Watchfield Writings 30.04.11

Watchfield & The Vale Flying Club
*Remember there are No Secrets from a Bottle, just Hardwork, Dedication & Determination*

Well folks here we are again and its now the 10th April, i hope things are progressing well within your lofts and those of you who have already commenced racing have had good returns, we ourselves start on the 16th April.

We started the old birds training on Thursday with a quick 5mile refresher, the same again on the Friday which both went without problems, then i stretched them yesterday (Saturday 9th), and took them approx 15miles away were i let the hens go at 0645hrs when they started to get there bearings they were smashed by a peregrine which split one of the hens away from the others, luckily this hen managed to avoid capture and dropped like a stone to nearby trees for cover, the peregrine spun and within seconds was back on the remaining ones which had split into a four, three and other singles. It picked out another which again luckily managed to dive for cover, this was sickening to watch and be unable to do anything but hope it failed.

So there we have it, looks like training for old birds is over now for another year thank god, it is just not worth the risk of training by ourself as if a hawk hits they are yours which are gone, the old birds will just be entered in the races now where if a hawk strikes a batch there is probably only one of yours in that batch so reducing the odds. Don’t get me wrong they are fit enough and after these 3 training spins they have been refreshed now, it will probably take a couple of races before they are race tuned/fit but the early races are not my target races so i have time to send them to get them 100% ready for the races starting 16th May.

Youngsters are going well, but we did have a bad day last week which saw the first losses of the year thanks to the hawks!!, the birds were out exercising when i spotted the birds scattered about a bit which caused a little concern, when i was watching them i saw 2 x perigrines smash back into them splitting the group of youngsters in two, i was gutted.....this was at 1745hrs and i managed to get the remaining youngsters down at 1915hrs. After getting these in and counting up i was 20 youngsters missing out of the 40 bred, i was absolutely gutted and was not amused, a little while later we got another youngster back, then another and a couple more. When darkness arrived i was 15 youngsters out overnight, all that work ruined/wasted, next morning i had the old birds out at first light but nothing, then at 0745hrs in the drizzle/rain i spotted two dots coming our way, come on then....come on....yes it was two of the youngsters, wet through and flights turned up, but they were home.

A little while later, we got another and during that day we got nine of the missing 15 youngsters make there way back, i was made up with the effort these youngsters had shown, although still gutted by the initial strikes at least these had shown heart. We got another the next day and another back 2 days later with half a tail, ending in losing 4 youngsters.

Well i did decide to get the training basket back out for a couple more times as i felt the team just needed sharpening, and now is the time to do it whilst they are all sitting so i put them into a couple of tosses from Bristol on Monday 11th & Tuesday 12th, these really shocked the team and the lesser birds really struggled as this is totally off any line of flight they may take when racing and they took all day to come home but it certainly made then think. Loft exercise was the order of the day for Wednesday and Thursday with no flying on Fridays they were off to the race tonight.

1st Race, Seaton 16/04/11.
Atmosphere at the club was good and eventually a turn out of 11 members sending 172 birds to this first race, with a good flying day forecast. It was up early on Saturday morning to get the loft chores done and out of the way as we were hopeful of an early liberation as i wanted to stamp all the youngsters up this afternoon, well the day opened a little cold and overcast but brightened at 10am. Apparently there was some communication issues with other federations coming across our route so we missed the early slot and eventually got the birds away at 12pm, well the day had turned extremely heavy, real deep dark cloud and i would class as very thundery with poor visibility and added the easterly wind i was not looking forward to the race now as i expect it to be quite sticky.

So we pencilled in an eta of an hour and forty five for this race, but this could quite quickly come and go judging by the day. So we set up the ets and sat and waited, clare spotted our first arrivals spinning from the front so we were well pleased with were they came from, these two hens dropped to be recorded at 1350hrs and with our next arrival coming diving from over the housed at 13.52hrs indicating that this had drifted over with other birds and pulled out late. Overall the birds were very very split up and arrived throughout the day, and eventually resulted in 1 missing on the night and he arrived early next morning.

At the club that night the result was 1st club to G & M Seagroatt who timed in a 6yr old blue wf busschaert cock racing on the roundabout on 1364.7, this cock has always been kept to the sprint races and brought home the honours today for George & Malcolm, in 2nd, 3rd & 4th were ourselves M/M M & C Brown with firstly a 2yr old blue gaby vandenabeele hen, followed by a 4yr old cheq janssen hen and finally a 3yr old blue gaby vandenabeele cock recording 1358.2, 1355.8 & 1331.4, all previous prizewinners and all racing natural sitting 8/10 days.

2nd Race, Seaton 23/04/11.
Another good turn out at the club this week, with 15 members sending 264 birds to this first race, with a good flying day forecast and easterly winds as is the norm for these early races which goes against our own birds due to location but helps to sharpen then up for the bigger races come May. We are having slight problems with the Unikon at the moment but we got there in the end. It was up early on Saturday morning to get the loft chores done and out of the way so we could relax and enjoy the race later.

News soon came through that the birds were away at 0845hrs into an east wind and a good racing day was on the cards, so we pencilled in an eta of an hour and forty five for this race, so we needed to be in by 1030hrs if we wanted to be near the winners. So with the ets set up we sat and waited, again clare spotted our first three arrivals at 1036hrs spinning from the front this was very pleasing going by the wind as at least they had broke from the pack and headed on their own line, quickly followed by a fourth which came over the house from the Swindon side, overall the birds came very well and all home in good time.

At the club that night the result was a good one for Smith & Baker taking 1st & 2nd club with their outstanding team of birds, Ernie timed a 3yr old cheq cock on 1431.1 followed by a 5yr old blue cock on 1420.3 to be well clear of the rest of the field (this was a pleasing result and was good to see as this loft in my opinion ranks as one of the top lofts in the south of England and was the first loft that i had heard of when still living and racing in the north west prior to moving down here, due to their outstanding achievements in the classics and nationals. Ernie who along with their 2nd partnership loft at Darren’s home won in total 4 individual club races on this same day as well as topping the federation, now hows that for flying of the best degree at the highest level, well done guys), in 3rd club was last weeks winners George & Malcolm Seagroatt timing a yearling blue hen on 1390.9 and Roy & Shiela Titcombe taking 4th club with a yearling cock on 1367.4

3rd Race, Newton Abbott 30/04/11.
Another good turn out at the club this week, with 14 members sending 183 birds to this as the forecast was a bit iffy to say the least and a couple of members decided to give this one a miss and others reducing their teams slightly. It was up early on Saturday morning to get the loft chores done and out of the way as we had a lot to do today with taking down the remains of our royal wedding street party from the estate. We soon had the phonecall to say the birds had been liberated at 0915hrs into a north east wind, and it was blowing strong at this end which indicated a very tough race on the cards with us racing the dogleg they would have to face this strong wind for the majority of the journey. Well i worked out an approx ETA as being 2hrs 30mins to start to look out but realisticly thought they would take longer especially over this side as the main birds would hit Swindon which is over 10miles west of us.

So we set up the ets and sat and waited, our first arrival came diving from the back to drop like a stone and run into the loft, it was our good cock who won 3 x 1st last year so we were pleased with him, the line were he came from indicates him drifting over the Swindon route then breaking for home a little to late, we had a wait of 10minutes for our next arrival our good little hen 04, who came on the same line as our first. Then again almost 10 minutes for our next then we had 5 in minutes all from the front so it looked like a funny race was on the cards. Well thats how it turned out and they were coming all day long with 3 still to come when we went to the club (2 of these were cuddled up together on the landing board when we got home).

At the club that night the result was 1st & 4th club to Smith & Baker, with Ernie timing a 2yr old cheq cock on 1209.5 and a 3yr old cheq cock on 1182.8, 2nd club was Ken Thorpe timing his good 3yr old Blue staf van reet cock a previous big winner for Ken on 1202.2 and 3rd club was ourselves timing our good 2yr old gaby vandenabeele blue cock bred by mum & dad on 1185.4. .

Thats it for now, the birds will be confined to the lofts for the next week as we are on a weeks break with the family, so a forced rest and then we will get them out again and ready for the first channel race in a fortnight then the NFC programme.

Well that’s it for this week, try hard, work harder, be happy and good returns.

great reading mark.
all the best.
john.

very enjoyable read mark and glad you got most of your ybs back

another great read mark ...
enjoy ur hol's (dont forget dad's humbugs) lol
x

smilinassassin wrote:

another great read mark ...
enjoy ur hol's (dont forget dad's humbugs) lol
x

LOL, had the old birds out this morning for an hour and left at 0720hrs, we got here just after 12........beautiful place, windy as hell today but beautiful

Even had a drive down to the beach at sennen cove (lib site)....awesome

excellent write up as usual mark

thanks for the article mark, enjoyed reading it as usual..................... have a good holliday.

Brilliant read as always Mark

Have a good holiday with the family

All the best Don

good read mark, thanks mate.