They can blow up like balloon with air. Makes them look very large. They do have alot of muscle though. We race them from 150 miles and work them up to 500 miles. They average about 45-50 mph.
Kinda reminds me of my iguana I had long ago. Little sucker could make himself twice as big by puffing up and making his spines stand up. Of course for him it was all about posturing and making himself seem scary and inedible. :happy:
We take them out in a special trailer and mass release them about 1000-2500 birds per race and they fly home. The birds that fly the straightest line home usually wins.
Let's assume you went 500 miles away and released 1000 pigeons. What percent are home in 24 hours? 2 days? a week? a month? never show up again?
From 500 mi they start coming home in about 11-12 hours. The slow ones usually make it home the next day. Some take longer and some never make it. Its common to lose a few birds on a long race over 400 miles. I like to race up to 350 miles the most. Less chance of losing them. Nothing worse than losing a good one. It hurts.
So is it fair to say that 99% will make it home? And almost all of those in 48 hours, with the vast majority showing up in less than 24 hours? That's pretty awesome. You win the prize for most interesting by a landslide in my book!!
Sorry I went MIA lastnight man. But looks like SuperTam helped you out. Impressive, and very cool pics!:surprise:
LOL - it was a very SMALL egging on. Actually, I didn't egg anyone on. Well....maybe a little. But we got on the subject of pidgeons nicely, and haven't looked back. Who knew those pigeons were so reliable?
I attained the level of black belt candidate (step before black and many schools/orgs use a different ranking system) in Tae Kwon Do back in high school and quit after literally getting bored of it. It was a very traditional Korean based school that frowned upon anything to do with the "sport" of TKD and did not participate in tournaments or the idea of TKD becoming an official Olympic addition. From there I moved on to Brazilian Jiu-jitsu and loved it but injured my shoulder one too many times to continue. Now, for hobbies, I just hit the gym 3-4 times a week if I'm lucky and love to design graphics and race at the strip.
Yes, those pidgeons did save the day. Amazing that they all come back from 400 miles away so fast. Lesson learned: Don't call the pidgeons fat either. How do they know which pidgeon wins the race? I assume that it is a competition right?
Like any race I assume. First pigeon home wins. I also assume they have leg bands on. But hey - until last night all I knew about pigeons I learned by throwing crumbs and stepping in crap.
Good morning everyone. We time our pigeons with a special clock that beeps in there arrival time. Each bird has a seamless band on it with its own number and year for life. We also use a "chip" on the other leg that is tied into the clock system. When the birds lands the chip and time is recorded. Every loft is GPS, and we know the milage that the bird flew. Our computer does the rest and gives us a speed for each bird based on time flown and milage. The fastest bird wins. They are put in desending order on a race sheet. Trophies and ego are the prizes, but money can be won also. We have special races for big bucks for people that want a little action. Google racing pigeons and learn.
In world war 2 the pigeon signal corps saved many lives. Pigeons were takin on missions, and when the troops were in trouble they would release two birds with messages on them. One of the most famous birds was GI JOE. He saved many lives by getting home with a very important message. When the Germans took over a country like Belgium. They would take all the homing pigeons away from the owners. They the Germans were ordered to shoot all pigeons that they seen flying.
Nice!! I was a second degree Black Belt in Shotokan, and same thing happend. After 13 years, I got bored of it. Did some Brazilian jiu jitsu also.
Wow, 2nd degree huh? Shotokan was a very popular form of Karate in this area for some time. Sad to say though Ari, now, at 35, I'd be lucky to kick over my head without pulling a groin muscle and rupturing my sphincter lol! :rofl:
That is awesome technology. What does a good bird cost? I assume that once a bird is yours, it is hard to sell it to someone else? Would it always want to come back to the same place? Do they have to be trained from the time they are young?
My pigeons go for anywhere from $250 for a baby to $20,000+ for a super breeder. Its like race horses the performance and pedigree establish the price. I raise my own race team each year. There's a race series for young birds and a series for old birds. Old birds are birds over a year old, and young birds are flown in the year they are born. We let the young birds out of the loft around 45-60 days old. Once they know where there house is they are homed in. After this is done the birds will always do what they can to get back home. When we sell old birds they become breeders for the new owners, and not flown anymore. They are always kept inside from that point on. To get the birds ready to race. We start to exercise them daily around the loft. They will fly for over a hour each day when let out. Then they want back in for food and water. After about a month of loft flying the birds are road trained. We take them out about 10 miles at first them work them up the road to about 100 miles over a months time. At this point the birds are starting to come into form and are ready for the first race. The first race is about 150 miles and the birds make it home in about 3.5 hours. The speed depends on winds and weather conditions. After the first race the birds are road trained 3 times a week and raced on Saturday. We feed them special mixes of grain to bring on form and keep them in racing shape.
