NEWS FROM SCOTLAND
Reports by Joe Murphy
Austin Whitaker and Jocky Scott of Fife
Well the festive season is over and we had a great time visiting all the family and it is great to see the reaction of the children at this time of the year. Our grandson Liam aged 7 was so overcome at his presents from Santa that he burst into tears and said ‘Oh I must have been a good boy that Santa has gave me these’. Needless to say his mum and Craig were in tears as the three of them cuddled each other. This to me is what makes Christmas so special when a little child appreciates the gifts received and moments like this live with you forever.
Outstanding Gesture
While on about receiving a gift I have to mention the wonderful gesture that Billy Holland (organiser of the Scotland One Loft Race) has done. He used some of the money gained from the above event and added his own personal contribution to feed 200 children for a year. Billy contacted Mary’s Meals (named after Mary the mother of Jesus who brought up her child in poverty). Mary’s Meals provide daily meals to chronically hungry children as this may be the only meal they will have that day. The great thing about this project is the child has to go to school to obtain the meal so they are being fed and educated at the same time. So in this way the hungry child is attracted to the classroom where they can gain a better future for themselves and their community. By providing one good meal to hungry, impoverished children every school day, they are filling their empty bellies so they have the energy and opportunity to learn, which can be their escape route out of poverty in later life. Daily attendance improves, concentration improves, education of girls is encouraged and better grades are achieved. In Malawi, it costs £7 to provide Mary’s Meals to a child for a whole school year and an average of £10.70 per child globally. One of the great things about this venture is Mary’s Meals are committed to spending at least 93p of every £1 donated to this charitable work, and are very careful to keep running costs as low as possible and not wasting money on anything that is not absolutely necessary. Wherever possible Mary’s Meals purchase locally produced food for the meals serve within the schools, this supports the local economy, it also respects local culture and food preferences, and it avoids incurring extra transport costs. For example in Malawi, they serve Likuni Phala, a nutritious maize porridge fortified with vitamins and minerals. They have over 60,000 volunteers, usually parents who cook and serve over 500,000 meals every school day. They draw up rotas, manage the stores, look after the cooking stoves, and make the idea of Mary’s Meals a reality. They are willing to volunteer their services in this way because they understand better than anyone else how important this daily meal is to their children. Billy Holland told me that this was his ‘Christmas Present’. He did not want anything else and was only too happy helping these children. I have always had a great respect for Billy Holland over the years but this wonderful gesture and kindness has put him in a class of his own.
Scottish One Loft Race No More
While on about Billy Holland he has informed me that he is not running the One Loft race this year. The reason behind this is proposals put forward for the SNFC A.G.M. to disallow one loft pigeons from competing in their young bird national. In this day and age when we are losing members right, left and centre to our sport and we already have a ‘split’ with 2 so called nationals in Scotland this beggars belief. I keep saying it is pigeon fanciers who are killing their own sport and here is another nail in the coffin. This has come about because Billy and Billy Bilsland cleaned up in the young bird national last year. If this proposal does go through it will not stop these 2 fanciers from winning in the 2014 young bird race because they are good fanciers and have quality pigeons. More importantly they race with the Up North Combine and their pigeons have been down the road further than the majority of the young pigeons being sent to the national, in fact the young bird national is a comeback race to these pigeons. That is why Billy Bilsland has taken the first 5 and 6 open positions in the last 2 young bird nationals and don’t think he will not clean up again this year. I’m sorry to see the One Loft go as it was a great venture for the Scottish sport and I know that the fanciers from outside Scotland who competed and won were over the moon to be on the national result. I spoke to Billy Holland after last year’s event and he even thought of getting these people to join the SHU and SNFC and compete as individual members flying into the One Loft location. This would have increased the revenue of both organisations but alas this will never come to fulfilment.
Thank You
Ian French has asked me on behalf of Anna Donnachie to THANK all the fanciers who purchased pigeons from the sale of her husband Mike’s entire clearance sale and she wishes them all the best with their purchases. It is a sad time to part with all your pigeons when you have been so involved with them over the years but I can assure fanciers they were quality pigeons and I’m more than happy with the pair I purchased and look forward to racing the offspring from them. A special thank you must go to Ian who conducted the sale and dealt with the distribution of the pigeons which was a great help to Anna.
East of Scotland Show Racer Society (East Region)
The Second show of the season was held at the Hill of Beath Ex-Servicemen’s Club on Sunday 15th December. Judges for the day were Stuart Donaldson Blairgowrie & Brian Kinnear Pitlessie Fife. 260 birds were entered for the judges to select. Once again the partnership of John & Alice Bell were breaking records fresh from winning the SHU Trust Show at Lanark on the Saturday. They went on to win Best In Show with their Young Dark Chequer hen a double winner at the show, which was Best In Show at the first show also. This is a feat never to have happened before winning Best Young Bird at both shows so a champion of the future! They won six out of the ten classes, with Struan Ferguson having a double winner with a Mealy Old Hen and Wallace & Ferguson winning two firsts with Red Cocks. Runner Up to Best in Show was also John & Alice Bell with a young Dark Chequer cock.
Likeliest Old Cock - judge B Kinnear 1st J & A Bell -Dark Chequer, 2nd J & A Bell 3rd S Ferguson 4th J & A Bell 5th Wallace & Ferguson 6th C Miller
Likeliest Old Hen - judge S Donaldson 1st S Ferguson Mealy 2nd J & A Bell 3rd C Winter 4th Wallace & Ferguson 5th J & A Bell 6th C Winter
Looking Thru Pen Old Cock - judge S Donaldson 1st Wallace & Ferguson -Red Chequer 2nd C Winter 3rd C Miller 4th S Ferguson 5th & 6th S Ferguson
Looking Thru Pen Old Hen - judge B Kinnear 1st S Ferguson -Mealy (double winner) 2nd Wallace & Ferguson 3rd C Miller 4th Wallace & Ferguson 5th S Ferguson 6th Wallace & Ferguson
Looking Thru Pen Young Cock - judge B Kinnear 1st Wallace & Ferguson -Red 2nd S Ferguson 3rd S Ferguson 4th C Miller 5th C Miller 6th S Ferguson
Looking Thru Pen Young Hen - judge S Donaldson 1st J & A Bell -Dark Chequer (Double Winner) Best in Show and Best Young Bird 2nd J & A Bell 3rd S Ferguson 4th S Ferguson 5th S Ferguson 6th Wallace & Ferguson
Likeliest Young Cock - judge S Donaldson 1st J & A Bell -Dark Chequer (Reserve Champion) 2nd J & A Bell 3rd J & A Bell 4th Wallace & Ferguson 5th C Miller 6th C Miller
Likeliest Young Hen - judge B Kinnear 1st J & A Bell -Dark chequer (double winner) (Best in Show) 2nd S Ferguson 3rd J & A Bell 4th S Ferguson 5th C Winter 6th C Miller
The Championship Points are being led by John & Alice Bell on 139 points from S Ferguson on 78 points. The Young Bird Points are being led by John & Alice Bell on 74 Points from S Ferguson on 37 points. The four bird team has two completed teams with S Ferguson on 29 points leading J & A Bell on 24 points with the young dark chequer hen dominating the shows for John & Alice Bell leading the bird for society on 30 points from S Ferguson mealy old hen on 21 points with three 1st prize cards. The champion Old cock leader is J & A Bell with a dark chequer on 18 points and they also lead the young cock classes with a dark chequer on 20 points. The yearling cock is also led by them with a dark chequer on 18 points and Wallace & Ferguson lead the yearling hens on 13 points. Wishing all members a Merry Christmas and looking forward to our next show on the 29th of December. The medley classes will be old cock and old hens 2 years and over.
Scottish Christmas Race
This was flown by the hardened members of Danderhall Club open to members of Pentland Midlothian and Traprain as well as some members of East of Scotland Federation where 39 of the original 40 lofts entered 184 birds (195 were pre-paid) for the annual Christmas race from Morpeth flown on 21st of December with the convoy liberated at 09-20am into a south west wind. Willie Kinnear and son Barry had a great race being 1st 2nd 3rd & 5th with the velocities of the first 3 birds being 1129.55 and two birds on 1128.55. The partnership wins £2.958 for their efforts not bad Christmas present so well done Willie & Barry. 4th place is A W Robertson of Granton club winning £147; A Young of Danderhall is 6th lifting £70 with McCormack & Fraser of Castlebrae in 7th spot winning £713. McNamee & Dewar of Danderhall are 9th winning £208. D Linton of Granton won 9th & 11th places and a good lift of £208. J Douglas of Danderhall is 10th winning £107. C Brown of the Castlebrae is 12th winning £94. J Pryde of Woodburn is 13th winning £94 and Power & Smith of Castlebrae are 14th winning £12 and 15th is F Perring of Danderhall winning £10 this pigeon recorded a velocity of 1057 so this will give readers an idea of how good a race this was. The official paid out was £4.361.00 which is truly amazing for a pigeon race in the dead of winter. Well done to the above winners and to all the other fanciers who timed in birds from this Christmas race. I have also heard that this federation are holding two young bird races on a Friday with basking on a Thursday evening to try and combat the young bird losses they have experienced in the past. These will be from the Ripon and Wakefield race points as at this time there are a number of federations all liberating within a 10 mile radius of each other so to combat this the Pentland Hills federation are trying this experiment. At least these people are forward thinking and trying to combat the problem and I hope it works out for them and maybe more federations need to look at combating the losses we have every year with youngsters. I have also heard that Edinburgh Premier & Bonnyrigg have joined Pentland Hills federation for 2014 and when you think that Traprain, Scottish Borders and East of Scotland all go with Pentland at 25 pence a pigeon down to Peterborough then it is little wonder this federation is so successful. I have heard that Dundee and Angus federations are convoying their pigeons together in 2014 and it is just a pity that other federations don’t join them and they can follow Pentland by cutting the cost of birdage through time.
It’s a boy
I received a phone call from a happy Tom McEwen from Elphinstone in East Lothian informing me that his son Scott and his wife Fiona have given birth to a little boy Finley who arrived on Boxing Day weighing in at 7 lbs 4 ounces; he is 3 ½ weeks early. Tom and his wife Marlene are ecstatic as this is their first grandchild and they are overwhelmed as are the happy mum and dad. I know that their many friends will congratulate them all on such a wonderful start to 2014 with the birth of little Finlay.
Obituary
Jackie Blackhurst of Easthouses, Midlothian passed away on the 1st of January 2014 after a long illness bravely borne. Jackie was one of the great characters of the pigeon sport and was one hell of a ‘Doo Man’. While in hospital the nurse asked him what he took in this tea and quick as a flash he said ‘Oh hen I don’t know, you will have to phone the wife and ask her as she makes my tea’. This was the type of man he was. One of his greatest achievements with the birds was when he won 2nd open SNFC Le Farte Barnard Gold Cup race with this great little hen ‘Alana’. Jackie and his son Stevie and his mate Wattie along with Joe Allan also from Easthouses attended my Sporting Challenge nights out and they loved every minute of them. Jackie thoroughly enjoyed these nights out as he could have a drink and enjoy good pigeon company. To his wife Jessie, daughters Diane and Jacqueline and sons Stevie, Kevin and John and their partners and children we send our heartfelt condolences at the passing of one of the greatest characters to fly pigeons in Scotland.
Jake Young of Danderhall Midlothian. Andy Miller informed me that Jake the senior partner of the J & T Young partnership passed away after a stay in hospital. This father and son partnership is without doubt one of the top lofts in Pentland Hills Federation and it is so sad that Jake has left us. To Mrs Young, Tam and all the family we send our heartfelt condolences at their loss.
Joe’s Joke
Three men died on Christmas Eve and were met by Saint Peter at the pearly gates. 'In honour of this holy season' Saint Peter said, 'you must each possess something that symbolizes Christmas to get into heaven.' The Englishman fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a lighter. He flicked it on. 'It's a candle', he said. 'You may pass through the pearly gates' Saint Peter said. The Scotsman reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. He shook them and said, 'They're bells.' Saint Peter said 'You may pass through the pearly gates'. The Irishman started searching desperately through his pockets and finally pulled out a pair of women's panties. St. Peter looked at the man with a raised eyebrow and asked, 'And just what do those symbolize?' Paddy replied, 'These are Carol’s.' And So The Christmas Season Begins......
Please continue to keep the news flowing; to Joe Murphy Mystical Rose Cottage 2 Flutorum Avenue Thornton by Kirkcaldy KY1 4BD or phone 01592 770331 or to my NEW EMAIL ADDRESS at:
© Compiled by Joe Murphy
