I started out using plain old muntant birds(mixed bredds} just for dog training about 2 1/2 years ago and realized that quality bred birds are more valueable for training to come back home. The only way to get these muntant (mutt birds, flying rats) to "Home" is to breed the adults first, otherwise most any "old bird" that comes from someone elses loft, or a "wild caught" one will go straight back to their last home. You need to raise and "train" the young "squeakers" {squabs "the chicks" just past 6 weeks old} to learn how to fly from your hand, lap, or shoulder back into their "loft". They are ready for flying exercises at only 5 weeks old! {B.T.W. "A Loft" is the proper name for a Pigeon house}.
The key motivating factor to train a bird propery is to get them on a feeding schedule twice a day and get them use to a routeen so they will expect it from you every day and trust you to feed right out of your hands if you so wish. Alway keep them just alittle on the HUNGRY side.
There "is" a small chance "if" treated well the adults could become adjusted to their "new" home and have had a few batches of young they could be taught to home to your loft from the training area but if started from the loft at first, but it's just too risky to even try it. I have lost every bird I have tried this with including a 5 month old purchased bird even from the back yard were the loft is! Your better off breeding the trapped adults a few times then shooting them over your dog out of a bird launcher!
The babies are really the only valueable ones for flushing over a dog and going back home. They in turn can be bred back to a brother, sister, or cousin like in line and in-breeding with horses and dogs creating a personal strain of birds created by you. Raising Pigeons is really alot of fun and even can become a fun hobby for flying them locally or long distance with racing strains, as well as for dog training. I plan on training some of my racing strain of birds out to 100 miles, and then I can be able to train with friends that do not have access to many birds and live out that far away. I'll be reassured that the birds will always beat me home waiting for me to return to feed them! I will bring back the same numbered, banded birds to my friends place again and blow their minds away cause they don't believe it can be done! That's the key to sucessful flying, training the young birds to fly from the yard exercises into the trapdoor installed the loft which can be made like a "quail recall shoot" or made with "pigeon bobs" and then letting them fly around the nieghborhood once they are going in on a regualr basis. This gives them experience to learn the immediate 1 mile radious aroung your home area. Once they are flying back to you with a shake of a feed can or a whistle blown to call them back in after letting them fly for an hour or so, then its time to start training them out at 1 mile toss "away from" their loft a few times and working your way up 5 miles at a time every other toss and then after 10, 15, 20, 25 miles out go to at least 30+. Once they are at this point, they should come home from any direction taken once they've learned every direction at this distance and once they enter that 30 mile radious zone which they are now very farmiliar with a home they'll come! The key is to alway keep them hungry just before each training toss and so on! It very easy to take them with you when you are going shopping, or driving to a friends, or what ever arrens you need to run during the week or weekend just to put the birds (at least 4 at a time) in their box and take them with you and find a good liberation point from home (East, West, North, or South)park some where safe, let them get oriented in the car or on top "in the box" for at least 10 minutes, then open the top and let them go.. It's alot of fun and satisfaction to watch all of that hard earned training pay off seeing them fly for a few circles them bam straight away they go!
These birds will need more than just "cracked corn" live on. Feed stores sell special Pigeon mixes just for them as well as "Pigeon Grit" that they apsolutely need to grind thier food up before digesting it. They will be in better shape for a hard and far away training session around dogs or training tosses. Clean, Chlorine free water is also an essential part of their diet as well. Do not keep them in a drafty, wet loft either as they can contract respatory diseases and get colds like humans can. Pigeons are also capable of carrying E-coli and Saminella + Piegon pox and Pharatyphoid. There are medicins especially made for immunizing Pigeons, also worming for Round, Hair, Hook and Tape worms that they will need or it can kill the young birds if the parents are carriers. These medicatons are not to be mixed up with medicins for chickens and other fowl that feed stores sell. If you really want access to alot of healthy trainable birds and don't want to mess with the wild ones, find a local Pigeon club that flys for competition or gets involved with racing them and that is a good way to get their "culls" sometimes for free.
American Racing Pigeon Union {A.R.P.U.} or National Pigeon Association {N.P.A.} are registries for local clubs to register their banded bird to, and most states have clubs that are in each section of a geographical area. Do a "search" and type in "Pigeon clubs in the U.S.A." that way you won't get every club from all over the world showing up! Believe me it's a very Popular sport still... www.globalpigeonsupply.com for supplies and medications. Have fun training!



Edited by - Lady Grouse Hunter on 02/25/2002 00:08:29