ACROSS THE MIDDLE
by Gordon Braban & John Wilkie
Pontefract & Worksop Young Birds 2012
Hello and welcome to week 3 of the young bird season with the Up North Combine. Just like the past 2 weeks, feds and sections could go where they liked for a race, so this week sections 1 & 2 had moved onto Pontefract which is only around 85 mile to the middle of the Gateshead Fed area, and sections 3 & 4 were at Worksop which is 110 mile to Washington. Sections 1 & 2 were in the good hands of Jeff Wallace and sections 3 & 4 plus the rest were with Steve Proffitt. The weather forecast leading up to this week’s race had been funny, with most of the week having sunshine in the morning time, but on the Wednesday you could not see 100 yards from first thing in the morning, then it got out about dinner time and then it closed in again. Thursday was a good day for most of it and then it started to rain on the Friday. The forecast for the Saturday was not that good first thing with full cloud cover but it was supposed to start to clear around 10 or 11. After last week’s race when nearly everybody had all their birds on, and the birdage well up, there still must have been a few birds missing as nearly all club and fed birdages were down; my own club was down by 304. So where have they all gone? Let’s start with section 2 Gateshead fed whose birds were down by 500 on last week’s race.
Section 2 Gateshead fed 2491 birds Pontefract lib 09-30 south west wind.
Wrekenton h s 596 birds. This week’s race was won by Bowman, Scott & Kelly {B,S,K} flying their first young bird race this week. B,S,K timed 2 young hens which took 1hr 27mins 42 & 44 secs to cover the 85+ miles. Their first hen was a blue wh youngster which was bred by their good friend Keith Atherton. The lads have had a good few birds from Keith and have flown well with Staf van Reets when they got them from Atherton & Banister before they split up. This hen was doing 1722-08 to be 1st club, fed & sec. Their 2nd hen was bred by Lee Morton and is a De Shak Denduver from his good 02 hen and she was doing 1721-43. Laskey & Robinson timed 11 birds in 30 secs to be 3rd club fed & sec with the first bird which was a pied hen doing 1721-15, then they dropped 8 together 18 secs later and with only 4 secs splitting the 8 they took 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th & 13th club, 16th down to 22nd fed then 24th fed then another 2 birds 6 secs later to be 29th & 30th fed with vels from 1715 down to 1711 with a mixture of cocks and hens. Terry Elliott & John Watson clocked 2 blue cocks to be 4th & 12th club 13th & 21st fed, their first a blue was doing 1715-76 then their 2nd blue, which was a SS rung cock, was doing 1714-12.
Bensham h s 483 birds. The Gray bros {Bob & Mick} had a clean sweep in the club this week when they dropped 10 birds together in 12 secs. Their first bird took 1hr 29mins 31secs and the 10th bird took 1hr 29 mins 43secs. Most of these birds were timed in out of the first race when they dropped 19 birds together. They win the fed 2 bird club with a young mealy cock that was 6th fed this week and 4th fed from the first race. They ended up 4th down to 12th fed and then 15th with the 10th pigeon {good flying}. Quinn, son, Smith & Noble timed 4 birds in, 3 cocks and a hen to be 14th, 26th, 27th & 28th fed. Their first bird was a hen that wins the fed 1 bird club and 2nd in the 2 bird club doing 1715-51.
Dunston h s 418 birds Neil {the salad dodger} Peart was the winner for the 2nd week running with a GB blue cock that was doing 1712-86 to be 25th fed. Morpeth & Scott were 2nd & 3rd club.
A good fast race with only 11 yards splitting the top 30 birds, but with some funny returns by the end of the day and there are still a few birds missing up to now.
To be continued...
