WHY PAIR UP SO EARLY

just wondering why if you are paired up you do so this early..i myself pair up in feb and i think it makes no difference to you ybs ,this is just my opinion but i would like to know why you do it...

Ray Ive always paired up early , one reason is to take advantage of the natural darkness, ie virtually 12 hr days 12 hr nights so no need to put the birds on artificial darkness till later on the young birds by then have already started to drop body feathers , its just something ive always done and thats my reason behind it
Ken

I pair up as I like early young birds and I dont breed anything from may allthough they are natural they only sit pot eggs through the race season as not to take anything out of them.

wondered bout this myself asked around what best time to breed if your not going on darkness lots of answers none that really hit home what are you thoughts?

Hi redrog i would breed as early as you can, and use the natural darkness as i said young will go into a body moult natural
Ken

I do it for no other reason than to try and get the edge over the other competitors.
By time racing comes, you have a more mature bird that is more capable of competing. The trick is to get them to moult, with the light they have usually casted the first one in the nest and occasionally two at the weaning stage.
Plus get half of a chance to educate um before the hoards of yb hit the skies.

hi ken, so if i wanted my ybs to be moulted out for yb racing and be like darkness ybs, but keep them natural......when would i need to pair up ?

I race young birds on darkness they go on dark from 14th of march no matter when they are bred early or later they go on it march till the 1st june I find they last long enough to race and still go through a normal moult ie flights,

does it make any difference to datk birds if they are weaned onto darkness or put on when the clocks alter...? which is best ?

friendsloft wrote:

Hi redrog i would breed as early as you can, and use the natural darkness as i said young will go into a body moult natural
Ken

cheers ken paired last week so hope they do the biz asap

friendsloft wrote:

Ray Ive always paired up early , one reason is to take advantage of the natural darkness, ie virtually 12 hr days 12 hr nights so no need to put the birds on artificial darkness till later on the young birds by then have already started to drop body feathers , its just something ive always done and thats my reason behind it
Ken

i know that is is supposed to be the best way ken and i believe it could well be,your not putting as much stress on them doing this.the reason i,m asking this question is that a lot of fanciers tell me these early bred ybs are better but i beg to differ,again this is just down to my experiences but its good to hear others ideas and theories about this

David they would not be like full darkness youngsters, but they would have gone into a light body moult, you would need to have youngsters hatching out end dec to get the full benefit of the natural 50/50 split that is what you are aiming for when you put them on the darkness system
Ken

It doesn`t seem to efect mine I dont no about other times as thats what I do and I dont do to bad with young birds

but they would be able to race the full yb program , and not be dropping to bits and have to stop racing?

Thats right why I do it this way as I will not race a bird that is moulting its bars when I send a young bird to a race it must be what I think is perfect or it dont go. they enough to worry about without try to get home without all their feathers

id dont think you would get to the longer races they would be a bit loose, but u should get 5 to 6 races s out of them.
The other point, i put mine on artificial darkness when the clocks go forward and they are taken off 21st june but i keep to the 50/50 split, once taken of darkness they are given a week to climatise themselfs before training starts, this is just my way of doing the system and it works for me
Ken

so dont you do 8 hours of day light ken, i remove boards at 9 am then close up at 5 pm which is 8 hours, do you lighten for longer ?

David my shutters are taken of at night, so the birds wake up to natural light, so say its lilight at 5am my shutters go on at 5pm, when its light at 4am the shutters go back on at 4pm and so on keeping the 50/50 split
Ken

ah right i see, ive read something along those lines before about removing the boards when its dark, so they wake up to natural light, by doing 12 hours 50/50 makes the routine easier i think.

i pair up on 21 jan and ybs go on darkness around 21st march and take off gradualy over 1 week around 10th june my birds get 11 hours of lite and i put the shutters up about 6pm .......i tried the natural dark my first season 3 seasons ago and was quite happy with it but dont think the birds were any better or worse for it