance.

Just curious Blue Sky what was the thought process etc in you choosing your 5 pair there. Sprint, middle, long. Big/small colour, cheap expensive, I could go on for ever if you know what I mean.

Knackered wrote:

blueskylotfs wrote:

I have recently bought 5 breeding pairs.

I have put the cocks into a new loft that has five nest boxes in it.

I was hoping that the cocks would be sorting out which cock has which box. But at the moment they don't seem very interested in claiming a box for themselves.

How long could it take before the cocks claim a box and therefore are ready for the hens to be introduced?

Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks in advance.

Just curious Blue Sky what was the thought process etc in you choosing your 5 pair there. Sprint, middle, long. Big/small colour, cheap expensive, I could go on for ever if you know what I mean.

Hello Knackerd

You seem very prolific with your input to this forum - Well done and thanks! We need a lot more guys like you in the sport, that will give help to others and are interested in the sport to do so, time and time again.

To answer your questions:-
The birds I have bought are certainly NOT cheap - at least not cheap for me!

I have bought a pair of Geerinckx yearlings from Bart's stock. These are for Middle to Long distance.

2 pairs of Vandenabeele yearling pigeons, - which are direct children from M & D Evans TOP birds. For Long Distance.

A pair of yearling birds from one of the Top 5 winners and Breeders from the whole of Belgium. Y/b's for all Y/b races 60 miles to 250 miles - older ones for Mid distance.

It seems to me, that in the 12 years I have been out of the sport, SOoooo much has changed. The birds are different (much faster), the feeding is different, training is not the same. etc etc.

When I raced before, I did VERY well, winning or placed in almost everything I entered. Topped the Fed a couple of times a year, Top Club, most years - and so on.

Consequently, I was not very welcome and most of the club members were VERY un-sportsman-like. In fact - one year in the Y/B championship race, we had two of only 3 birds back in race time and our clock setter refused to do our clock! Until someone had a word in his ear.

I have been involved in competitive sport almost all my life, and I have never met a group of people, that (in general) don't like you winning. I would like to see something done about it - as I understand it is still going on. But what can we do. In a lot of places in the UK, the sport is taking a hammering. To get into the sport, you either have to spend a small fortune on stock birds, or try and get into one of the MANY One-Loft-Races. The problem with that is, it is not cheap to enter those kind of races. I know the prizes are great, but you need a good family of fast-clever-intelligent pigeons to do these races, and that takes time and skill.

I hope this answers your questions.

All the very best and keep up the good work.

Blueskylofts

i think you get bad losers in every sport blue sky some think they have a god given right to win

shippy wrote:

i think you get bad losers in every sport blue sky some think they have a god given right to win

yes I agree you need a thick skin .

oldstrain wrote:

shippy wrote:

i think you get bad losers in every sport blue sky some think they have a god given right to win

yes I agree you need a thick skin .

Of course there are bad losers in sport, but I have never known as many as there are in our sport. Everyone has stories of bad losers within their club/fed.

Maybe if they had to get on the pigeons' backs and 'Make' them fly faster/straighter, like a jockey has to do with a horse, they might be more sportsmanlike.

Has anyone noticed if the 'bad losers' are the ones who would have won if you hadn't beaten them, or are they people who don't win anyway?

I have only belonged to this forum for a short time, but everyone has been very helpfull in answering my questions and it seems a good place to be. Thanks ya-all!

hi blue sky, nice to see you contributing to the forum......I don't always think its a matter of pigeon men being bad losers, its sometimes a matter of being bad sportsmen in general.......I also see cliques among certain members and rules/topics are a forgone conclusion long before it gets to being voted on at meetings........I keep my self to my self basically, im there to race my birds (hopefully...lol), and I don't get too involved with the other members.

David wrote:

hi blue sky, nice to see you contributing to the forum......I don't always think its a matter of pigeon men being bad losers, its sometimes a matter of being bad sportsmen in general.......I also see cliques among certain members and rules/topics are a forgone conclusion long before it gets to being voted on at meetings........I keep my self to my self basically, im there to race my birds (hopefully...lol), and I don't get too involved with the other members.

That is very sound advice Dave. I think I will follow suit, once I can find a club to join. Right now, I don't belong to any club. I am just trying to build a new family and will not need to join a club or race until 2017. That doesn't mean that I wouldn't join a club now if I could find one that could have me. I am sure my old club wouldn't accept me back again because of all the winning I did when I was a member before.

I also belong to pigeon clubs to race my birds and to win as much as I can. However, past history has shown me that, even if you keep your head down, people still spread nasty rumours which certainly are not true. Once, one of the members of our club started telling everybody that I had killed all the birds that he gave me; (a) this was definitely not true and (b) I think it was because I was beating him with his own birds.

When I have belonged to clubs before, I have always been willing to help out whenever and however I can. I am not one of these people who sit around letting everybody else do the work, and being involved does mean you have to communicate with people which brings its own problems and misinterpretations of what one has said.

I think, at the end of the day, no matter what you do in life, you just have to try and be the best that you can be.

Cheers
Phil from blueskylofts

are there many clubs in your area phil...?

I don't think its right a new member cannot get into a club to race, unless he has been a bad member or owed money in the past, he should be allowed to join.

David wrote:

are there many clubs in your area phil...?

I don't think its right a new member cannot get into a club to race, unless he has been a bad member or owed money in the past, he should be allowed to join.

no wonder its a dying game

Phil, I would just roll up to the next meeting of your old club and tell them you want to join again, and look at the faces of the members , now that would make a picture

Lofty wrote:

Phil, I would just roll up to the next meeting of your old club and tell them you want to join again, and look at the faces of the members , now that would make a picture

Hi Lofty

Man! I would love to see their faces.

Maybe I will borrow a go-pro and video the event.

blueskylofts

Now that would be worth watching , I bet you would only have to walk into the room and their faces would drop, boy I would like to be a fly on the wall when you walk out of that meeting

nowt worse than pigeon men for bickering and jealousy why guys cany just enjoy their hobby win or lose

blueskylofts wrote:

Lofty wrote:

Phil, I would just roll up to the next meeting of your old club and tell them you want to join again, and look at the faces of the members , now that would make a picture

Hi Lofty

Man! I would love to see their faces.

Maybe I will borrow a go-pro and video the event.

blueskylofts

Blue sky I reckon I would even jump on a plane to see that   . Pigeon politics sad that it can be so destructive for a sport, that we all love so much supposebly. Blue sky we have a general rule in my club & that is if you walk in the door & place your money on the table you become an instant member. Now !!!. Nice insite into how you have gone about starting back up in the game/sport as such & I can only wish you all the best & hope you stick it right up the bigots when you come across them on race day.