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A, B, C and D (april 4th 2017)

A strange headline, I know, and it needs some explanation indeed. The letters A, B, C and D stand for the names of fanciers. I prefer not to mention their real names, since I do not want to hurt people or their business. Just want to open eyes.

 A AND B
A and B are two well-known ‘champions’. They are both pretty good but not THAT good. They mainly owe their fame to enormous amounts of birds they race. It they would race say 10 birds only, they would be average.

They both made pigeons their living. In the past you could do that from the money that there was to be won in the races but times changed, to-day professionals in Holland and Belgium depend on their sales. Nothing against it. This is a free world also for the two ‘champions’. Those guys get along so well that they frequently trade birds. Mr. A can get whatever he wants from Mr B and vice versa.

Both of them yearly have an auction. And you know what is kind of funny? When an auction is on from Mr A it is Mr B who is the best bidder. And again vice versa: When Mr B has an auction his best client is his buddy Mr A. Understandably fellow fanciers raise eyebrows. Why pay 1,000 euros or more for babies that they can get for free? Why pay 1,000 euros or more for babies that normally cost 250 euros or 500 max?

Maybe they are stupid. Or…. maybe not so???

C AND D
Mr C and Mr D also made pigeons their living. Unlike A and B they are pretty young and I personally find them far better racers than A and B. One reason is that they do not have that many birds. Sometime ago they together flew to the Far East to promote their birds and there they became kind of friends as well. Real good friends, it turned out later on when C auctioned some birds. Many of them were bought for pretty much money by D. Later on D also auctioned babies. You do not need much imagination to guess who was responsible for the high prices that were paid. Prices that D would never ask if fanciers would buy directly from him. Are they also stupid, or…. ??

  UNBELIEVABLE
Unbelievable how much money is paid to-day for just babies that have not proven anything yet. Some time ago I visited a real good fancier. A man who is almost unbeatable and I was much surprised about what he, let’s call him Mr. X told me. In 2016 his results were so fantastic that he bred some summer breeds from his very best pigeons. In march 2017 they were still in his loft. Nobody had shown an interest, though he did not charge much money. How come? The ‘mistake’ that he makes is that he does not make pedigrees and… he has no ‘name birds’. And believe me, there are many of such people. I mean people with fantastic pigeons. Pigeons that weekly prove in the races how good they are, but nevertheless no clients for them. For 1,000 euros you could not even buy one baby from A, B, C and D.

Mr X was reasonable and charged 200 euros for babies of his very best, but in vain. He could not sell any. Is there a chance that the poorest birds of Mr A, B, C and D are better than the best birds of Mr X? Come on. Fanciers like X cannot sell birds because they do not have a great name, or pigeons from a great name, or fancy pedigrees or photos of their pigeons. What they do have is fantastic pigeons that win, but ‘fantastic pigeons that win’ is not what many foreigners want.

They want paper tigers. Till the day that they will reluctantly admit: A S was right. But by then they will have lost much money, much time and perhaps much ambition in this sport as well.