The National Flying Club enjoyed a good hard race from Saintes, when members sent 4,503 birds and had them liberated
at 05.30hrs. in a south east wind. With the very hot temperatures on the race day, a hard race was always on the cards and
with the east in the wind, the early action was on the west side of the country. Sections D, G, C, J and F took all the
top positions in the open result, with the first bird on the east side being clocked by Mr. & Mrs. Tony Hayward of Sandhurst
, recording 1st. section E. 23rd. open.
Graham Buck of Plympton, near Plymouth, had a brilliant race, clocking three of his four entries on the day and recording
1st. section D. 1st. open. His winning pigeon, clocked at 12.59hrs., was a natural yearling blue chequer cock, sent feeding
a ten day old youngster and looking at his hen again. This game cock wasn’t raced as a young bird, only being trained up to
50 miles and has raced every week this season, being sent to Lamborne (150 miles) the weekend before his Saintes National
win. I’m personally very happy to report that this National winner is half Eric Cannon of Godalming bloodlines, being bred
down from Champion ’Culmer Gold’, one of Eric’s N.F.C. Pau merit award winners. Graham purchased two young birds
at Eric’s Paulton dispersal sale in November 2000, both being grand children of ’Culmer Gold’ and these two
pigeons bred the dam of the Saintes National winner. The other half of his pedigree is Trevor Glover and Keith Bush
bloodlines.
Graham has been a pigeon fancier, on and off, for 40 years and first started up at the age of 14, with birds obtained
from a local fancier in his village. He tells me, to start with he wasn’t very successful, as he obtained pigeons from
here, there and every where, and on the whole they were a lot of rubbish. Graham always fancied long distance racing and
in 1961 obtained some good stock from W.C.T. Gundry, president of the N.F.C. in the 1960’s and started to have some
outstanding success in the longer events. His first club was the Totnes H.S., which raced the east to west route, and won
his first race from Templecoombe (76 miles). He maintains his early mistake was, obtaining pigeons from everywhere on
starting up, instead of getting a good family of pigeons, from outstanding lofts. Graham’s first loft was a small converted
garden shed, but he says he had some great fun racing to it.
Graham is only interested in long distance racing and races his birds on the natural system. He races inland club races
for training, but never has a clock set and generally trains his pigeons very little, because of the very bad Hawk problem
in Devon and Cornwall. Graham says the young birds have to be trained up to 50 miles, but the old birds are flagged around
the loft every day. His loft is 21ft.x 8ft., has three sections and trapping is through a Sputnik for the young birds, and
open doors for the old birds. He uses a straw deep litter on the loft floors and tells me it is changed about once a month.
Graham tells me he is an old fashion fancier, with an old fashion natural racing system and hopper feeds farm beans, peas
and maize. He pairs up his 20 pairs of old birds in the first week in March and only keeps about six stock birds. Graham
says he is always on the look out for good long distance pigeons and the main families kept are Keith Bush, Trevor Glover
and a few Eric Cannon. When bringing in new stock birds he always looks for good long distance performances and never the
look of the pigeon. His 30 young birds are raced to the perch and if they are raced, he never bothers to have a clock set,
just sending so they learn the ropes. Graham has worked in a paper mill for 35 years and says his wife, Pauline, is a great
help with his pigeon management, as he is a shift worker and works odd hours. He says he would like to thank Yvonne,
the lady next door, as she looks after the pigeons when Buck family are not at home and does a great job feeding them when
they are on holiday. His best performance in the N.F.C., prior to winning the Saintes National was, 1st. section D. 57th.
open Pau in 1998. He is a great worker for the sport, being the club secretary for many years and says in his opinion the
sport of pigeon racing has gone backwards in the last 20 years. Graham never inbreeds, just pairs good pigeons to good
pigeons and has never had any luck with late bred youngsters. He never feeds anything special for the moult, feeding the
same mixture all the year around, but put them on barley after Christmas, to fine then down a bit, before pairing up.
Congratulations to Graham on his brilliant Saintes National win!
Section winners in the ’Bamford’s Top Flight’ Saintes National were:
(A) L. Severe 1198 : (B) F. & P. Emery & son 1263 : (C) M. & G. Ayles 1304 : (D) G. Buck 1403 :
(E) Mr. & Mrs. A. Hayward 1265 : (F) Mr. & Mrs. F.J. Crawford 1293 : (G) B.S. Sheppard 1338 : (H) S.G. Biss 1092 :
(I) Till Bros. 1256 : (J) L.A. Whittingham & son 1299 : (K) N. Laycock 1264 : (L) R, D & B. Brindle & M. Farrell 1242.
Congratulations to you all!
N.F.C. Convoyer’s Report (Colin Bates).
All birds picked up at marking at marking stations, travelling down to Portsmouth, calling at Crewe and Frome.
All birds fed and watered at the marking stations. Sailed for Canne at 23.15hrs., docked at 06.30hrs and left for Saintes,
stopped on route near Nantes, to water and rest the birds. Arrived at the Saintes liberation site at 14.00hrs. and parked
under trees to give the convoy some shade from the sun. Watered on arrival at site and feed the birds at 15.00hrs.
On the race day, I phoned my race advisor, Ray Barrington, and he gave me a good line of flight forecast, with the weather
being hot in France. With sun on the baskets, I liberated at 05.30hrs. and the birds cleared well. Thanks to my Catterall
drivers, Brian and Mike, for all their good work.
I would like to finish this week’s ’NATIONAL FORUM’ by saying, well done, once again, to Graham Buck
on his wonderful performance in the Saintes National.
If you need to contact me with any N.F.C. news, please phone: 01372 463480 or
email: keithmott@btopenworld.com
