Artículo publicado en www.elimarpigeons.com hace unos años.
THE HARDEST ROUTE - PART 2
ONE MAN'S MISSION TO
WIN AGAINST THE ODDS IN NORTHERN SPAIN
My devotion to the old English bloodlines
by Sergio Capín Barreda
Since I found through the Elimar website the English
long distance events culture, I have understood the big selection process your
birds have been suffering over the last 100 years.
I appreciate the special environmental conditions you face: the channel, bad weather and the unfavourable location of some of the marathon fanciers' lofts situated in the more westerly position of all the International convoy.
The dispersion of the lofts into the country with massive differences between 500 and 700 milers is another plus favourable to creating your type of long distance pigeon.
Here in Spain, each province has a different championship, but we don´t celebrate a big race similar to your Grand National. People here have a different culture and the longest race in Spain is celebrated from Lisboa to Barcelona: 650 miles from SW to NE with poor results.
Fanciers are afraid of losing pigeons and the culture of importing European strains of pigeons predominates over the strict selection process of your own pigeons in your own racing conditions. Only a few fanciers achieve the master title of the sport here in Spain. The vast majority are only compulsive purchasers of foreign strains.
Your type of long distance events select a special bird capable of flying solo along many miles. The best quality for a racing pigeon, in my opinion.
You have developed a powerful navigational instinct and a survivability quality which distinguishes your pigeons from the rest of the continental strains of birds that fly in massive flocks to their lofts concentrated in small areas such as the small countries of Holland and Belgium.
My archetype
of an Old English bloodline Marathon Cock. See text for details.
My archetype of an Old English bloodline Marathon Hen. See text for
details.
From a
foreigner's point of view, I see a massive difference - with some exceptions -
relative to the commercial purposes between English and continental fanciers.
English fanciers aren't merchants and I think this is the key to preserving the
right material selected for the task.
I don´t like
“professional” lofts which treat the pigeons as cows in a farm, because in that
case the fancier’s part will be more important than the pigeon’s. I´d like to
achieve success with pigeons from a small loft with a natural system fancier
whose birds are selected by their genes, not by the system.
Though Elimar I
came into contact with Cameron Stansfield and he gifted me a dozen pigeons,
each evolved from pigeons which have coped with English conditions over many
years. More about these various bloodlines later but this week I have included
two photos, one of what I term my archetypal cock and one of my archetypal hen.
Cameron has sent me this blood. My archetypal cock (see photo) was bred by
Keith Bush from Cossall from his Lerwick Gold Award cock and gifted to Brian
& Cameron Stansfield as a baby. He is responsible for 1st section, 2nd
section, 2nd section, 3rd section, 4th section etc from either Pau or Tarbes at
distances of between 670 & 690 miles for three different lofts in National
Flying Club and British International Championship Club races. My archetypal
hen (see photo) is John Wills' Britannia - winner of 1st Open BICC Perpignan
for John & Rose Wills. Mr Wills gifted Cameron a daughter of Britannia and
she bred Cameron's 3rd section NFC Dax International 636 miles and is also in
the breeding of Mark Gilbert's 1st Open L&SECC Old Hens in 2011.
Finally, I love the
English type of bird selected through this way because I think this is the only
way to build a strong family of long distance champions here and there.
I will keep you
informed about how I progress in my attempt to build a family of pigeons which
can cope in my part of Norther Spain.
Elimar note: Part 1 of Sergio's venture can be found in the Lofts &
Articles section on Elimar.
