NEWS FROM SCOTLAND
Reports by Joe Murphy
Joe Murphy receives his trophy for Best Garden from deputy Provost of Fife
Last weekend our eldest son Mark got married to Veronica. They have lived together for the past 14 years and he has asked her many times if she would marry him but was always told ‘No’. Then the last leap year Veronica asked Mark if he was not asking her to marry him and he said ‘No, I’m fed up asking you so I’ve given up’ so she proposed to him and the final day has taken place. It was a wonderful day and they had all our 10 grandchildren plus our great granddaughter involved and it was a wonderful family occasion. The couple are away to Prague, Vienna and then Budapest on honeymoon and by the time this is published will be back home in Scotland with plenty of stories to tell us. We are following their daily visits to places via Facebook and they are having a lovely time. I will include a photograph of the happy couple.
Veronica & Mark
SNFC
I heard this week that Andy Garven has handed in his resignation as secretary of the SNFC and this is down to I'll health, so I know that many people like myself will wish him well in the future as this is a stressful job and no matter how hard you try you will never please everyone. However this is a good opportunity to restructure this job and make it into a part time appointment. The club like every club is losing members due to age, giving up the sport or any other reason you can think of and to have a person in a full time job just does not make sense in the present climate. I hope whoever is appointed sees the changes that need to be made and moves the club into the high technological world that we are in today. We have Facebook and Twitter to name just 2 ways of communication and we should be using these to keep in touch with the membership or for highlighting the performances of the pigeons and members of the club. Everyone goes on about PIPA and the amount of money spent on pigeons, it is not their fault! They are highlighting top quality pigeons and fanciers and the demand is there for these pigeons. Many years ago you could read about all the great fanciers we had up here in Scotland Jock Reid, Eddie Newcombe, Robbie Stoddart etc. but nowadays ask anyone outside Scotland to name an outstanding fanciers and they would be hard pressed to name ONE. I recently did a feature on G W & P Macaloney in the Pictorial and one top English flier did not know anything about them or had even heard their name. Yet this partnership are without doubt the BEST club and federation fliers in Scotland with 1st prize wins against birdages that are the highest in Europe. There again ask anyone in Britain who Mark Gilbert or Geoff Cooper is and they can tell you. The point I’m trying to make is the SNFC need to move with the times and now is the chance to do it and I hope they appoint someone in the same frame of mind as me.
Feedback
Received an email from a fanciers who does not wish me to print his name but wishes to express his opinion on the young bird losses I spoke about a few weeks ago he wrote. ‘Hi Joe, I was reading your article on losses and would like to throw in some "food for thought". I’m not sure racing pigeons have the homing ability of days gone by as pigeons are bred and prepared in a different way. Young birds for example, are often bred much earlier than years gone by are then put on darkness, are limited to daylight hours, and in most cases get perhaps one hour of exercise a day. They are then trained before racing to leave the basket and on homing to the loft immediately trap. They are forced to be made more advanced by having a full body moult, but retain their primary flights to allow them to fly the full young programme. Don't get me wrong Joe, many fanciers do it very successfully and manage to also time these same birds as yearlings from 400 plus mile races. Many have never had the same success flying on the natural system, and would never go back to the old ways, but I wonder if our birds are bred and expected to perform too early, as most are not "street wise" enough when the going gets tough. This is only an observation and not a reason, and I would not wish far better fanciers than I thinking that I’m suggesting they are causing large losses with their methods’.
I have said much the same thing during the season but to be honest 2013 seems to be the worst losses for many years. I have highlighted pigeons being reported in Denmark and Germany from races in France to Scotland but it is the same all over. I also stress last year that it was predicted that solar activity would be at its worst in 2013 and I wonder if this has had anything to do with the losses. It could also be the quality of pigeons we are keeping nowadays and maybe they are not up to the standard of the ‘Old Strains’ we used to keep. I just don’t know. I remember years ago I used to speak to Dale Newcombe on a regular basis and we both tried to purchase direct children from 1st open national winners, Gold Award winners (5 times a prize winner from France to Scotland). Now you would think that with having children from these pigeons that by blending them together they would breed ‘Champions’. We both had our success in the national results but it was not as easy as just buying direct children from the winners. It is the same story with a top breeding pair: one year you can have every youngster bred from them left in the loft the next year you could be lucky if you have one or two left. It just doesn’t make sense anymore and I’m coming to the belief that it is better to just train the youngsters and leave them to mature and race them as yearlings. I don’t see the point in purchasing quality bloodlines to throw their offspring away in the first year of their lives.
Hawk Attacks
Received an email from Gordon Baird who wrote: ‘I mentioned to you before that I keep my pigeons on a farm and last week when the birds were let out for a fly prior to getting a bath, a peregrine came out of nowhere and scooped one of my birds out of the sky and flew off with it, never to be seen again. I was annoyed with myself thinking the hawk must have been looking for a feed at that time of day. So this week I let the birds out at 3.30 pm and within 5 minutes the peregrine was in amongst them again, it swooped down out of sight about 200 yards away, and I went looking for it without any success, but when I got back to my loft a sparrow hawk was picking the feathers off the back of a young blue hen. When it saw me it was off like a shot, and thankfully the blue hen survived the experience. When the birds returned home I had lost 2 both raced young birds, one a blue bar and one a black chequer. The peregrine has no preferred colour choice he simply dives down at speed and homes in on one that tries to dive away for cover. If he catches the bird by the tail or the wing, the pigeon can be lucky and escape minus a few feathers, but that is the exception rather than the rule. I have witnessed the peregrine and the sparrow hawk hunting many times, but in my opinion the sparrow hawk is much better at killing by surprise, so much so that they will come in low at ground level with speed and agility and catch a pigeon at almost every attempt. It is usually close to your loft and can even be behind the loft and you won't be aware, whereas the peregrine causes extreme panic.’
Bronze Winner
George Veitch of Pencaitland in East Lothian. George’s chequer cock SU 07 E 973 won a Bronze Award for 5 times a prize winner from the inland races with the SNFC. His performances are as follows: 2008 he won 39th section B 127th open Eastbourne flying 379 miles 397 yards recording a velocity of 1042.85. In 2011 he won 7th section B 92nd open Marlborough flying 313 miles 79 yards recording a velocity of 995.34 he also competed in the Eastbourne race winning 54th section B 77th open flying 379 miles 397 yards recording a velocity of 1117.47. The following year 2012 he won 30th section B 73rd open Cheltenham flying 277 miles 708 yards recording a velocity of 1084.91 and then this year he won 123rd section B 308th open Maidstone flying 353 miles 1643 yards recording a velocity of 1044.71 so well done to George and his good chequer cock.
Joe’s Joke
Subject: Catholic sex: A young couple wanted to join the church. The priest told them, 'We have a special requirement for new member couples. You must abstain from sex for one whole month.' The couple agreed, but after two-and-a-half weeks returned to the Church. When the priest ushered them into his office, the wife was crying and the husband was obviously very depressed. 'You are back so soon...Is there a problem?' the priest enquired. 'We are terribly ashamed to admit that we did not manage to abstain from sex for the required month.' The young man replied sadly. The priest asked him what happened. 'Well, the first week was difficult... However, we managed to abstain through sheer willpower. The second week was terrible, but with the use of prayer, we managed to abstain. However, the third week was unbearable. We tried cold showers, Prayer, reading from the Bible....anything to keep our minds off Carnal Thoughts. One afternoon my wife reached for a can of paint and dropped it. When she bent over to pick it up, I was overcome with lust and I just had my way with her right then and there. It was lustful, loud, passionate sex. It lasted for over an hour and when we were done we were both drenched in sweat,' admitted the man, shamefacedly. The priest lowered his head and said sternly, 'You understand this means you will not be welcome in our church.' 'We know.' said the young man, hanging his head, 'We're not welcome at Homebase either.'
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
