[Rooster J. Cogburn]

alec guinness, on 26 January 2012 - 22:36 PM, said:

well done young lewis some cracking questions with great answers,got a few off the top of ma head but was scratching with most of them was reading up the other week about "tayside princess"cracking doo and also "fiery cross"

Cracking pigeons.

Just had a very intersting conversation about Belgian pigeons there wi ma Irish pal.

He told me the doos in his loft can be traced back to Belgian birds that were introduced to Northern Ireland in 1908.

At the time the linen trade was the big thing in Ireland so they got ships coming into Belfast from all over Europe.Eventually these Belgians cottoned on to the fact(nae pun intended ) that a lot of the Belfast workers were doo daft.So they started bringing big "hampers" ae doos across with them.

They'd all meet in a park in Belfast and the Irish boys would look through the doos and pick out what they liked.There name was then recorded beside the pigeons ring number and the birds were singled up.
If they were back home in Belgium before the next trip across they were brought back and the Irish lads would have to pay a guinea for them.If they didn't make it home then nothing happened.
Thats one way to test the homing ability of yer foundation stock

I wonder how many of the Belgian birds brought into Ireland today could manage that ???

[alec guinness]

Rooster J. Cogburn, on 26 January 2012 - 21:45 PM, said:

Cracking pigeons.

Just had a very intersting conversation about Belgian pigeons there wi ma Irish pal.

He told me the doos in his loft can be traced back to Belgian birds that were introduced to Northern Ireland in 1908.

At the time the linen trade was the big thing in Ireland so they got ships coming into Belfast from all over Europe.Eventually these Belgians cottoned on to the fact(nae pun intended ) that a lot of the Belfast workers were doo daft.So they started bringing big "hampers" ae doos across with them.

They'd all meet in a park in Belfast and the Irish boys would look through the doos and pick out what they liked.There name was then recorded beside the pigeons ring number and the birds were singled up.
If they were back home in Belgium before the next trip across they were brought back and the Irish lads would have to pay a guinea for them.If they didn't make it home then nothing happened.
Thats one way to test the homing ability of yer foundation stock

I wonder how many of the Belgian birds brought into Ireland today could manage that ???

not too many lewis but when you look back even then we had doos racing/homing from over 700 miles into the uk. no fancy chuck or pills etc to prop these doos up.

[THE FIFER]

Bump

[Rooster J. Cogburn]

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