The Darkness System

Again, I know it is a bit early, but I have a bit of time at the moment, so I thought I would get the jump on the thing! And make notes for later on.

1. When do members put their young birds onto the darkness system? At what age and what month?

2. When or How do you darken your y/b's? Time a.m and time p.m.?

3. Do you train whilst your y/b's are on the darkness system?

I know some people darken at a certain time at night and open them at a certain time in the morning.

Others, darken in the afternoons and then remove the screen/curtains when it is naturally dark outside, say 22:00 hours. Then let the y/b's experience natural daylight.

And yet others do something else.

Ideas please!

Phil

end of march they go on darkness til end of june I put shutters on and take off when dark so they wake to natural daylight ...so long as the darkness hours are longer than the daylight hours then everything should be ok

yes I prefer that method Darren, I tried it a couple of seasons ago and preferred it......like you say it lets natural day break into the loft, plus it doesn't restrict ventilation for all those hours over night if your covering interferes with the air flow.

hopefully I`ll be doing it again in the 2017 season.

Ok, so do early,early ybs bred now, go into a moult straight away, being that they are in darkness from say 4.30pm till 7.30am, and if they do will you still put them on a darkness system at the end of March.

I think early bred ybs do moult naturally lofty because of the hours of dark/light.....and I would imagine these early ybs would be nearly moulted out apart from a few wing flights by the time yb racing comes round.

maybe someone more experienced than me can advise.

yes but you would need eggs now for this to happen I would think or certainly by new year but still a bit to much left to chance for me

David wrote:

I think early bred ybs do moult naturally lofty because of the hours of dark/light.....and I would imagine these early ybs would be nearly moulted out apart from a few wing flights by the time yb racing comes round.

maybe someone more experienced than me can advise.

I am sorry David - I don't agree, and I will tell you why:-

One year I put our birds together around December 15th, I took half of the off-spring from the first round and put them on the darkness system - the other half I treated naturally, that is to say, I let them develop naturally, no extra lights and no other special treatment.

By the time they came to the better races towards the end of the season, at least 75% of the 'Naturally' treated young birds were falling apart. Whilst the darkness birds looked amazing and flew incredibly well.

I think that year, we won the young bird trophy from our club, for the first time.

The other thing about your comment is:- Even if you are right about them moulting out, by your own admission, they may still retain some of their last few wing flights. Are these strong enough to withstand punishing, long distances as we find in the last few y/b races?

Phil

I paired up at a similar time my first year ....we had our eggs around boxing day to new year some carried nest flights until the next year ...if I paired early I would definitely still put them on the dark end of march ...other option would be breed much later and pair in march but that don't suit widowhood racers

oldstrain wrote:

I paired up at a similar time my first year ....we had our eggs around boxing day to new year some carried nest flights until the next year ...if I paired early I would definitely still put them on the dark end of march ...other option would be breed much later and pair in march but that don't suit widowhood racers

Nicely put!

Phil

phil, we each have our own experiences re ybs I suspect, and ive found early bred ybs will be moulting by the time the clocks alter when most put their ybs onto the dark......but this comment you make re the wing flights;

The other thing about your comment is:- Even if you are right about them moulting out, by your own admission, they may still retain some of their last few wing flights. Are these strong enough to withstand punishing, long distances as we find in the last few y/b races?


as we both agree, even if they moulted the body, they would still hold wing flights...but to suggest the flights may not be up to the job cannot be right, because as you will know by using the darkness system darkness young birds do not moult the wing flights, only the body, so they are racing with what should be a full wing of old flights, and it doesn't hamper them.......


but like I say, I don't profess to be an expert, this is why I never give "advise", I only give my own personal experience of what ive done or seen my self with my own birds, and maybe someone with more experience can give some input.

is this what they call the light system hal...?

Friend here explains it better.

https://www.facebook.com/northlandpigeon.lofts/posts/1521708751442670

thanks for sharing hal

halcanada wrote:

http://www.quejadoloft.tricityhoming.net/my_young_bird_system.htm
http://www.pigeonracingforum.com/young-bird-racing/pulling-flight-feathers-t370.html

A couple of great articles Hal - also the guys Facebook.

Cheers
Phil

really don't like the idea of pulling flights just don't sit right with me.each to their own though

oldstrain wrote:

really don't like the idea of pulling flights just don't sit right with me.each to their own though

me neither , I remember a few years ago a member on here by the name of gaz b tried it, he always had to have the lights on and it was never ending , unlike dark system.

I also don't like the idea of pulling flights.

Pulling birds feather out for no REAL reason is not for me either.

Phil