Our goal is to resume training Monday however they are now calling for rain both Monday & Tuesday. hopefully this changes. At this point I feel it is in the best interest of the birds to Post Pone the Final Race by one week. We had a late start due to high temperatures in late July, early August. Now with days off due to Dove Season, the birds will need to be eased back into training. I do not want to rush training only to lose a bunch of birds after activation. I have been fighting this decision for a few days and it has not been easy. We always want to give the birds the best opportunities to compete as well as the best for all of our breeders. We apologize for any inconvenience to our friends that have made plans or purchased airfare. I hope everyone understands the reasoning behind this decision.Date Changes Will Be As Follows:Saturday October 22nd - Ganus Family Auction at Ganus Hunting LodgeSunday October 23rd - Shipping at the Hoosier Loft, Live Auction of America's Dream Loft & Friends,Banquet Dinner will be held at the Hoosier LoftMonday October 24th - Final Race (weather permitting) 365 MilesWe will begin working with local hotels on Tuesday to see if we will be able to get group rates for those that would still like to come for the race.
We did not train yesterday or today due to dove season starting. We will resume training Monday or Tuesday. Birds have been trained 16 times and as far as 40 miles. The birds will start back at 30 miles and then they will start jumping out from there. Trailers are being cleaned today and birds will be given a bath.Have a great weekend
We will resume training Wednesday this week. We thought the birds needed some rest after Sunday's training. We also had bad storms come through mid-afternoon today and tomorrow we are expected to have high winds. This past weekend the birds have gotten themselves into some trouble as we have seen multiple injuries. On both Saturday & Sunday we had hawks visiting while birds were arriving home as well. Sunday they just wouldn't give up. We did not witness any attacks however they had the birds very scared. Late arrivals from Sunday as well as the birds that returned today are being trapped into separate sections and the birds are being evaluated for injuries or just needing some additional TLC. Owners of injured birds have been notified this afternoon and will be removed from the race.
The birds were released a little later this morning due to some heavy fog that was lingering at the loft. During the end of July we had a set back with training due to some extremely hot weather. Although weather is good now, we do not plan on rushing the birds down the road to make up for lost time. We will get there, and thank you to everyone for your patience. The health of the birds is very good and birds are starting to train nicely. We will be back at 13 miles again tomorrow. We are also monitoring the weather for Saturday, Sunday, & Monday as they are calling for rain in our area all 3 days. We think the way the weather patterns look that we might be able to train 2 of those 3 days. On another note, our friends Big Andy & Mark Mourton are still accepting birds. Big Andy until the end of August and Mark Mourton until September 16th. If you have some extra late hatches send them to these races and have some fun in the spring. We would also like to Congratulate the Florida Pigeon Derby on a very successful intake period. I had the pleasure to meet Ioris Brito twice in Las Vegas at the iPigeon Gala. We wish you a very healthy and successful racing season! Great Job. And Good Luck to all the other One Loft Races that will soon be getting underway for the actual races.
Birds were taken 5 miles today and came home nicely. The birds rushed into the loft as we have been working on changing their schedule to have them clock right away. It seems to have worked today, and we believe there are birds that may have jumped the antennas going into the loft. We do have some birds outside still that are being a little stubborn also. We do not want to stress the birds out by chasing them back out to run over the antennas again. We know this is frustrating for fanciers that may be showing a missing bird. It is also frustrating for us because we have modified the traps several times to try to slow them down. When they are determined to get back in though they find ways to bombard the traps.
We have started to flag the pigeons as of yesterday and today. Majority of the birds group up nicely, however we do have our fair share of birds reluctant to fly. This will all change over the coming weeks. Birds have been split into two groups. Hopefully we see less accidents this way. There have been several birds coming back in the evening and early morning as well. All birds were given a bath today and they continue to molt nicely. Our plan is to continue with flagging daily and we will start to introduce the birds the the trailer for property releases next week.
Birds were out flying today. We have a storm that is starting to roll in so we allowed the birds in an hour early and in the middle of that we noticed that not all the antennas were registering. Some of the birds came in over those antennas which they will not clock. Due to the storm coming in we will not push the birds back out to clock. The birds are in and we will continue to leave the clock run tomorrow and the birds will be out loft flying tomorrow. Anything that did not clock today will clock tomorrow.
