Begining

I have begun to train my young birds for the 2010 season. Here is where I am at: I have pulled 1 to 3 flight feathers depending on the age of the bird. The older birds only needed 1 feather pulled because they were already moulting Their 8th feather. I figure by the time racing starts they will be naturally completed with their moult. 2 birds didn't need any feathers pulled. I moved these birds to another loft section and allowed them to continue flying.
I pulled feathers a bit late. June 23rd. I clipped the ends of the feathers and waited 2 weeks before I pulled them. Some guys just pull them. Other guys will pull one feather at a time so that they can keep the birds flying. I must admit the time off of training while the birds were kept in was nice. All of the young birds were kept inside while they grew their feathers back.
All of my young birds were trained out to 20 miles before they were locked up to grow feathers. I figure when they start training again they can start right back at 20 miles. They were all trained from 20 miles 4 times. I did not start at 1 mile and work my way up. I started at 20 miles for the first training toss. Joe Rotando recommends a first toss from 40 miles. I have done this for the past 2 years but guys in the club thought I was crazy. Some said I risk losing my whole team with a crazy stunt like that. I got scared and and only went 20 miles. I lost only a couple the previous years from the 40 mile toss. I lost 2 from the 20 mile first toss. Rotando says that short tosses are a waste of time since a pigeon can see 12 miles in every direction around the loft.
I am right at 50 young birds today.
For the last 7 days I have been letting them fly around the loft twice a day. Earlier this week I wasn't forcing them to fly but for the last 2 days I have been kicking them all out of the loft and making them fly. They have been flying for a few minutes and then landing on the roof and panting. This morning they flew continuously for 45 minutes and when they came down they were not panting. They are ready to go up the road again. I will probably take them 20 miles on Wed.
I now have to break them of the habit of landing on the house roof. They land on the roof and sit for a minute and then hop down on the loft's landing board. I will make sure they are really hungry when I let them out and then when they are finished flying I will whistle them in.
This year I tore down my three lofts and built one large one with four sections. The difference this year is the landing board is too close to the house roof. I am thinking it could be a problem. I don't want the birds returning from a race and landing on the house first and then hoping on to the landing board.