Successful decoying
Peter Theobald says believe what you see when it comes up to setting up a successful decoy pattern
Experienced decoyers will tell you that they have their favourite fields on the farms where they have permission to control pigeons. These will be fields that produce good bags year on year, regardless of the crop being grown. But have you ever wondered why this is? From my own observations, these fields are invariably under natural flightlines, which pigeons use all the year round as they head out to feed. Sooner or later that field will contain something the woody wishes to eat, so the process of all the birds in the area congregating on that field begins.
The field will almost certainly be on the pigeon’s natural highway and the build up is often swift, particularly if the crop contains the only available food in the area. Finding food and passing on that information to other pigeon is why decoying is so successful; we are presenting what the birds expect to see when they arrive at their chosen field.
Quite how they pass this information on has always puzzled me, but I am convinced any flockfeeding bird, be they corvids, geese or woodies, can tell by their mates’ flight patterns whether they are heading out to feed or returning to roost. If a pigeon is heading out to feed, any other pigeon that it passes will observe which ways it’s going and, in due course, head off in the same direction. That is what’s known as a flightline and identifying it is central to a successful day’s decoying, so we can judge where to set up on our chosen field.
Sound effects
It sounds simple: watch pigeons piling into a field on a regular flightline and set up where the line enters the field. But we haven’t considered what effect the wind and the sound of our shooting will have on the bird’s line. We all know how quickly pigeons change their line when feeding on rape; the moment they locate where we are set up.
They can only do this if they can see their mates heading off in a different direction and trust that they know where an alternative field of rape is located. That is why it is essential to pick a windy day when tackling winter rape and doing your best to break the flocks up before starting shooting. It can sometimes take an hour to get birds away from their first choice field but it is usually time well spent, especially if you do not want them to head for their second choice the minute they hear your shooting.
Things are different in the summer months, when the winter flocks fragment into their breeding territories, but pigeons will still rely on visual signals to locate the best feeding opportunities. It’s like several B roads eventually joining a motorway to a particular destination. It is not unusual in the summer to have three pigeon
“Pigeon rely on visual signals from other birds to locate the best feeding opportunities”
‘motorways’ entering their chosen field, having collected all the B-road traffic along the way. That is when we tend to score our big bags, particularly when the stars align and a large population of birds is hell bent on the only available food for miles around.
This situation seldom occurs in the winter, when birds tend to roost in one wood and follow each other out to feed on a very tight flightline, instantly reverting to a different field if that line is disrupted. It is rare indeed to have two lines heading to the same field in the winter.
Time served
I have spent thousands of hours watching pigeons flighting to their chosen field and have learned to tell the difference between a bird heading out to feed and one that has already eaten. The latter will not respond to your decoys, no matter how much you tinker with them. Even on days when you think every bird should come to your chosen field, there will be some that ignore your set-up and sail on by to some unknown destination.
It is important to recognise these birds, because they are not going to decoy, but you may get a shot at them as they pass by, provided you do not expect them to drop in. Be warned, a moment’s hesitation on your part and the opportunity will be lost.
I have watched decoyers constantly changing the pattern of their decoys to try to get these birds to respond, but they are usually wasting their time once the pigeons have decided to head elsewhere. I have watched 1,000 pigeon feeding and fluttering on a given field but have still seen the odd bird completely ignore them to pass right over, heading elsewhere.
Having said that, you should ignore the occasional bird that does not respond to your set-up but you should do something if the majority is showing no interest. If you are sure that the pigeon entering your field can see your layout but are not dropping in, it generally means one thing: you’re in the wrong part of the field. It is a common misconception that if you are set up on the right field, pigeon will decoy no matter what, but that could not be more wrong.
We do our best to locate the part of the field where the pigeon choose to land and set up there. It matters not if that place is the furthest from an easy access or is in the middle of the field — the birds will always tell you where the best spot is.
Having stated that it is a mystery to us how they communicate, we need to trust what our own eyes are telling us on any given outing.