| Health Tips to prevent problems with birds? Everyone needs to watch their birds closely for health problems. If you want to win work at and on the birds health and loft situation. Always be looking to improve comfort and ventilation for the birds. Check the list below often. 1. Vaccinate for PMV, every bird every year. (and also young birds right out of the nest after May 1st or at least before July 1st) 2. Do NOT over crowd your lofts. (50% of all lofts I have seen do NOT have enough fresh air in them and too many pigeons) 3. Disinfect watering system OFTEN. (I alternate them and soak them in a 5 gal bucket with bleach in it.) 4. Quarantine any new birds coming into your loft for at least a week. Treat as needed (watch the droppings). 5. Do not let sparrows or other birds enter your loft and keep mouse poison around 24/7/365. 6. Worm and dust often and give 2 drops of Ivomec to each bird at least twice per year. Protect your birds, their health, and the sport by keeping on top of the situation. It is better to cull a few young birds now than to infect your entire flock. No one is exempt from this even if you don't buy or acquire other birds. Isolate them if their droppings are not right! In general the droppings indicate the health, small firm round droppings is what you want. (Use Pro-biotic). 7. Birds should ALWAYS have a white nose (the whiter the better) and solid roundish droppings and a clear throat. 8. Get rid of birds that do not seem "right" or very healthy or birds that have not produced birds that compete for you. 9. You must control your birds. Young birds you do this with feed and old birds you make sure they keep to their own nest and are not trouble makers in the loft. 10. Try to wean your babies very young. I move them at 24 days and then visit them and handle them each day making sure the are eating and drinking. 11. Work everyday to make the birds healthier. No feed should be left when they are done eating and give clean grit every other day. It is best to put the grit on a board in the aviary and NOT in a crock or bowl unless it is made of wood. |
| One loft races and our success. One loft races are one of the best ways to test your birds against others. Treated (fed watered, medicated) and trained all the same in the same loft puts all birds on an equal bases. This is more of a true test and true competition of birds and breeders of the birds than even flying against your neighbor across the street. One loft races are FUN! People gather for food, drink and talk pigeons while waiting for the birds to return. It is even fun if you don't have a bird in the race just meeting and talking about the birds as well as all the great food etc. However, it definitely more fun if you have birds in the race! And, it is even MORE fun to win a money position in the race. As far as getting in races with someone (some individual loft) as your handler, this is VERY risky at the least. You must know and choose a GOOD handler then you have to luck out with the winds on race day. I don't want to go into this any further but after being in a good number of races with handlers I can say that part of my life is over with as I will not do this anymore. When getting in One Loft races make sure the race is reputable and has a good track record. Check it out with past participants. The Goldstars and One Loft Races: In 1987 was my first One Loft race experience and it was as good as it gets as we took FIRST place and won over a grand! This was in the Belleville RPC One loft race. It was a 300-mile race and there were 2 birds on the drop and my cock trapped in first. Over the next 3 or 4 years we placed in the money EVERY year as one or more of our birds were on the drop (equal first). Then, for some reason the club changed the race to a 250 (instead of a 300-mi race). This caused many birds on the drop and our success was not so good (when you get 35 birds on the drop you need birds that can run fast - to the trap - and not so much of a quality racing pigeon. None the less we still won some money positions quite often. In almost every One Loft race our club has hosted (all but one I think) I have had birds in the money. The bottom line is these Goldstars are excellent One loft birds as long as the race is 250-miles or over (other wise it is just a trapping contest and not a true test of the birds). The Goldstars have been tested on 400-mile Young bird races and WON the race, in fact one was the only day bird in the entire Concourse in race A and the other was 2nd Concourse in Race B. Remember, a Concourse is made up of 2 or more Combines and a Combine is 2 or more clubs! These birds are great at 400-miles! |
| Important message about buying birds Whether you are just starting out in the sport of racing pigeons or you have been in it a while the object is to win races correct? To do this consistently you need quality birds and that is what most pigeon race men are looking to acquire or breed. Well, you can’t breed quality out of so-so birds in any amount of time you can afford to waste. The best way to acquire good birds may be to get them from a local loft, and older flier, that has been around for years and is always there on clock out day no matter how hard a race it was. Other than that, or if you prefer to beat your competitors with your “own” type of birds, or something different then you will have to go find the quality elsewhere. Most of the “Feather Merchants” have some excellent birds, however they are among hundreds of poorer quality birds. By Feather Merchants I mean pigeon houses that sell pigeons to make a living. These people must sell birds to survive and are responsible for maintaining employees and all the other expenses involved. Their goal is to move bird’s period. Yes, they do go to Europe, they do import birds, and they do try to find quality and maintain a reputation. However, I have known many a flier who have bought birds from them and seldom ever got a bird worth the money he paid for them. One fellow, new at the sport, in two to three years purchased over $10,000.00 worth of birds (and this was 20 years ago) and maybe got 6 birds out of all of them that where worth the money he paid for them. In fact 90% of them were of no value at all as they were lost as young birds almost immediately. Although they had fancy pedigrees and they looked good the quality was disgusting and a waste of time and money . There are also fellows that have worked their way to the top. They won awards for many accomplishments, then decided to sell bad birds on their “good name”. Whether this happened by accident (the winning) or their GOOD location, or not so swift competition I am not sure. Perhaps, along with the fact he was a super handler he was able to win these races. I have witnessed such men locally where no one else could win with their birds. The bottom line is that in buying pigeons you don’t always get what you pay for from SOME people or merchants. You might get a good looking bird with a fancy pedigree but that does not mean it is of any quality. Believe me as I have witnessed it over and over that paper (fancy pedigrees) does not win races. Birds that are out of birds that are out of other bird’s years ago, from Europe, don’t get it here! Perhaps they are diluted or inbred too much are not even out of who they are supposed to be out of I don’t know. What I do know is that these Goldstar birds that I have bred for 35 years win for most everyone and in any part of the country and in YB races as well as OB races. Their pedigrees are out of birds that have done it themselves (won races and or bred winners) here and now in the United States of America. We breed for quality NOT quantity! I guarantee if you put an equal amount of Goldstars against an equal amount of ANY other family of birds these Goldstar's will out fly and out breed them ALL! If you want to win races plus have some birds no one else has then try these. You won’t be sorry! |
| Goldstar Lofts & Birds |
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| Our 600-mile champions! (note: we fly over 619-miles) (We are listing only the winners and day birds and not the other many other consistent top Combine diploma winners we have) Band # Position AU 85 LSL 7573 BC H 1st Club, 8th Combine 1987 AU 89 LSLC 0919 BB C 1st Club, 8th Combine 1993 AU 93 LSL 5374 DCWF C 1st Club, 7th Combine 1995 AU 93 LSL 5369 BC Cock 1st Club & 1st Combine 1995 ("Broken Arrow" qualifies as an AU registered champion) related to 5374, 1716, & 4203 as well as many 500-mi winners. AU 96 LSL 0644 DC Cock 1st Club, 4th Combine 1998 AU 97 LSL 1719 BC Hen 1st Club & 1st Combine 1999 AU 97 LSL 1716 BC Hen 1st Club, 8th Combine 1999 AU 98 LSL 2855 BC Cock 1st Club, 4th Combine 2000 (also 5th Combine 2002) AU 98 LSL 2850 BC Hen 1st Club, 2nd Combine 2000 AU 99 ILL 0068 BC Hen 1st Club, 4th Combine 2001 IF 00 IIF 0243 BC Cock 1st Club & 1st Combine DAY BIRD 2003 Race A Speed of 1375 YPM (also 5th Combine 2004) IF 00 ILL 2011 BC Hen 1st Club & 1st Combine ONLY DAY Bird in Combine 2003 Race B AU 99 ILL 0058 BC Hen 3rd club & 4th Combine DAY BIRD 2003 Race A IF 02 ILL 4203 BC Hen 1st Club & 1st Combine 2006 (also 5th Combine 2005) AU 06 STAR 1679 BC C 3rd Club & Combine DAY BIRD 2008 Race A These type of birds make up our entire loft of Goldstar racing pigeons. 99% of all birds we sell will have some (if not many) of these birds in their pedigree. These are quality pigeons and they prove it! They Perform in the races and the longer or harder the race the better they do! |