PIGEON RACING
Birds missing in action as weather takes its toll
WINDS and weather were favourable when the 1 400 pigeons flying home over 500-plus kilometres to the Border and Kowie lofts were released at Oudtshoorn in two batches just over a week ago (7.30am – Yearlings and 8.30 – Any-age birds).
By that Saturday evening fanciers were left trying to puzzle out the erratic return of their pigeons with some lofts having only half of their race teams reaching home perches by nightfall.
In what appeared to be parallel circumstances, many pigeon unions across South Africa experienced similar outcomes with perhaps the worst case being that of a Cape union with 2 000 birds released and only seven birds reaching home on the day.
While local fliers reported good returns of the missing pigeons on the ensuing Sunday, the question remains as to what was the cause of such a result.
Scientific experiments since 1970, have shown that the animals using the earth’s magnetic field as an aid to navigation, will have problems when solar activity creates strong geomagnetic storms which distort the earth’s normal magnetic field and thus will impact upon the pigeons’ abilities to navigate.
This appears to be the most likely explanation for last Saturday’s race outcome.
That something was unusual is seen in arrival times . Usually it is just a matter of seconds separating birds at the top of the result sheet.
In this race it took 35 minutes to fill just the top-10 positions in the Anyage event.
The first bird was clocked at the loft of Mario Ferreira in Stutterheim (75.5km/h) almost 10 minutes before the second-placed arrival in Queenstown at the Francois Mostert’s Loft. This loft trapped the third bird as well, another five minutes adrift.
On down the result sheet it was the same. The first EL bird, flown by Ian Ristow and Les Jamieson of Northerns, posted a speed 69.4km/h in tenth spot a full 35 minutes behind the winning time.
The Yearlings fared somewhat better, as far as arrival times go, and while the gaps separating the first birds were not as wide, nevertheless, on down the result sheet the arrivals mirrored the Any-age situation.
Jean Rademeyer of Bushman’s River had three pigeons land to clinch the top three spots at 74.8km/h. Fourth went to Raymond Schenk at 73,8km/h. It was a Kowie clean sweep as their lofts took all the top-10 positions. First of the Border birds registered at Tiaan Landman’s loft in Queenstown (71.3km/h) with Mark Gendall of Northerns clocking the first EL bird (71.0km/h).
The next race from Beaufort West (500km) also promises to be a nervous affair for local fanciers as not only are there forecasts of more geomagnetic disruptions, but the general weather forecast suggests that this is also likely to present a challenge.