The weather has been terrible. This morning we had fog and then strong winds. Tomorrow we will have diving temperatures and 20-30 mph winds. We do plan to toss the birds on Sunday from 100 miles. This is a training toss only to keep the birds in condition in preparation for our 225 mile race.
We flag the birds most days and they are flying for over an hour to 2 and 1/2 hours.
We will post the training toss results on Sunday evening.
Bobby
(479) 719-3995
We are continuing to loft fly the birds. We had hoped to toss from 55 miles today. In spite of a favorable forecast, we had low thick clouds and a lot of haze. We will toss the birds on the first possible day.
Bobby (479) 719-3995
Our 150 mile race has been closed and the points have been assigned. I contacted Terry to inform him the point totals haven't updated to reflect both races. Hopefully he will resolve this quickly.
Unfortunately it appears many of our missing birds were pushed farther south than I had feared by the strong side winds and probably ended up in the Little Rock Arkansas area. Unfortunately we had quite a bit of rain on Friday and Saturday. This only made things worse. This is too bad as I believe we lost some good pigeons that just made 1 mistake at the wrong time.
We are flagging the birds each day possible and watching the weather for a decent day to fly our 225 mile race. Right now the weather is showing rain or strong tail winds. I don't prefer either.
Our next race will pay prize money. I will post the payouts in a few days.
Good luck to all,
Today's race was all about the winds. We had strong left side winds today all along the race course. We race from the southwest to the northeast. The first birds all came in high above the trees from the south. It seems they chose to stay high and fight the winds but got pushed and had to turn and come north to reach the loft. In my opinion these first birds did as good as any pigeons can do with these conditions and I am very impressed. They arrived 15 minutes earlier than I expected and came in like fighter jets. The bigger group that arrived about 14 minutes later arrived low on the line of flight. I believe these birds tactic was to stay down low and go over the trees and then back down low again to avoid the winds. They didn't veer off course but it took them a little longer with this approach. Our late birds all came from the east. They missed the loft and had to turn around. They came in fast and trapped and went straight to the food without drinking. They obviously went down for water. I expect most of our missing birds to return tomorrow from the east. Fort Smith Arkansas is 10 miles to the east and has a large feed mill there with hundreds of pigeons. The Arkansas River lies between our loft and Fort Smith.
We will clock the birds returning tomorrow but it won't be live clocking. We will randomly post the results.
We are flying the 150 mile race tomorrow from Windom Texas. We are supposed to have sunshine and 6 mph headwinds at the release and all along the race course. This should be great conditions for a pigeon race.
The birds were enjoying the brilliant sunshine and pleasant temperature today. The loft sounded like a bee hive with all the activity and happiness. Birds were in and out of the aviary with great zest.
Hillbilly Loft had a bird return, AA 3143. This bird went missing from our 35 mile training toss on November 26th. He is in good condition. Evidently he's been living in someone's loft. Although we are sending him on the race he will not be eligible for points or prizes. His perch fee was paid and he's here, so at the request of his breeder we are sending him.
Good luck to everyone,
All our birds are now home. The race has been closed and the points have been assigned. To view the points, go to our website and place the pointer on the "RESULTS" tab. On the drop-down menu click on "Points." When the next page pulls up, place the pointer on the "RESULTS" tab that is just above the "Windy" icon. On the drop-down menu, click on points.
We will fly the 150 mile race as soon as possible. I am watching the weather for Wednesday.
We would like to try and clock our 2 birds that are still out before we close the race. Hopefully they will return tomorrow morning. We will close the race and adjust the points at that time. The 2 birds not homing on the day, will not be eligible for points this time.
The point system for this race series will be exactly the same as all previous. We sent 187 birds to our first race, 4 birds were declined for activation by their owners. So from the 191 birds that returned from our activation toss this leaves us with 187. One bird, SOI 8545, is our mystery bird that lofted in several months ago from a flyer in Missouri. He is an entertainment pigeon we are watching to see how he performs but is not eligible for prizes. He will also not be eligible for points. That leaves us with 186 birds competing.
Our point system is as follows: We will use 186 as our base number for each of the 4 races. The 1st two races will start with 186 points and will be awarded in 1 point decrements. Any bird clocking on the day will receive points. Any birds clocking in on the 2nd day will not receive points. All birds on 1st drops will receive the same points. The next bird will receive 186 points minus the number of birds on the 1st drop. Example: 10 birds on the 1st drop. All 10 birds will receive 186 points. The next bird will receive 176 points.
The 3rd and 4th races will receive double points. Those races will start with 372 points and points will be awarded in 2 point decrements. Everything else is the same as the 1st two races.
Happy New year to everyone! I hope all your hopes and dreams are realized in 2019.
We have had lousy pigeon weather this week. As I write this it is pouring down and has been all day. I wanted to toss the birds from 55 miles mid-week but it was not possible.
We were able to loft fly twice. Every single bird flew in a tight group for 1 to 1 and 1/2 hours or even longer.
The birds were wormed again for 2 days. We did that about a week ago and we finished a 5 day treatment for Trichomonasis yesterday (Wednesday).
If the weather report holds we should have a very nice day to race on Saturday. We are expecting birds about 11:00 or a little after.
Anyone who hasn't sent your race fees must do so now. We can take a credit card payment over the phone if this helps.
Here is the info on our optional "B" Race:
After the 3rd race (225 miles) you will nominate all birds you would like to have participate in the "B" Race.
The "B" Race is the final race of our race series (325 miles).
The entry fee for the "B" Race is $200 per bird. Send entry fees immediately after the 3rd race (225 miles) so as not to hold up our final 325 mile race.
The "B" Race birds are only competing against the other "B" Race birds for the "B" Race prizes. They are still participating for all the prizes in our regular race series.
The "B" race will be paid by trapping order.
The prizes for the "B" Race will be paid to the top 10% of the birds in the "B" Race. Example: if there are 50 birds the first 5 birds will win prizes. The percentages paid would be: 30%, 25%, 20%, 15% and 10%. If there are 50 birds participating the payout amounts would be: $3000, $2500, $2000, $1500, and $1000.
