Naive people sometimes (03-10-23)
Sometimes the alarming thought occurs to me that the naivety of many sportsmen has no lower limit. With many foreigners as the frontrunner, of course.
Take the Dirk v d Bulck pigeons for arguments’ sake. Those are hot right now. Abroad even more so than here, but that is due to cunning propaganda, not set up by himself. If you read about him, he seems like a down-to-earth and honest guy, as evidenced by what he claims in particular in a report about 'breeding couples'.
Experience taught him that ALL pigeons also give a lot of waste. He finds a breeding couple that gives ONE really good one every year very exceptional. In the Janssen book you can read who said about the same thing: Yes, Adriaan. The man who was known as ‘the magic breeder’ from Arendonk.
WELL
So dear fanciers, if you have a pigeon from someone from a very good pair and that turns out to be a worthless junk?
Don't think too soon you've been cheated. It would be rather exceptional if you had only one young from the couple which immediately was a good one.
Because believe me after so many years of pigeon racing: A pigeon is really not a good one because the brother is a good one. Or the father. Or the great-grandfather.
The great-grandfather? Indeed. Because some dare to brag with it when presenting pigeons for a sale.
BREEDERS
I have also said for many years that I hardly believe in 'breeding couples'. At least, in what many mean by that: Couples who almost only give good ones.
Some foreigners with too little 'pigeon brains' and too much money even have a name for such: 'Golden Couples.'
Watch out dear beginner with money who is looking for good pigeons. Couples who give only good ones exist only in our imagination and in sales lists.
If somewhere a (or hen) of a 'breeding couple' dies, or… get lost or… when fanciers are about to sell a good pigeon, you sometimes hear: 'Oh, no problem. I still have brothers (or sisters) of it.'
Wrong guys. It's really not that simple and successful fanciers who have been around for a while know that.
HE TOO
Some peopIe are more down-to-earth and straightforward than others. Verkerk is one of them. How many good ones he has already grown?
But still... even with this phenomenon, you should not show off with Golden Couples. He REmates every year, sometimes even several times a year.
The best pigeon Klak had in the autumn of his career was his '613'.
Klak did not make the young from that 613 more expensive, nor the young from his parents. Klak used to say: "Who says these are better?"
V D BULCK
Back to v d Bulck. You sometimes hear about good players that they are never hit with setbacks. Sometimes it even sounds like a reproach. Knowing some fanciers, I am convinced that they enjoy reading that things can be done differently. That fate can also strike those 'supermen'.
V d Bulck now did not ignore the fact that the breeding of the first round this year was a fiasco. Incidentally, for the breeding loft he prefers younger pigeons and especially pigeons that performed. So it had another reason.
As mentioned, v d Bulck pigeons are popular.
Like from that one breeding couple: He got the cock of that couple from Panis, the hen is called 'Blue Staff', from that other superman at speed, Staf Boeckmans.
Imagine such a foreigner advertising with a baby from that couple:
'And now a 100% pure v d Bulck'. The fact that none of the parents was born in his loft remains of course unmentioned.
Possibly his best breeder, his name 'Mirakel' is already telling, wears a Dutch ring. It is a product of co-breeding with A Majid.
Pure v d Bulck pigeons? V d Bulck himself does not believe in them.
SOMETHING LIKE THAT
The above is reminiscent of what happened to the Hofkens pigeons in my younger years. Barely 30, newly married and moved to my current hometown, I pretty much became friends with Gust, although that 'friendship' was based more on his good breed of pigeons that I also wanted in my loft, than on empathy.
So if friendship was a big word, mutual trust was there. That's why I was allowed to organize a sale twice. Both sales failed, but... There were a lot of good pigeons in both auctions, as it turned out later.
Especially in America, 'strain Hofkens' became extremely popular. Gust did not live long enough to get sick of the publicity that his 'branches' would make about his pigeons at the time.
Hofkens loved nothing more than buying. Two-thirds of his pigeons were purchased or were bred from purchased pigeons. Others show off with 'pure Hofkens' while Gust himself did not have them.
Building your own strain, as you used to read in earlier years? v d Bulck, Hofkens, Verkerk and Co never had their own 'family' and did not ever intend to own it. They prefer to leave ‘building their own strain’ to the competitors.
AND MORE
Another example of naivety:
Someone who hadn't had pigeons for long: 'Today the youngsters were taken away to 80 km for the last time. That is also the first release station. So they have to know their way around.'
'Teaching pigeons the way home?'
That's not how it works, dear fellow fanciers.
Pigeons that are on the road for hours too long from a learning flight is another thing. "You don't have to toss them up anymore. They have learned enough', you sometimes hear. 'How naive' if you ask me. I say it more often: NOTHING those birds have learned.
DISTURBED?
Of course there will be people who are bothered by what I wrote about breeding couples. No problem. I know something doesn't have to be that way because I think it is. But as for those 'breeding pairs', something for the disbelievers: From a couple you can breed, let me not exaggerate, 8 young per year. You can easily grow 5 years of it, so 40 young.
Anyone who thinks he has such a couple that gives 50% good babies can email me.
In the case of 40 bred youngsters, the performance of his 21st best pigeon should be added.
What I find admirable with many Americans is their self-criticism. For example, I once wrote that many there are so naïve. The article was published with these lines in bold. Sometimes they are also down to earth.
There was that young Belgian who had flown there to push his auction. He wanted to make a good impression and said: ‘I also breed bad pigeons. Of every 100 young I grow, 25% are bad.’
A critical fancier: 'So if I buy 100 youngsters of yours 4 years in a row, I have 300 good or supers? Chuckles in the room.'