Old bird season over

After two training tosses and two races my old bird team is out of action. A few losses, some hit wires and hawk attacks and iam left with two fit birds anybody else had a bad start to the season? one good point is it might give me the jump on the rest for yb racing and as i have been gifted some cracking birds by a site member it gives me a chance to give them my full attention so not all is lost YET.

cowandchicken wrote:

After two training tosses and two races my old bird team is out of action. A few losses, some hit wires and hawk attacks and iam left with two fit birds  anybody else had a bad start to the season? one good point is it might give me the jump on the rest for yb racing and as i have been gifted some cracking birds by a site member it gives me a chance to give them my full attention so not all is lost YET.

MMMMMMMmmmmmmmmm Not good CC Sh*te happens tho at times & I suspect, most/many could relate to your experience etc. One can only hope you find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow there, when your Young bird season comes around.

I think there are many flyers that have had some big losses, up and down the country. I hope when i get back to racing, i will be training to the four point compass. Giving the birds the understanding of flying into the zone, with changing winds on their flight home, I think we need to train our birds to adapt to the changing weathers. While watching a flock of birds returning from a training toss, you could see how unbalanced they were. They were fighting to control their bodies, being thrown about in the wind gusts, trying to maintain their flying speed. Hope all goes well for you in the young bird season.

sorry to hear m8...a few members in our club are in the same boat after Saturdays race from Portland ...out of just over 200 birds only 30 were home on the day from a 62 mile race and it was a similar story for the whole area ,birds were released at 3pm into cloud cover and rain.good luck with yb racing hope it all pans out for you

Sorry to hear of your Losses ; do you start to early ?;or as the Weather Changed ?;i know over here at the moment we are getting hammered with bad weather & we start on the 23rd May ; which is making it harder to get the birds right to start Tossing etc ;

sorry to hear that but was 2 training tosses enough you do not say how the birds were, were they fit to be raced take a good look at yourself before blaming the birds

sorry to her this Jason, these things happen to us all........good luck with the yb season

oldstrain wrote:

sorry to hear m8...a few members in our club are in the same boat after Saturdays race from Portland ...out of just over 200 birds only 30 were home on the day from a 62 mile race and it was a similar story for the whole area ,birds were released at 3pm into cloud cover and rain.good luck with yb racing hope it all pans out for you

That appears to have been one crap race O/S Fortunately it wasn't 162 miles etc as then, there may have been someone walking the plank from the   ship I suspect & a new driver required. Now any inside information there, as to what may just happen at the weekend. Before I put my life in jeopardy with my prediction .

killer wrote:

Sorry to hear of your Losses ; do you start to early ?;or as the Weather Changed ?;i know over here at the moment we are getting hammered with bad weather & we start on the 23rd May ; which is making it harder to get the birds right to start Tossing etc ;

Come cry on my shoulder K I wouldn't worry to much etc tho, as your first race is about as far as the Bristol race was here last weekend & we all know ??? you come from the sprint capital of this little island of ours down here.

if the race was from Portland on the south coast I used to live near there it is a bad race point if weather is not good it gets enclosed with fog and has sea on 3 sides and a very narrow causeway that joins it to the mainland

we have decided to basket sunday for a Monday race from poole on the coast in our south road club ...may day ,may day weather looks to be good lets hope it stays that way ...we also got a race tomorrow from worksop as our other club racing north have decided to basket tonight ...sending 8 to each race good call by both our clubs and their reasoning has to be commended

rainbow wrote:

sorry to hear that but was 2 training tosses  enough you do not say how the birds were,   were they fit to be raced  take a good look at yourself before blaming the birds

Rainbow it seems you misunderstood my post so i will give a more detailed version of events just for you. My birds are on open hole all day every day so unlike some who are locked up all winter mine are free to fly and keep a level of fitness. come closer to race season they get 6 to 10 tosses down the road to 60 mile. our first race is 60 mile so i cant see fitness being a issue. On the last two tosses i lost 2 and 2 came back after hit by hawks. The first race i lost 1, 1 got hawked and 2 had hit wires due to strong head winds. the second race i sent my 2 fit birds and got both back fine and in good time. I dont send just for the sake of it and need those birds for next year so decided to pull them up. Not once did i blame the birds and take great care for them as a small team flyer i cant afford to be careless with them. I hope this helps you to understand my previous post as well as everyone else did.

im racing 3 cocks this ild bird season not over till I don't have any birds

you said after 2 tosses and 2 races your season was over you did not say they had training up to 60mls so who are you blaming the pigeons or yourself

read the full post not the bit you want and think about what it says

I won't be sending to kingsdown or Portland ever again to many loses their haven't sent yet

cowandchicken wrote:

After two training tosses and two races my old bird team is out of action. A few losses, some hit wires and hawk attacks and iam left with two fit birds  anybody else had a bad start to the season? one good point is it might give me the jump on the rest for yb racing and as i have been gifted some cracking birds by a site member it gives me a chance to give them my full attention so not all is lost YET.

Sorry to hear about this bad news fingers crossed you can have a good young-bird season

ok have read it what will be different in the yb team

What will be diffrent is i will not post anything on how my ybs are doing

don't be silly take no notice of me
let me tell you what I found years and years ago when birds are on a open loft there are days when they should not go out because of the weather the other thing and this is just me birds seem to do better on a 30ml toss than 60 do take no notice of what I say good luck george

cowandchicken wrote:

What will be diffrent is i will not post anything on how my ybs are doing

I would be disappointed if the above was the case CC here. George was just having a seniors moment I suspect sadly I'm . Blind Freddy knows how things can change from good to bad or vice a versa etc in this caper of ours for most of us here at times. So hopefully just do what you do & with an ounce of luck, you may just find that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow by the time young birds comes around.

I have pm him saying I was sorry and if he wanted a few ybs next year just ask george

Very kind of you George, Hope all is cleared up now, Life is too short for fall outs.

What I cannot understand is why they were released. Inclement weather, etc,. It does happen here but very rarely. If the weather is not suitable they are held over or brought back. Some will say that if 30 made it the others should have also. But there could be other factors.
I was in the racing loft yesterday, the no 2 loft. Heavy hay on the floor. Bottom row of nest boxes 16 inches above floor level. Hard to see under there. Had 5 young birds under there too big to band. 2 black ones, other 3 blue. Was going to kill them. Put plastic marker bands on instead. They will be trained very hard to 100 miles. Kicking myself. Negligence on my part. Must be an age thingy, brain farts.