It is now the middle of February, the snow and sleet is being whipped across the garden by a force eight north easterly gale, the cross Channel ferries, unable to berth are being stacked off-shore outside the harbour at nearby Dover and I have no desire what-so-ever to paddle around in the garden. Not being an early starter my breeding plans are still on hold for at least another month and so, as is usual for me, enthusiasm is at it lowest point. Now then is the opportune time to get started on some notes. I apologise for not submitting anything to Bob for some time now, but read on and you should soon see why I have not been contributing . . .
Now, at the end of another frantic season of shows and long journeys I finally have the time to sit and resume, at least in part, my writings based around my interpretation of activities on the pigeon scene.
During the course of the show season I have travelled through five countries and covered in excess of 5,000 miles, over 4,000 of which were by car. I dread even to contemplate calculating the cost of fuel, accommodation and meals etc.
Unfortunately I had to miss out on the season's official opening show at Peterborough but am reliably informed by many fanciers who did attend that it was yet another triumph for Kevin and Christine. Sadly I am led to believe that there was a feeble attempt at character assassination taking place but I guess the perpetrators are just sad and are of no real significance, not real pigeon fanciers. Hopefully I will be able to make it for this season's event.
The first of my thousands of miles of travelling took me west, to the South Coast show over at Eastleigh in Hampshire. This is a good venue with probably the best natural lighting of any show that I attend, great for colour pigeons but it is just a bit too early for some breeds and for the later-bred youngsters.
My task here was to adjudicate over both the Exhibition and Competition Rollers as well as going through the Antwerp Smerles. A well-supported display of top-quality Exhibition Rollers resulted in Richard Simpson taking Best Roller with his excellent adult Red/White cock that was oozing class and was full of that elusive ingredient, expression. Best Young Roller went to the same fancier with a Black Badge hen and completing his triumphant day he also took my Best in Section award with the adult cock.
The Competition variants of the Roller, are a very different type of beast and here were dominated by the entries of S Sollit who, as usual, put out a very strong team of super fit birds that were good in size and well balanced, hard as nails and very typical of their breed standard. They looked and felt as though they could fly and perform all day.
The Rollers in general, both Exhibition and Flying, were of an excellent standard. The quality of the Antwerp Smerles was also very good as was their presentation, unfortunately with only eight entries they could have done with a bit more competition. Both classes were taken by birds from the P Pratt and Sons stud with a very stylish, powerful adult Red Cheq beating off the challenge of a young Dun Cheq to take the certificate.
