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The Western Canada Challenge 2010 Pigeon Derby |
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One Loft, 6 Race Series Keremeos, British Columbia |
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DIARY ENTRIES 6 ____________________________________________________________________________ July 26, 2010 Did a head count and it appears I dropped 20 birds from the first Elkhart toss. Although the times were great 20 birds couldn’t figure it out. I seem to have an extraordinary amount of broken legs and damaged wings this year. It seems like I get a couple every toss. Don’t know why. They seem more reckless than previous years. Also I can’t seem to kick the respiratory problems that keep showing up. I treated the whole flock previously so now I am treating just individual birds. July 28, 2010 2nd release from Elkhart. 34 degrees C. Home in 1 hour 15 minutes again. Some stragglers but most arrived in one bunch. The good news is I picked up 10 birds from the previous toss. I now have 171 birds in the loft. 87% of the original total. Merritt next, 120 K. See new pictures of toss.
DIARY ENTRIES 5 ____________________________________________________________________________ July 25, 2010 Temp. 33 degrees C. After successfully completing two short tosses from the north we took the birds across the mountains to Elkhart Lake. It is a distance of 80k. I had said 60k previously but I was in error. Anyway, the results were fantastic. They were back in the loft in 1 hour 15 minutes. The sky was clear 100% but it was very hot. I will repeat the same toss on Wednesday.
DIARY ENTRIES 4 ____________________________________________________________________________ July 10, 2010 Gave the birds a treatment for respiratory because I had noticed some wet noses. July 11-19 I have had the birds twice at 16k, twice at 25k, and now twice to 39k. I have to say the birds are doing awesome. They are beating me back from each release which is always a good sign. The hot weather continues. No respiratory problems evident. The only thing they are getting now is some apple cider vinegar. Two more short tosses and then it is over to the other side of the mountains. A 60k toss and probably the toughest.
DIARY ENTRIES 3 ____________________________________________________________________________ June 26, 2010 I had a visit from Mr. Hawk which scared the heck out of the birds but he failed to connect. July 2, 2010 The Hawk is back but again he failed to connect. July 8, 2010 I started road training today and had the scary first toss but everything went fine. I started road training with 183 birds. The best year ever, but I am touching wood as anything can go wrong when it comes to training. As a matter of fact I took my own youngsters out to 14K. Their 3rd toss. I have 72 youngsters. 24 went missing and finally 15 returned the next day and 9 were gone permanently. This is from 14K!! This is a touchy spot as the Similkameen River dog-legs to the north-west and the Ashnola River joins at this spot. I repeated the toss the next day with almost the same result. What the heck is going on? July 9, 2010 Took the derby birds out to 10K and the birds were back at the loft right away but kept flying for another 1 ½ hours. They will have their crack at the 14K mark on Monday. The weather has turned really hot for the last week with temperatures averaging 37C. However we are not plagued with the humidity that our friends get in Eastern Canada.
DIARY ENTRIES 2 ____________________________________________________________________________ June 11, 2010 Vaccinated Pen #4 today and then released them with the rest. All birds out and flying. June 16 Spotted some canker in one bird so I flock treated the whole works. June 18 Did a head count and there are 189 birds. I have had limited sickness this year and have only had 7 birds with health issues. I have used Health Guard in the water this year and it seems a very powerful ally. I have two birds with broken legs and one with a broken wing. I will nurse them along and see what happens. June 23 The weather is finally starting to warm up. All birds are flying for at least 1 ½ hours per day. Both they and myself are ready to hit the road but I will not start road training until approximately July 10th. I will do an inventory approximately August 4th. To date I have had little or no Hawk activity.
DIARY ENTRIES 1 ____________________________________________________________________________ June 7, 2010 Hi everyone The birds have been arriving steadily and we are now full. It seems a lot of people sent older birds this year and some sent birds on the last day that are very young. It will be interesting to see how the different age groups play out over the season. May 26 I released the first pen (50 birds) and got them oriented and flying. It has been a very unusual spring. Raining almost every other day. It definitely makes it harder to keep the birds healthy. However so far, touch wood, no salmonella and limited young bird sickness. May 30 We (myself and my two main helpers) Paul Phelan and Harry Sanders vaccinated pens 1, 2, and 3 (150 birds). I had a vaccination gun this year and it was slick as hell. I highly recommend it. I also released Pen 2 to join the first birds. 100 pigeons out flying. June 2 Released Pen 3 – 150 birds our loft flying. My first hawk of the season showed up and that got everyone flying. No losses and they all came back. So far hawks have been at a minimum. I attribute that to the fact that I have a pair of crows nesting below the house. They are hell on hawks.
June 5 I gave everyone a bath with borax as I noticed some lice on the birds but borax takes care of that promptly. END |
