The Roller-Pigeon.Com Blog

Made a big mistake and almost paid a heavy price. Let the A-Team out when the wind was blowing strong. I thought the winds were calming down and would have time for maybe one team today. Joni said not to let them out it was too windy. She said she watches some trees over by the pond, and if they are blowing it’s too windy to fly rollers.

So, what did I do? I let the A-Team out and the moment the last bird is out and I walk out from around the kit box, I can feel the wind become REALLY strong. I am instantly regretting letting them out and so immediately grab the feed can. By then they are at least half a mile downwind and getting further away!

I start waving my florescent green kit flag in the hopes that maybe they will see me waving it frantically and want to head toward it. Well, I don’t know if it worked, but after being totally gone over half a mile away behind the trees and with the winds just getting stronger, they come up fighting the wind and heading back toward normal air space.

By now I grabbed the feed can and am shaking it for all I’m worth and whistling to get them to come in. Now these birds are about as light from wheat feeding as they have ever been, I really thought they were goners.

The good thing is I keep good control over my birds with the feed can and once they heard me calling to come eat, they did everything they could to come down. It took probably 5 minutes to be able to finally get to the point of landing on the kit box!

Every bird was there except that red grizzle. I thought maybe some might roll down since they flew less than 10 minutes and the strong winds kept them hovering over the kit box for about 20 seconds before they could work it down to the kit box. Not one even rolled.

They landed and were in the kit box ready to eat within 15 minutes of letting them out. The red grizzle showed up about 20 minutes later. I put him away to feed him up.

I did a huge blunder today but feel due to good training habits, I was able to cover my mistake by being able to get the birds to trap way early than they normally do. Next time I’m listening to Joni.