Well,
that’s racing over for an other year and we have six new National winners,
all looking forward to picking up their prizes and silver ware, at the N.F.C.
prize presentation, at Buxton in Derbyshire, on 13th. December. I
have mixed feelings about the 2003 season, it was great to see my friends, Ced
Allwright and Mark Gilbert, both win a National race, but the over riding
success story must be to see an English loft win 1ST. open
International from Dax, in the form of Brian Sheppard of Trowbridge. Great
stuff! My biggest disappointment was the way the Pau Grand National was so
badly messed up and then the problem swept under the carpet, hoping it would
beforgotten about. Well, I
haven’t forgotten and think the people concerned should be sacked, as they
are not doing the National Flying Club any good at all! When I think of what
has gone on in our premier club this season, it makes me sick and will be
resigning all my offices in the N.F.C. at the end of the season.
I
received an email this week from John Gibson of High Wycombe and reads:
Dear
Keith,
The ‘NATIONAL FORUM’ is a great P.R. vehicle, keep up the good
work. However, there is one over riding question this season. Why did R.
Barrington instruct the convoyer to move the liberation from Pau to Saintes
and liberate at 17.00hrs. Until this information is disseminated to all the
N.F.C. members, the rumours will not go away. The decision making must be
transparent.
Regards,
John Gibson.
Bob
Reeves of Exeter.
Enough
of that, let get on with this week’s article, which features a very dear
friend of mine, who won the Nantes National in 1996, Bob Reeves of Exeter. He
is one of the pigeon sport’s gentlemen and is not only a great pigeon racer,
but is also a pigeon lover, representing everything that is good about pigeon
racing. On my visits to Bob’s little loft, the birds are always bursting
with contentment, with his small team of natural old birds popping in and out,
feeding their young and generally enjoying life. On one of my many visits to
Bob’s bungalow, he had the young birds out for a fly and when he called them
down they alighted all over him, not from hunger, but from love.
Bob
won the Nantes National in 1996 with his two year old Warrington-Savage Barker
blue chequer hen, ‘Reevo’s My Peggy’, named after Bob’s late wife.
This game hen won the National while feeding a youngster, but was locked out
of the loft when she arrived home from Nantes, as Bob didn’t expect her home
so fast and was cleaning the old bird section out. The clock and thimbles were
in the bungalow and he lost a lot of time, clocking his National winner in his
kitchen. ‘Reevo’s My Peggy’ is medium apple bodied in the hand, with
silky feathering and a nice tic behind her orange eyes, which really sets her
off. She has been a truly class act, as prior to winning the Nantes National
she won many top positions including, 1st. club, 4th.
Section, 8th. Open W.E.C.A. Littlehampton, in spite of being a
really bad trapper. On her build up to her National win, she had four races,
including Rennes, and her last training toss was a single up from Torquay, 20
miles from the Exeter loft.
Bob
was born in Exeter and although his father wasn’t a pigeon fancier, he owned
some good Grayhounds in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s. Bob first became
involved with pigeons at the age of six, when he used to watch a school
friend’s father’s birds train and race. The young Bob kept his first birds
in a fish box, with chicken wire over the front. One particular fancier who
gave him some special help in getting started in pigeons was Tom Wilson, who
lived just down the street from the Reeves family. Tom’s loft was situated
on the old city wall, looking out over the River Exe and beyond to the Haldon
Hills, the present day Exeter liberation site. Bob said, that Tom was a grand
old fancier who taught him a lot of the basics of racing pigeons, which he has
never forgotten. Bob has been a fancier for 70 years, apart from the war
years, and his first club in which he raced was the Western Counties R.P.C.,
which is still racing on the north road today. He likes all sport, but his
other love is boxing, which he did competitively from the age of nine, boxing
foe Exeter Boxing Club and the Royal Navy. Bob had 421 amateur bouts and lost
only 11 of them. His first loft was 3ft. square and 18 inches deep, made from
Tate & Lyle sugar boxes and nailed to the bathroom wall. He had to get up
a ladder to clean and feed the birds and once he got splinters in his bottom
when he slid down the ladder with some race rubbers, to run to another
fancier’s loft to clock in!
Bob’s
present loft is 12ft.x 6ft., with two sections, one with 12 nest boxes for
natural racers and one with 28 box perches for the young birds. His self-built
loft has open door trapping and he maintains that good ventilation, and plenty
of it, is a must for good loft design. He pairs up all his old birds on the
full moon in March, when the wild birds mate up, that’s when he mates up. He
says, he races the natural system, as he is an old fancier and it suits him.
His birds have lots of clean water, good corn, a clean loft, and most of all,
a lot of love. During the race season he likes to give his birds three
training tosses in the week, Tuesday 20 miles, Wednesday 40 miles and Thursday
20 miles, as this keeps them on their toes and muscled up. His family of
pigeons is made up the old English strains of Warrington-Savage Barker,
Kirkpatric-Savage Barker and a few Busschaerts, and they do him proud. The
Warrington-Savage Barkers were bred down from Menzie’s Lerwick hen, only
bird on the day and in race time from 671 miles. The Kirkpatric-Savage Barkers
were obtained from his son, Allan, who raced them with outstanding success to
Thurso. Bob’s best performance to date was winning the Nantes National in
1996. He says it’s a race he will never forget and only fanciers who have
won the National, know the fantastic feeling you have when you are told that
you have won.
His
family is very interested in the pigeons. Indeed, they are a smashing family.
He has two sons who are both fanciers, Bob Junior who now lives in Malta, and
Allan, who had to give up because of the dreaded pigeon fancier’s lung, but
still likes to go to see his dad’s birds on race days. Bob races in the
Exeter Invitation R.P.C., of which he is a life vice president, and races both
north and south routes. When racing, Bob feeds his old birds with a good
mixture, as this seems to keep them in condition longer. He gives them a
trapping mixture and a lettuce twice a week and maintains that there is plenty
of iron in green feed. He also boils stinging nettles and, after straining
them, puts the liquid in the drinking water. Bob has tried a deep litter of
wood shavings on the floor of the loft, but doesn’t like it. He prefers to
get on hie hands and knees for a daily scrape out. When breeding, he puts the
best to the best to keep the line going until he needs a bit of new blood,
hopefully from the same strain. When selecting breeders, he goes for good
type, balance in the hand and good winning bloodlines. When you have had
pigeons for 70 years, he thinks you have a feeling that you’ve put the right
two birds together.
There
you have it, Bob Reeves, the N.F.C. Nantes National winner! I can be
contacted, with any good N.F.C. news, on Telephone: 01372 463480 or Email
address: keithmott@btopenworld.com
