The Ballynahinch based partnership of Marie Magee, with Joe Cromie & Son achieved awesome success at all levels of pigeon racing competition in Northern Ireland, better still the Lady that she was, had a life long dream like the vast majority of all fanciers in Ireland that maybe one day the Cromie & Magee partnership would win a National, sadly Marie passed away before her dream was fulfilled.
The Cromie & Magee & Son partnership continued with the objective of maybe one day winning that National that Marie graved so much, on Thursday 28th of May that dream was fulfilled when “Marie’s Dream” won the INFC Skibbereen O/Bird National.
A Nice snap taken a few years ago of the Cromie & Magee & Son partnership from the (L) Joe Cromie Junior, Marie Magee and Joe Senior.
The 2009 elected Press Officer of the Irish National Flying Club Willie Reynolds, made contact with Joe Cromie and made arrangements for myself to call on Saturday morning to compile this short loft profile on this award winning partnership that have won an awesome amount of awards over the years especially flying with the East Down Combine, I decided to pencil in Saturday with Joe as with being neighbours with Rab Hunter, I assumed that celebrations would be running into the wee hours of Friday morning and perhaps I would have been the last person that Joe Cromie would have wanted to see walking up his drive-way on Friday morning, and rumour has it celebrations went into the long AM hours of Friday morning.
Marie Magee pictured in 1993 holding a Blue Cock winner of 2nd Open Skibbereen Y/Bird Derby NIPA and 7th N.Section and 8th INFC the following week wining £3,000 in total flying to the loft once owned by Billy Walkingshaw.
Having an address of Glassdrummond Road, Ballynahinch and a rough idea of were I was heading I set about my task early on Saturday morning knowing that the Talbenny birds were due to be liberated at 10.00am with a likely arrival some three hours later, so with this in mind I decided to head straight for Ballynahinch and knew I wasn’t far away from my destination when I noticed a fit Rab Hunter carrying a bag of Beattie’s Corn down the garden.
The County Down area of Northern Ireland has some the nicest scenery around and when travelling towards Ballynahinch which sits dead centre of Co. Down bang in the middle between Banger and Newry in one direction and Downpatrick and Lisburn in the other on a glorious sunny morning with little traffic on the road you get to appreciate how nice an area of natural beauty that it is. The Glassdrummond Road is positioned on the Lisburn side of the Market Town of Ballynahinch and the Cromie & Magee & Son lofts are set in a very spacious garden over-looking fields and fields of greenery, neighboured of course by the superb set up of Rab Hunter whose lofts run parallel with the Cromie & Magee set up.
I had a quick chat with Rab who told me that he seen the National winner arriving thinking it was for himself, wouldn’t have been a surprise for Rab Hunter is having a stunning season flying with the Ballynahinch Club, he was accompanied on the day of the National by Denis Clements of the Largymore Club in Lisburn, Rab commented that they were keeping a tight watch when they noticed this Blue in the distance coming from the perfect direction, and his excitement increased when the pigeon started to lock its wings on approach to the lofts, only to have his hopes dashed when the bird zoomed over the top of the Hunter lofts and lit on the Cromie & Magee loft next door, Rab was telling me that it couldn’t have happened to a nicer and more deserving family, with both men spending unrelenting hours together in Joe Cromie’s Summer House at the bottom of the garden almost daily talking about pigeons past and present.
That same Summer House is awash with winning Diploma after Diploma and I had the pleasure of interviewing Joe Senior for around an hour in unrelenting sunshine and heat (a rare thing for us fanciers in Northern Ireland especially on a race day). Joe Cromie first commenced the sport of pigeon racing when living in Killyleagh back in 1963 and at that time raced pigeons from the Master that was the late Billy Parkes, of course those pigeons where the Fabrys and Busschaerts, Joe told me that one of the most successful pigeons he owned of all time, was a direct son of the world famous ‘Barney’ when mated to ‘Bizzy Lizzy’ this pigeon was sourced from Tom Kilpatrick and Joe has an oil painting of this said pigeon displayed prominently within his Summer House.
Joe won more than his fair share of prizes in the period of 10 years that followed and then took a break from the sport in 1973, concentrating on work Joe stayed out of pigeons until returning to race youngsters in 1981 and from then until this current day the Joe Cromie and subsequently the partnership of Cromie & Magee have won far more than I would have room to mention, they are perhaps one of the best known partnership names ever to race pigeons into Northern Ireland.
The lofts of Cromie & Magee & Son of Ballynahinch, the one closest previously owned by Billy Lecky and the one furthest away previously owned by Billy Walkingshaw, to former legends in the sport. Photo by Adie
In 1986 Joe spotted his current home which was a Labourer’s cottage positioned on the Glassdrummond Road in Ballynahinch and without delay set about purchasing it with the objective of working at the improvements himself over time, he purchased that said cottage for a tidy sum of £19,000 and has never looked back. I think you could easily add a few tens of thousands to that price even in the current housing market we have at the minute, a beautiful modern and well maintained property it has been developed into with substantial unspoilt land to the rear of the property, even with a number of lofts, there is still plenty to catch the eye. On the subject of the lofts, Joe Senior and Junior now house the stock pigeons in a loft which was originally raced to with the youngsters and this particular loft was previously a hen house with chimneys owned by one of the best fanciers ever to race pigeons into Killyleagh namely Billy Walkingshaw. The current O/Bird loft to which the National winner was timed is Billy Lecky’s old loft, all in all every where you look, the fanciers, the pigeons, the systems and even the lofts nothing but success wrote over all the four departments.
"Marie's Dream" winner of 1st INFC Skibbereen National 2009.
On to the pigeons and I think best to mention the National winner first of all “Marie’s Dream”, a 2 year old Blue cock timed at 2.49pm flying 243 miles to the old loft once owned by Billy Lecky. The pigeon in question is off an exceptional breeding Hofken stock cock who now is at a tender age of 14, this cock has bred scores of prize winners over the years and was sourced from the formidable partnership of Andrews & Jackson from Howden. He in turn to produce the Skibbereen National winner was mated to a Soontjen hen loaned to the boys from Martin Flynn who flies exceptionally well in the East Down Combine affiliated Drumaness Mills HPS this hen Martin purchased and he was having problems with her pairing up. As a youngster the National winning pigeon scored from Pilmore Beach winning the Club and finishing 17th West Section and 39th Open East Down Combine, then the following week from Skibbereen finished 1st Club and 8th Open. The following year the Blue National winning cock was placed on the widowhood system and in the first race he stayed out over night, so Joe Junior decided that, all was not well based upon this and his performances around the house, so he stopped the pigeon although keeping him in the widowhood team and continuing to train him around the house. Then this year he was put back onto the road and has been in the clock a few times including finishing 4th Club from Clonmel at the start of May.
Joe Cromie Senior of Ballynahinch pictured holding “Marie’s Dream” after being confirmed winner of the 2009 INFC O/B Skibbereen National.Photo by Adie
I have mentioned a couple of families so far, gone have the days of the Busschaerts, like so many who had the pleasure of the racing the Parkes Busschaerts, sooner or later they become less and less, and the extra assistance to stay at the top requires you to source from other quarters, Joe Cromie and Joe Junior have spent wisely although at times vastly in bringing continued success to their operation, this included the Hofkens from Andrews and Jackson, Soontjens from the late Leslie Mairs of Kells, Co. Antrim who was a legend to say the least, having been born in Ballymena myself and Kells only a few miles out the road, and in my early days of scribing Leslie Mairs was the man during my early years in this game, his record was second to none racing firstly the Staf Van Reets and later the Soontjens of Tony Mardons, Joe Cromie and son where big buyers at the Leslie Mairs sales and opted to side with the Soontjen pigeons at that time. Over more recent times they have also brought in Soontjens from Nigel Laycock and these blended into their already well established stock loft which contains 21 pair of stock have proved and inspiration and have produced winners from the very start.
Joe Senior, is now retired and at a the age of 75 years young, concentrates much of his time with the pigeons now, assisted greatly by Joe Junior who also works full-time and lives a few miles away from his father’s home. Ironically Joe Cromie at the age of 75 wins his first National flying with the Irish National Flying Club and the man who finishes runner-up to the Cromie & Magee & Son team is John Patterson of Ballylesson, who last year at the age of 80 won his first INFC National.
Joe Cromie Junior and Joe Senior holding 9th Open NIPA Rosscarbery Inland National 2009 and 1st Open INFC Skibbereen O/Bird National 2009 respectively. Photo by Adie
The Cromie O/Birds are raced on the widowhood system and Joe senior looks after around the 20 mark, they are fed Marimans French Petite, and are individually fed in their boxes and aren’t broke down at the start of the week, Joe has found over the years that this has made little to no difference as when the pigeons are at the top of their game they eat very little. Each cock is given 3 – 4 pea-nuts each evening and are given a ½ tea spoon of a combined mix of small seeds once or twice per week. Training is morning and night and surprisingly they have no set time, tossing also is only adopted if the work rate around the house isn’t sufficient, which would entail a maximum of 2 x 20 mile tosses per week. Water is changed once per day and the lofts scrapped at least twice per day. When handling the National winner within the loft, their was a wonderful tameness about the pigeons who only see the hens traditionally on a Friday evening and as the season progresses in distance the father and son team would select the races that they would like to concentrate their team on, and re-pair them up in preparation for same. There are heaters installed within the Widowhood loft and when enquiring if they were used much, Joe admitted that they are more in use during the winter when condition are not good on the outside. Golden Boost is the only supplement added to the water and this is given on a Wednesday with Electrolytes added for their return from racing. They receive treating prior to breeding and racing for all the usual aliments, and Canker continues to be treated for every four weeks during racing.
Joe has implemented many Y/Bird systems over the years including mating up at the start of December which seen the majority of the youngsters not going through a wing moult, but as times have changed he opts now to put around half the team which numbers usually around the fifty mark on darkness for around eight weeks, the hours of darkness are from 5pm to 9am. The ending of the Darkness in the lofts happens like the vast majority of other fanciers around the first week of June to which tossing would start relatively very soon after the Darkness comes to an end, starting with a number of short distance tosses moving up to a maximum of 20 miles and no further, they will see this liberation point once daily weather permitting. Feeding is exactly the same for the Y/Birds one type of feeding that being the Marimans French Petite, the only difference is they are Hopper Fed and the amount they get is judged when they leave the feeder to go for a drink the hopper is then removed along with the remaining food. Golden Boost is the only additional supplement given to them again on a Wednesday, although this year for the first Orego Stim is being used, and at this stage it is to early to say if the boys have witnessed any difference, breeding of the youngsters has been delayed this year for like has been reported elsewhere the Cromie’s also had problems with the Black Nest Felts loosing a round of youngsters in the nest at the 3 – 4 day stage after hatching. After this occurred and the first time ever for the Father and Son team they removed the felts and went back to the traditional straw, without further hiccups. Once again the Y/Bird loft is kept as clean as possible at all times.
I would like to finish by wishing Joe Senior and Joe Junior many more years of success and congratulate them on winning their first National flying with the Irish National FC, a life long dream of Marie’s that has finally been achieved and dedicated in her memory with the excellent performance on the day by “Marie’s Dream”.
Adie McCormick
18 Tonagh Gardens
Lisburn, Co.Antrim
N.Ireland
BT28 1BX
Email celestiallofts@aol.com