Racing pigeons is definitely thrilling on many levels. One is overcome with joy when his pigeon makes its journey homeward. Setting it free and then sitting in wait till it comes back has a mixture of excitement and fear until the pigeon arrives at the loft. Pigeon racing is a sport whereby many pigeons are released and first one home is the victor.
Pigeon racing demands you to incorporate a lot of techniques. From the beginning keep two pigeons. From the outset acquire two birds. If they are not purebred that should not put you off your goals. You might be even taken aback to realize that it is a common occurrence for breeders to breed crossbreeds. Secondly read as much as you can on pigeons. After gathering the information you should be well versed on food acquisition, diseases the pigeons are susceptible to, loft housekeeping, moulting, banding, tossing as well as training guides. The upkeep of the pigeon needs to be rigorously followed so that you don’t compromise your pigeon and its winning chances in any way.
New pigeon trainers are fall into a trap of having a house pet relationship with their pigeons. Given that you invest quite a large amount of time to the birds this is bound to happen but one has to stick to the primary goal and that is to create pigeon racing. When one coaches an athlete there are some strict rules in place so that they develop a winning stance. Pigeons are no different and the same strict rules need to apply to them as well.
Another common mistake is over feeding your pigeons. Pigeons have the tendency to gain weight quickly. Most trainers commonly feed their pigeons around 6 times per week. You might as well not bother racing the pigeon if they are fat as they will not move with the speed needed for winning.
Humans are not the only creatures that have to deal with stress. If their living arrangements are not in order then this will result in poor performance. Safe guard the lofts against mice and other rodents. Change their feeding water continuously as diseases often occur from unhygienic conditions and most importantly don’t push your pigeons to participate in many races. Smart trainers only allow their pigeons to participate in four official races annually.
One can easily see that a race pigeon requires one to have a lot of dedication and time. You therefore need to source insightful information as you need to be fully versed in this field to become successful at it.