22 British Homing World, August 10th, 2012

BICC PERPIGNAN INTERNATIONAL

The 185 BICC pigeons along with 16,921 pigeons entered by fanciers fromall over Continental Europe were liberated at 0555hrs on Friday 3rd August.Weather conditions throughout the course looked to be ideal, with a lightnorth-westerly breeze over the first part of the course changing to light south-westerly in the closing stages, accompanied by sunshine and good visibilityfrom southern France to the Belgian/French border. Perpignan is situated onthe French/Spanish border and the convoy, consisting of the vast majority ofpigeons from Belgium. Holland and Germany, would have, in all probability,headed north-east skirting the Massif Central passing over Montpellier beforerunning up the Rhône Valley to Lyon, Dijon and on into north-east France andthe German/French/Belgian border country. The British contingent would thenhave had to head virtually west-north-west to hit the French coast betweenBoulogne and Calais. Pigeons were being clocked in Northern France andBelgium on the day, but the imposing sight of the English Channel obviouslyproved too much of an obstacle late in the day for the British birds. However,early on the second morning a steady flow of pigeons began to come throughinto Kent before gradually working their way across country to the morecentral and westerly located lofts.

Leading the way was a 2y widowhood cock to the Dover lofts of Geoff

Preece & son, Clayton. The partners are no strangers to success on theinternational stage as they are previous winners of the BICC clocking the onlybird on the day into the UK, and this season have finished 3rd Open BICC PauInternational and 12th Open BICC Marseille International. The BICCPerpignan winner, also winning the House of Aarden sponsored young bird, isa chequer widowhood cock now appropriately named Wiggins GB10D17160.His breeding is 100% long-distance lines. He is a grandson of Bill Woodall’sBarcelona winner, Dragon’s Boy and a hen from the German Stoffel-Ophof loftcontaining the bloodlines of ‘270’ and Marseille Star. I’ll let Geoff relate thestory of their latest BICC winner: ‘Wiggins’ is only 2 years old and hascompeted in 4 International races of more than 500 miles. In 2011 he won 10thOpen BICC National Perpignan (Yearling) 581 miles; in 2012 10th Open BICCNational Pau 547 miles, 39th Open BICC National St Vincent 533 miles and1st Open BICC National Perpignan 581 miles. Readers will note that theseresults are from long-distance International races with liberations from thewestern Atlantic side of France and the Eastern Mediterranean side. Many ofthe outstanding pigeons in mainland Europe do this every year including the2012 1st Open International winner from Barcelona for Philippe Deu. We sent4 pigeons to the Perpignan race and timed them all winning 1st, 18th, 19th(Yearling) and 20th Open, 586 miles (the latter is in fact the nestmate to theNational winner). The 19th Open winner gave us a special personalsatisfaction because in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012 we have the first Yearlingin the race results. A special thank you is necessary from us to Bill Woodall,Dr Jeff Horn and our friends and fellow fanciers, without whose support andencouragement we would not have been so successful.’ Not bad going whenyou consider that Geoff & Clayton started the season with just ninewidowhood cocks and in the latter stages introduced seven hens tocomplement the team. Congratulations on another excellent performance.

In the runner-up spot is one to the Wickford, Essex partnership of DickyPearmain & son, Steven. This is another partnership that has enjoyed aterrific season of International racing with the BICC as they clocked fivepigeons to appear on the Marseille international result and a further seven onthe St Vincent International result where they again finished in the R/Uposition. In the Perpignan race they clocked a 3y chequer pied hen closelyinbred to Nico Volkens’ Dutch National winner from Pau. The Pearmain henhas a terrific track record as she has won 13th Open Pau International and30th Open Tarbes/Agen National in 2011 and this season has been 34th OpenBICC Pau International on the day; 18th Open BICC St Vincent Internationalon the day and now 2nd Open BICC Perpignan International. She was sent tothe race feeding a 6-day-old young bird – the first baby she has ever beenallowed to rear. As with all the Pearmain racers she is allowed an open loft andis raced on the natural system albeit with periods of celibacy at certain timesduring the season.

British InternationalChampionship Club

Perpignan

Chequer cock Wiggins 1st Open BICC Perpignan.

British Homing World, August 10th, 2012 23

Mike Mitchell of Dover has earned an impressive reputation in a very shorttime competing with the BICC on the international stage. Here he clocked fivepigeons to finish at 3rd, 8th, 26th, 56th and 79th Open to maintain thisimpressive record. The first in the clock is a celibate hen of Van Helmondbloodlines which had previously featured at 138th Open in the AgenInternational race. Mike’s second timer is a real beast of a pigeon with thefollowing turns on the International stage: 16th BICC Pau 2009, 1st BICCNarbonne 2010, 33rd Pau 2011, 15th Tarbes/Agen 2011, 88th Pau 2012 andnow 8th Open BICC Perpignan. This is yet another of Mike’s celibate hens.The hen at 26th Open is another outstanding racer for the Mitchell loft as shehas won 1st Open BICC Tarbes/Agen in 2011 when she was the only bird onthe day in the UK. A full loft report on Mike Mitchell can be found on the BICCwebsite.

The next man on the result at 4th Open is the world-class Winkfield Wizard– Mark Gilbert. Mark sent 27 birds to this 619-mile race and clocked 17 onthe result at 4th, 6th, 9th, 12th, 17th, 28th, 29th, 31st, 34th, 39th, 42nd,44th, 58th, 59th, 61st, 65th and 66th Open and these also finished at 1st,2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th etc Centre Section. What more can I say about thisabsolutely outstanding fancier? He should be competing for GB at theOlympics! Mark’s pigeons were as follows: ‘I sent 27 birds. These were myTarbes National team and the Barcelona team this year and I returned themto this race. The first 5 birds were roundabout cocks that went to Tarbes NFCa month or so earlier. I think the Barcelona took too much out of them.However, they did all return but were later in the day. I now have 22 home ofthe 27 sent. The first bird, a 2y cock which was 29th Open Tarbes this year, isa direct son of the Treble Cock, who was 6th Open Perpignan and 12th OpenBarcelona. His mother was a double granddaughter of Brian Denney’s TuffNut. The second bird is from a daughter of a full sister of Derweerdt’s Iban,when she was paired to a son of Smaragd, the International winner fromBarcelona. He was 21st Open Saintes NFC last year. The third bird is abrother to the first and was 278th Tarbes NFC last year. The fourth bird is agrandson of Southfield Supreme and Derweerdt’s Emiel, 1st OpenInternational Bordeaux and was 278th Tarbes this year. The fifth bird was a giftfrom John Wills and was 21st Open Tarbes this year.’ There you have it, then,27 birds to a 619-mile race timing 17 on the result of AN INTERNATIONAL

RACE. This guy is taking pigeon racing to a new level.Ron Dove of Ashford in Kent is another fancier who has had an excellent

series of results with the BICC in 2012 rarely missing out on the result in theInternational races. In the Perpignan race Ron clocked three of his six entriesto take 5th, 15th and 54th Open. Ron has developed his own family ofpigeons over the years with no specific strain name but based entirely onperformance at the distance. Hs first in the clock is a red hen that finished at61st Open BICC in the Agen International earlier this season. She is agranddaughter of Ron’s 5th Open NFC Pau hen and has had four Channelraces with the EECC plus the Agen International before being set up for thePerpignan race sitting due to hatch, as was Ron’s second in the clock at 15thOpen. The Dove team are raced on the natural system and are not raced asyoung birds, just receiving a perfunctory training programme before beingthrown in at the deep end as yearlings with a first race at 130-miles across theEnglish Channel!

Don Harvey of Dover comes in next at 5th East Section, 7th Open. Donhas not enjoyed the best of health this year but this Perpignan performanceadded to his 1st sect 3rd Open BBC in the Barcelona race should act as agood pick-me-up. This 4y widowhood cock now named Playboy has had everyrace with the EECC this season plus Niort and Tarbes where he finished onthe result. He has also flown Tarbes in 2011. As with all Don’s widowhoodcocks he is fed a good widowhood mix in pots in the nestbox and this issupplemented with some treats fed communally in a hopper. Don does not usea breakdown mixture as his widowers are expected to work hard inpreparation for the long distance races. The 7th Open winner’s pedigreeshows a strong influence of Eric Cannon pigeons in his breeding with a touchof Ian Benstead Shepherds and Eric Fox bloodlines thrown into the mix forgood measure. With that lineage he couldn’t fail! Playboy’s racing results areas follows: 2010 BBC Bordeaux 38th Open 1,065 birds, 3rd Section G; 2011NFC Tarbes 222nd Open 3,290 birds, 49th Section E 767 birds, 11th PaulO'Leary Single Bird National Flying Club Nom and 2nd Kent 500-Mile Club;2012 NFC Tarbes 237th Open 2,808 birds, 62nd Section E 582 birds; BICCPerpignan 7th Open, 5th East Section, and first IPRR Single Bird Nom andprobable 3rd Kent 500-Mile Club.

Crowley & Green of Compton Bassett come in at 10th Open. Richard

Geoff & Clayton Preece with two of their long distance pathfinders.

BICC Perpignan Mike Mitchell holding his two hens 3rd & 8th Open BICCPerpignan.

Ron Dove has enjoyed an excellent season winning 7th Open BICCBarcelona, 8th Open BICC St Vincent and 5th Open BICC PerpignanInternational.

Dickie Pearmain with 2nd Open BICC Perpignan.

Green writes: ‘The pigeon clocked was a 5y blue hen called Big Blue, one ofour best middle-distance racing hens having previously won 138th Open NFCSaintes as a yearling in 2008, 51st Open BBC Bordeaux in 2009, 76th OpenBBC Vire and 77th Open CSCFC Bergerac in 2010, 469th Open NFCFougères and 79th Open BBC Bordeaux in 2011. So far this season she hadbeen raced on widowhood and had competed from Lyndhurst, Carentan,Cholet, Messac and Littlehampton but her performances were well below parwhich could be attributed to losing her cock at Cholet, therefore it was decidedto put her in the young bird loft where she immediately paired up with a youngcock. She had never been raced further than 460 miles but is bred for thedistance. Her sire is direct from the triple-national-winning loft of The SantensBrothers of Oudenaarde in Belgium. I was fortunate to visit Marc and Gerardin 2006 and came away with four cracking cocks but had to wait until 2007when I went back and collected the hens to pair to them as none wereavailable the previous year. In 2007 I paired one of these cocks to a Van Loonhen bred from S & P Kulpa stock and they were the parents of this crackinghen. Whilst in the young bird loft she was exercised and trained with the youngbirds and mistakenly (2007 and 2012 bred have white rings) sent to two any-age races from Poole and Portsmouth with the Bourton Midweek club whichobviously did her no harm as she put up an exceptional performance fromPerpignan considering our loft location.’

Over in the West Section the winner was clocked at the King’s Cup winningloft of Joe Raeburn of Melksham. Joe clocked a granddaughter of his San

Sebastian King’s Cup winner Gwen sent feeding an 8-day-old baby. This henhad previously flown Tarbes earlier in the season and Palamos in 2011 aftercompeting from Tarbes with the NFC for the first time in 2010, so she hascertainly had plenty of experience in long-distance racing. Joe tells me: ‘Theblue hen's breeding is van Bruaene (Laureaat Barcelona) Gwen 1st Open SanSebastian NFC x Mark Gilbert. On the sire’s side a son of a van Bruaene cock(1st Sec G Nantes NFC) x daughter of Gwen (this hen a winner of 1st WestSect Tours) when paired to a son of Laureaat Barcelona. The dam was a henI had selected on a 2008 visit to Mark Gilbert but I have no breeding details tohand. My Section winner has flown this year from Fougères, Cholet andTarbes, then on to Perpignan. She started the season paired to Gwen in theyoung bird loft as Gwen at 16 years old no longer lays, She flew Fougères andCholet with the NFC paired this way. Then I re-paired her to a latebred cockon 5th June and sent her to Tarbes sitting 12-day eggs. She returned on theMonday morning from Tarbes. I kept her sitting the same eggs until 25th Julythen slipped a chipping egg under her so she was sent to Perpignan feedinga 5/6-day-old chick. She has flown from Tarbes twice and Palamos so maybenext year I’ll try her at Barcelona.’

Wilf Reed of Monmouth, now 80 years young has become a ‘naturalisedWelshman’, despite being born and raised across the border in England. Wilf,assisted by his lovely wife, Janet, has won just about all there is to win in thefancy and in the Perpignan race he clocked a direct daughter of his Barcelonahen, Barcelona Belle, when mated to a grandson of Red Barcelona to win 2ndWest Section. This hen was raced roundabout earlier in the season beforebeing re-mated for Tarbes NFC where Wilf clocked the winner of 1st SectionG. She was then set up for Perpignan as a widowhood/roundabout hen. P.Holley comes in next at 3rd West Section. Pat clocked a Wim Muller cock, a

24 British Homing World, August 10th, 2012

Crowley & Green pictured at the BICC presentation with trophy for 1st OpenBarcelona 2011. The partners are 10th Open BICC Perpignan International.

Don Harvey’s Playboy 7th Open BICC Perpignan.Don & Elaine Harvey with Playboy 7th Open BICC Perpignan.

10th Open BICC Perpignan for Crowley & Green.

grandson of his Champion Magic which won 1st, 5th, 7th and 41st Open BICCPerpignan for Pat. The cock was sent sitting 10-day eggs and had previouslyflown Tours and NFC Tarbes this season. As with all the Holley pigeons he isallowed an open loft and fed in a hopper on Versele-Laga Super Widowhoodmix.

In my last report on the Le Mans race I was unable to include any detailsof the winners of 6th Open for Peter Gretton, alias Pedro in the South as Ihad been unable to contact Peter – not surprising really as the number I hadwas the wrong one! However, Peter contacted me later and provided thefollowing details: ‘The bird is a yearling raced on natural. The sire I bought offA & J Grantham of East Yorkshire, a Vandenabeele and the dam I got offO’Hare & Woodward, a SVR. I feed Bamfords Young Bird Mix (no maize) towhich I add some small seed, also from Bamfords. This bird was sent sittingeggs and when it arrived home it decided to keep flying for another twominutes. I give garlic in the water every day.’ That’s the last of the old birdraces done and dusted, just the two young bird/old hens races to go on 25thAugust and 8th September. Once again I have to offer Steve & Lesley Wrightat the House of Aarden our grateful thanks for their generous sponsorship ofthe International races. Those readers out there who are not yet members canstill join for the young bird/old hens races as one of the Section winners in thePerpignan race joined in the week leading up to basketing. Go on – have a goyou’ll never regret it.

GARETH WATKINSPerpignan

Provisional Result based on Telephone Verifications

British Homing World, August 10th, 2012 25

Wilf & Janet Reed.

BICC Perpignan Joe Raeburn 1st West Section.

Peter Gretton 6th Open BICC Le Mans.

Mark Gilbert’s roundabout lofts.Op Sec Name and Town M Day AFT MPM YPM

1 ES1 G. M. Preece & Son, Dover 581 2 18.27.51 845.439 924.5832 ES2 R. Pearmain & Son, Wickford 618 2 19.44.35 840.666 919.3633 ES3 M. G. Mitchell, Dover 581 2 19.02.47 819.575 896.2984 CS1 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 20.19.20 818.078 894.6615 ES4 R. Dove, Ashford 582 2 19.16.09 810.467 886.3386 CS2 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 20.34.05 808.300 883.9687 ES5 Don Harvey, Dover 581 2 19.19.56 806.610 882.1198 ES6 M. G. Mitchell, Dover 581 2 19.21.14 806.553 882.0579 CS3 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 20.42.51 802.599 877.733

10 CS4 Crowley & Green, Nr Calne 638 2 21.22.38 801.420 876.44411 ES7 F. Knowles & Son, Wingham, Cant 590 2 19.46.41 800.773 875.73612 CS5 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 20.53.41 795.663 870.14813 ES8 L. & K. Buddle, Dover 579 2 19.32.50 795.565 870.04014 ES9 H. & P. Archibald, Dover 579 2 19.40.26 789.961 863.91215 ES10 R. Dove, Ashford 582 2 19.48.19 788.529 862.34616 CS6 Mannor Lofts, Southampton 597 2 20.20.15 787.735 861.47717 CS7 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 21.13.36 783.221 856.54118 ES11 G. M. Preece & Son, Dover 581 2 20.00.30 780.191 853.22719 ES12 G. M. Preece & Son, Dover 581 2 20.09.02 774.684 847.20520 ES13 G. M. Preece & Son, Dover 581 2 20.09.34 774.342 846.83121 ES14 A. Annis & Son, Margate 590 2 20.31.06 771.808 844.06022 ES15 F. Knowles & Son, Wingham, Cant 590 2 20.34.27 769.787 841.84923 ES16 F. J. Cornwell, Southend-on-Sea 612 2 21.26.50 766.180 837.905l24 ES17 L. & K. Buddle, Dover 579 2 20.22.59 762.942 834.36325 ES18 J. Childs, Wickford 617 2 21.50.52 758.648 829.66726 ES19 M. G. Mitchell, Dover 581 2 20.50.35 748.927 819.03727 ES20 F. Knowles & Son, Wingham, Cant 590 2 21.08.58 748.849 818.95128 CS8 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 22.27.02 740.523 809.84629 CS9 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 22.40.29 733.202 801.84030 ES21 F. J. Cornwell, Southend-on-Sea 612 2 22.33.51 728.254 796.42831 CS10 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 22.52.53 726.580 794.59832 ES22 E. Ivory, Sittingbourne 597 2 22.03.15 726.559 794.57533 ES23 M. Cowell & Son, Ramsgate 593 2 22.03.50 722.100 789.69834 CS11 M. Gilbert, Winkfield, Windsor 619 2 23.05.51 719.782 787.163