"Jack Flash" Wins INFC Yearling National

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"Jack Flash" Wins INFC Yearling National

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National Win for Liam Donnelly & Son of Finglas, Dublin.

Loft profile to follow very soon.
Now listed below apologies for the delay.
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Re: "Jack Flash" Wins INFC Yearling National

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“Jack Flash” wins INFC Yearling National

“‘Keeping the Faith’ – It’s as simple as that”

These were the words from Liam Donnelly when I paid a visit to his family home situated in the Kippure Park area of Finglas, Dublin accompanied on this occasion by my father “Homer” the INFC elected Press Officer.

I had travelled down last Wednesday afternoon to do this loft profile on Liam who races in partnership with his son Owen following the confirmation that they had won what is widely regarded as the leading National race for Yearlings in Europe namely the INFC Yearling National from Sennen Cove. Upon arrival at the Donnelly household I was greeted by a familiar face in Mick Gilligan who is Secretary of the Finglas RPC and a man I have had the pleasure of meeting on a few occasions at different events that I have attended over the last couple of years in the South of Ireland.

Mick as mentioned is the hard working Secretary of what must be one of the strongest and most competitive Clubs within the Irish South Road Federation namely the Finglas RPC. Just to give you an idea of the strength of the Finglas RPC, during the ISRF Prize Distribution each year a Club Shield is presented to the Club whose members have scored the most amount of points during the course of the racing season Combined O/Bird and Y/Bird, in 2008 as the guest of the ISRF I had the pleasure of presenting Mick Gilligan of the Finglas RPC with the Club Shield winning it with a record total, of some 3,000 points ahead of the next competing club, Mick was telling me that the club usually order around 4,000 rings annually so when your winning the Finglas RPC Club especially in the Y/Bird season with around 1,000 pigeons competing weekly your in a league of your own, that’s what you call competition!

With the introductions all complete I set about asking Liam how it felt to be a National winner, the first Finglas INFC National winner ever. He admitted that it hadn’t really sank in yet, but would like to firstly take this opportunity in thanking everybody who has called either at the house on phoned congratulating him.

Liam Donnelly has like many fanciers been involved with pigeons since he was a boy, seems to be the case with the sport of pigeon racing once a member of your family has them or has had them the bug just seems to spread through generation after generation, a drug many would admit. Liam first raced pigeons as a member of the Dublin Homing Club in 1966 competing for many years before joining the Finglas RPC in 1984 to which he is the current President and Chairman after many continuous years of hard work and dedication. During the spells of racing in both Clubs he had a measured amount of success, but couldn’t with all the work move up to the next level, a level required to become noticed as I would say, noticed meaning consistency week in week out.

Over recent years Full-Time Taxi Driver Liam has attended many auctions and admits to buying in new stock every year, he has conceded that to compete at the highest level you must buy new stock each year, they all won’t be successful, nor fit in to your own individual regime, but if you stand still you will inevitability go down the sheet rather than up the sheet, a lot he feels is down to the pigeons, for you can work in the loft all the hours that God gives to you, but this has been done without success or improvement so when you take all into account a percentage of any fanciers success is down to the pigeons that he or she races.

As you have read at the start of this story “Keeping the Faith” Liam always knew he was going to win an INFC National, it is something that he has always been bumming and blowing about for many years to the point that some of his fellow club mates, just never listened anymore, we are all guilty of bumming and blowing at some time during our spell of pigeons racing some more so than others, but for Liam this was different, he knew that with the right system , pigeons and a level of dedication the National award would follow, regardless of the fanciers who said I, I when he told them, he never relented in his ambition and resolve of winning a National in what he regarded being the ultimate National racing organisation around namely the INFC.

Liam has worked tirelessly to achieve this goal over the last number of years preparing a good team for every event possible, with many set backs as you seem to get in pigeons more so than delights. In this particular race last year won by Owen Kirwan of Gorey in Wexford, Liam sent what he considered a superb team which numbered eleven and I can tell you as I will explain later in this report the Donnelly set-up is one of the smallest I have ever encountered in my years of scribing. So to send a team of 11 and only get one home (late) is a sucker punch, of course not excluding the money involved in doing so. While on the subject of previous winners and upon doing some research over my fathers INFC archive collection let me bring you some stats, this is the third year on the trot that this particular National has been won by a loft in the South of Ireland, on checking the wind a couple had north in them with the third a Lt South Westerly.

When you then look further into the results you see a bigger picture that would indicate that the Southern flying lofts have enjoyed a great deal of dominance in this race over the last few years with a number of fanciers figuring highly year in year out, firstly in 2007 it was J & J Merrigan of Rathnew taking 1st Open for the East Coast Fed, then last year as mentioned above we had Owen Kirwin from Gorey in Wexford winning 1st Open for South Leinster Fed and in 2009 its the turn of Liam Donnelly & son Owen from Finglas RPC who win 1st Open for the Irish SR Federation. Now looking deeper into it Owen Kirwin finished 6th in 2007 won it last year and this year is 10th Open superb all round racing. The winners in 2007, Joe & Jody Merrigan are 6th this time around and then you see another leading partnership in Paddy Rock & son Martin from the Skerries they have finished 4th Open in both 2007 and 2009. These are only a few of the stats that come to the surface but there are many which attribute this particular National considered by many of course as the best and most challenging one for Yearling pigeons in Europe to be in favour of the Southern Flying members of this prestigious organisation over recent years.

Getting back to the task in hand and the reason behind this visit to the Finglas area of Dublin and subsequent loft profile, is a very special Yearling Blue Cock now named “Jack Flash” he was timed at 13.19pm flying 229 miles to the Donnelly loft which sits high in a very small and compact rear garden to the Donnelly property in Finglas. A further two good arrivals were timed at 13.43pm and 13.46pm with total of six birds timed and five recorded on the day for the Donnelly loft from an entry of 15 sent to Sennen Cove.

The pigeon in question was flying on the roundabout system, to which “Jack Flash” started the season as one part of a team consisting of 14 Cocks and 10 Hens all on the roundabout flying to the one and only loft sited in the terraced back garden measuring no more than 24ft x 12ft, yes you read right the complete garden, in this Liam has a loft measuring 18ft x 6ft up on a high foundation with the space at the bottom bricked and windowed up and facilitated into a small stock loft which you would have to crouch down to enter, this holds no more than five pair of pigeons, and yes you read right again 5 pair of stock pigeons. Who said the small team back garden man couldn’t win a National. I am impressed with Liam, he has the outlook of what is required and is managing to achieve it with next to no space whatsoever, racing the roundabout consists of the Hens being kept in the middle in the small wardrobe perch boxes I call them, box perch size with a shutter door from top to bottom, the cocks on the other hand are kept in the Section furthest away from the house, in here you have 12 Boxes on the back wall and a couple of boxes to the left hand side when standing in the section, the National winner’s box is the top box on the left hand side, might be something in the top Box, for in my last loft profile last week on the M & A Pearson team the 1st, 2nd & 3rd Open winners all were flying to the top boxes in the loft!!

Now the hens in Liams Middle section locked up in these wardrobe type boxes sourced from Sandyhill Pigeon Supplies (Henry Byrne) are let out twice per day to train, they are allowed to roam the section for a Drink etc before the doors are opened, they will fly for around 40 mins and during this time the cocks will be moved to the middle to investigate. The Hens fly without persuasion and are duly called within the 45 minute time frame to the far section, to which all the Cocks now in the middle Section are exited and the hens then return to be fed from the hopper in the Middle section, and the cocks are called in after roughly an hour to which yet again they are not forced to fly and fed accordingly.

I set about, upon this info from Liam to ask him about his feeding system with regards to the roundabout pigeons, and how surprised I was to hear that although they follow a very well implemented exercising regime they are fed as much as they want. Feeding is soured from Tom Nelson and the main one is Henry Beattie’s own mixture, which delights me in admitting that it is a good all round mixture for the money, with the increasing cost of corn in every fanciers mind at the moment, clean and well balanced, available in a clear bag so to see what exactly you are buying. Liam purchases four bags of this and mixes it with one bag of Bred and Wean. This particular mixture is fed to the roundabout team from Sunday until Tuesday night when they will then move onto the famous Verse Lega ‘Gerry Plus’. The latter feeding must be one of the biggest sellers on the feed market with many now using it for widowhood, roundabout and more so with young bird racing. This of course based upon the previous winning loft profiles I have completed.

I was some what confused as to how you can heavy feed, but yet get the exercising out of them without flagging etc, of course and seeming ‘Thick’ I had to enquire how he balanced feeding and training. During the course of my many loft profiles if something needs explaining I normally ask, doesn’t always mean I will get an answer, or a truthful one!! To be fair to Liam he explained it perfectly and I suppose when you here it, it is one of those ones where you have to be their yourself, similar to a lot of the feeding systems in place and a dimension that I consider the most important with reference to competing and winning. Only time in your own loft will teach you when your pigeons have been fed enough, whether it be the searching noise in the hopper by a few or the running to the drinker all tell tale signs of a pigeon that has had enough. As previously mentioned heavy protein feed Sunday to Wednesday morning and then ‘Gerry Plus’ onwards with the last feed that of Hemp and Hemp only around 27 hours prior to the expected time of arrival from the race the feed of hemp will be 1 teaspoonful per pigeon. This will be given as mentioned prior to the basketing night and will be as close to the recommended 27 hour time frame from feed to estimated time to the loft, this and many of Liams practices have been put in place after many trails and errors, again something as you many experienced flyers will know that no same system can work in every loft, for if this were the case how boring pigeon racing would be.

Training of the O/Bird round about pigeons is mostly around the house morning and night and as mentioned they are not force flew, if they seem to be losing some momentum they are put into the basket. Training will commence around the four week barrier before the first race how many tosses they get is very much dependant on the weather and on top of this you can exclude them being tossed in a North East Wind, Liam just doesn’t see the point for they are more than well schooled as youngsters and the tossing prior to the O/Bird season starting is more or less to remove any cob webs and to add more fuel to his assertion ‘many good pigeons just not himself have been lost in training tosses in a North East Wind’. All the tosses will start and finish at 18 miles and will not increase in between, when the pigeons are exiting the basket and heading straight home in the right direction without delay they are ready.

Now for the youngsters which are raced to the same loft, so in respect to space not to many are raced the majority of the 50 are on the darkness system with the later round put on Natural, Liam always buys in around a dozen youngsters each year as with very few stock pigeons, he needs to make the numbers up and more frequently than not these additional youngsters are sourced from the one and only Tommy Nelson of Ballymun, a fancier you certainly wont go wrong with. A true gentleman, and a class fancier who week in, week out is the man to be feared in the Irish South Road Federation.

The youngsters are hopper fed and once again this is measured to a degree with Liam in the loft for the full duration of the feeding, once again the rule is going to the drinker, once three or four leave the hopper time for it to be lifted, and should one or two be late in following the evening feed the following morning a handful of the allocated corn is removed from the daily allocation. The two pigeons that were late will also be lifted away from their feed before the hopper is empty. The Y/Bird Section like the rest of the loft is kept immaculately clean as are the drinkers which are cleaned and re-cleaned daily.

The Y/Birds get the best and although there is an implementation of measurement with the feeding they are well fed, but again this is based on work load, they soon burn it all of, they like the O/Birds are flew around the house morning and night, I must stress also that there is no set time for letting them out, this is very much dependant on what hours Liam is working with regards the taxi business.

Training of the youngsters starts about four weeks before the first race and will see Liam and Mick Gilligan taking the youngsters together starting at a distance of around 3 – 4 miles, they will get a few of these until they have got the hang of the tossing regime, the distance obviously increases during an intense period of training, rising to the ultimate distance of 35 miles, no further, they will stay at this distance every time they go into the hamper, and as the racing programme gathers distance, training also increases and more days than not the youngster will see the 35 mile toss twice daily. This will see the pigeons going on the transporter in the mornings and Liam and Mick taking them in the evenings, must also point out that once racing commences the birds are not out of the loft unless in a hamper for tossing or racing, no freedom to fly around the loft morning and night, they will get this relaxed freedom only one day per week for bathing.

The feeding for the youngsters is just the same mixture as the O/Birds, they also have minerals and grit available at all times and fly to box perches with fitted pull out trays for easy cleaning. Liam also mixes Homoform with Red Band and they get a handful of this everyday, also something they get daily over the corn is Verse Laga Optimal Start 25 which is an egg coated crumb mixture that the birds love to high heaven, deep yellow in colour and a lot of his very fine, Liam tells me that when you put over the corn a lot of it finds it way through to the floor of the hopper, but go back in after feeding and you will never have known that their was anything of that colour in the feeder such is the love of this product by the pigeons, again this product like the feeding is sourced from Tommy Nelson.

This strict regime has seen Liam gain admiration from a number of fanciers over the last few years, for it is well documented that L Donnelly & Son of Finglas RPC can race Y/Birds. Last year for instance the loft enjoyed another exceptional year with three Red Cards among a vast array of prizes, to some reading this you may say only 3 Red Cards, but you have to consider that this Club purchases 4,000 rings annually and many weeks during the Y/Bird season the Club will send a combined total of 1,000 pigeons to any said race. So to top the Club with that birdage away is some going and not forgetting your competing against some of the biggest names in the ISRF.

The stock as mentioned earlier in this report are housed underneath the main loft which sits around 5ft off the ground in order for a good open fly in for the pigeons, the space let underneath has been utilised with a small stock section, which contains five pair of stock pigeons, when you consider that all this success is achieved in such a small garden racing against the big team and well organised fanciers it is then that you start to appreciate just how good a fancier Liam Donnelly is. The five pair of stock birds include a pair from Jan Kurjzer of Holland with the majority of the rest sourced from good friend Tom Nelson of Ballymun and Tommy sourced these exceptional pigeon from two outstanding lofts in the North of Ireland namely Hartogs from Henry McLaughlin of Coalisland who owns the ‘Blue Devil Lofts’ exceptional pigeons owned by an exceptional fancier and a gentleman at that. The other pigeons that Tom supplied to Liam were sourced from Sammy Buckley of Annaghmore, many will already know that the late Sammy Buckley had an exceptional team of pigeons that won many top awards for fanciers all over the country and these pigeons till this day are doing the business for the lucky fanciers who have maintained the line over the years and Tommy Nelson is one of these said fanciers.

How fitting it is that Liam Donnelly & Son also win the 2 Bird Average in this INFC Yearling National event and the award they lift for this is the Sam Buckley Memorial Trophy. Wonderful to say the least and how proud Sam will be looking down, his colony of pigeons that he built up is to this day winning in the big competitive National competition.

The first pigeon timed by Liam Donnelly was a Blue Cock “Jack Flash” he was timed at 13.19pm flying 229 miles and lit on the roof of the loft and entered in a flash with Liam’s one and only 18 month old Grandson Jack looking on, hence the name “Jack Flash”. The Sire of this National winner was a Jan Kurjzer and is a G/Son of his famous “De 119” this pigeon was purchased at an auction conducted by Gerry McCourt in Dublin. The Dam of the National winner is from Tommy Nelson and contains all the top bloodlines that Tommy is renowned for including the Sammy Buckley pigeons.

The second pigeon timed at 13.43pm was again a Blue Cock this time of Piet Valk breeding and looking at the result he finished 28th Open and won the Sam Buckley Memorial Trophy for Liam. Not content with that he was to record yet another arrival 3 minutes later this one containing the bloodlines of Tommy Nelson on both sides. To think that Tom supplied just four hens to Liam to make up his numbers in the stock loft and ever since that Liam admits that the success since has never relented especially pigeons coming down from all four hens, how is that for performance and friendship and excellent example of what pigeon racing is all about.

I will wrap this article up by firstly apologising for the delay in getting it put together, such is my work level currently on a number of fronts, I am having less and less time every day and that’s starting each day now at 5am with many late nights continuing each week so apologies Liam and of course extended apologies to the viewers who have logged onto the website to read this article I trust it was worth the wait and on closing I would like to personally congratulate Liam Donnelly on his National success and I look forward to seeing him at the Annual Dinner in November along with Mick hopefully, and of course Tommy Nelson to complete an awesome trio.

Adie McCormick
Irelands Own Pigeon Auctions
www.pigeonnetwork.com
Tel 028 92 604778
Email celestiallofts@aol.com
Irelands Own Pigeon Auctions
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