KEITH MOTT
“ON THE ROAD” WITH KEITH MOTT
National Young Bird Show Nottingham
The 150 mile drive up the M1 motorway to Nottingham in early November, to judge at the National Young Bird Show, started my 2015 judging commitment and I must say, I was looking forward to it very much, after my lay off from judging in 2014. I left home at 06.15hrs on the Saturday to make start time at Rushcliffe Leisure Centre and picked up my ol’ mate, Terry Haley, on the way, and after a little problem with the Satnav we arrived at 09.30hrs, half an hour before the start time. Our good friend, Matt Bentley, lives locally and he came over to the show with Jo Cuthbert, to score for Terry and myself. Jo came around with me and I’m not really sure that she enjoyed it, as I went into my ‘sergeant major’ mode, as I do when I’ve got seven classes to judge, shoot footage for my new video and take photos for the fancy press. I do get a bit bossy when I’m in full flow, ask my wife! LOL! When I’m filming the family on holiday or at Christmas, if they don’t perform the scene to my satisfaction, I make them do it again! Betty says she walks twice as far as me on holiday, where I make her walk up and down re-shooting video. LOL!
The Rushcliffe Leisure Centre is a brilliant venue to hold a big show like the National Young Bird. It is adjoining the local swimming pool and is part of a big leisure complex, which serves the general public in Nottingham. The show hall is first class for a big pigeon show, with plenty of space, good light and fresh air. Just perfect! This was my third time at the Rushcliffe, as I held the first of Eric Cannon’s three dispersal sales there in November 2000 and prior to that I visited the National Young Bird Show to have a look at the venue. This wonderful show has been run by Andy Lowe for about the last 20 years and the 2015 event was sponsored by Howdens and the Roper Store. Andy runs the show, being assisted on the Show Racer side by Les and Sarah Carter, who have been very successful for many years exhibiting the Colin Carter pigeons. I had a chat with Andy on the day and he told me, ‘my team and I run several big shows every season, including a special at Christmas. At this year’s show we have added adult classes, as unfortunately it is not viable to have just young bird classes as we are not reaching a large enough entry to cover to cost of the venue. The most important thing is to keep the show at the Rushcliffe Leisure Centre and we are trying to do this without increasing our entry fee. We want to make our events attractive to the fancy, so with this in mind, we will be putting £500 in the prize money on at both shows. We will also be awarding a ‘Best in Section’ rosette along with our Nottingham pottery to all section winners and £50 prize money to our ‘Best Member’s Bird’. Thanks to Andy Lowe for all his wonderful work over all those year and congratulations to him for winning ‘Best Young Bird’ at the 2015 show. Well do mate!
The show is run under NPA rules and the entry was down slightly this year as there was another show staged locally, but about 400 birds were entered, which included the usual Racer and Show Racer classes and several fancy Tumbler, Fantail and Roller classes. The judges for the Show Racer and Racer classes were: Mike Horner, Phillip Crawford, Les Petty, Nigel Westbury, Bob Hughes, Mervin Hoskins, Dai Roach, Alistair Tankard, Tony Baugh, Collin Bullard, Phil Harrod, Dale Spyby, Terry Haley and Keith Mott. The Les Petty and Phillip Crawford partnership of Little Addington won ‘Best in Show’ and ‘Best Opposite Sex’ with two wonderful mealies, which very closely related.
Les Petty was born in Greenwich, South London and he tells me his dad was a fancier, racing in the Friendly Homing Society. He had his first small 8ft x 6ft loft, which his dad built, with a small aviary on one end and he was about ten years old at the time. Les said, ‘my first pigeons were two pairs of Sion Mealies from one of my dad’s pals, Tom Sexton and another of dad’s friends, Ray Baker of Eltham, was very successful and taught me a lot about eye-sign. My interest in pigeons only lasted until I was about fourteen when football and girls took over. Years later in 1998 I was settle down and decided to restart and bought a pair of show racers at the Comrade Show, not sure how good they were I asked the opinion of an experience fancier standing by the sale pens. He turned out to be Ralph Howman and his birds form the basis of my red and Mealies today. At the time I was living in Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire and was introduced to Phil Crawford who lived about 10 minutes away, and he also kept show racers. He took me under his wing and taught me a lot about showing and encouraged me to join the Midland S.R.S. He also introduced me to Paul Rogers whose birds featured strongly in Phil’s team and I was given some of those birds whose bloodlines are still present in my team today’. He started showing in 1999 and in 2003 Phillip Crawford and Les decided to from the partnership and were quite successful. In 2005 Phil had to move to Wales and Les moved to Northamptonshire where he is still today and they are members of the Monmouth as well as Midland Show Racer Society. Several years ago Les met Alistair Tankard and on becoming great friend with him, have spent holidays at his house in the Scottish Highlands. Les says he has some of the best blues and blue chequers he has ever seen and Alistair has given Petty & Crawford some superb birds over the years. Two of Les and Phillip’s best Show Racers are: Red Cock GB 08S6522 winner of.1st Yearling Cock Bridlington 2009, Reserve Champion National Winners Show 2010, 1st Old Cocks Blackpool 2011 and Silver Hen GB 09S06208 winner of Best in Show Nation Winner Show 2011.
The partners have two lofts, the first a brick built 18ft x 9ft two sections structure with double glazed and is heated, which houses old and young cocks. Loft number two is made of timber and is 16ft x 8ft, with two sections and this houses their old and young hens. Les and Phillip pair up their 20 pairs of Show Racers in the second week of February each year and they breed about 60 young birds. They clean out twice a day and bath the birds twice a week during the show season, and keep more red and mealy birds than other colours. The partners have a penning room, which is heated and birds are penned the night prior to the show. Les Petty is currently the chairman of the Midland Show Racer Society and they only have about six members who show regularly, but the standard of birds is very good. Les is also a member of the Midland Columbarium Society based in Towcester Northants, where he also show his German Beauty homers
Annual Website Up-date
The month of November has seen me under take the annual massive task of updating my Internet website, www.keithmott.com I must say, I really enjoy my website and still can’t believe how popular it is, with it getting thousands of hits ever year. I think the secret behind a successful website is to keep updating it and keeping it fresh, which I’ve always worked hard at! The ‘Photo Album’, ‘Families Raced’ and ‘Loft History’ features have now had their 2016 up date. All the new photos and write ups on the 2016 pairs are now in place. The new list includes four new children of the champion Eric Cannon stock cock, ‘Foxwarren Fred’ and two direct off Brian Denney’s Champion ‘Brian’s Blue’, the NFC record holder. A special feature this year is a pair very inbred to ‘Sasha’s Boy’ the grandsire of 1st open International Agen in the 2015 season. I still get many emails and phone calls asking for detail on ‘Pigeon Fancier’s Lung’ and my old ‘Rabbit Hutch’ loft system, which has affected my life in past years. I have written several articles on the subject over the years, as in my opinion it is a very serious problem in our sport and have now written a good up dated article, which will stay as a permanent reference article for fanciers, with photos, on my website. I will be publishing the new reference article in my ‘ON THE ROAD’ page in the near future. Thanks to every one for supporting my website!
That’s our article for this week!
Thanks also for the many emails and phone calls I received about the 1960’s article, I really enjoyed that one!
can be contacted with any pigeon ‘banter’ or news on telephone number: 01372 463480 or email me on:
TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT.
