# M & D Evans Vandenabeeles



## sunshineracinglofts (Sep 1, 2011)

As some of you have heard me talk on this subject before, my partner David Trunell purchased the perfect pair ( a pair of breeders from Evans Vandenabeeles, cock is son of shadow) and also wrote the article chronicling the success of the evans birds. He is finishing up the article (part 2) and we talked yesterday and he mentioned some pretty interesting points when speaking with Mark Evans about pigeon racing. 

For those of you who dont know Evans VAndenabeeles they prob have the most impressive race record in the UK, and are up there for all of Europe, year after year and one loft results as well . (2nd in SCMDPR) 

During the convo, Mark said 

- He completely disregards all physical traits when breeding, back, eye, wing, vent. When Dave asked him why? he said he has been burnt to many times, by sitting the bird out because his structure wasnt up to a par, only to try the birds young out, to have a champion bird... Mark said this kept happening,and they kept buying breeders back that were not good handling. 

-The above brings to the next main point in which think they are so successful. If the Evans sell someone a bird/kit they offer a prize/gift if you give them your results. This is done as a motivator for the buyer to keep the breeder informed. This allows them to INCREASE the rate in which they test and it also lets them know what birds to buy back. If you give them a top report, you better believe your probably going to get a call asking you what you want to sell the bird for. Year after year they buy back there top racers and top breeders, at really an cost according to Mark Evans. So my point above, they would buy these proven breeders and racers back, and they handled less than well to there standards ( some of them). He said after they tried the structually "bad" pigeons and they bred winners, they quit even paying attention to the structure of the bird. 

I thought this was very interesting.


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## Skyeking (Jan 17, 2003)

I think it is very interesting too, and especially the "buy back" option.

I can see you also get many more results back than you ever dreamed and can hopefully get clearer better results (because of the increase in tests rates) in the selection process.

It would be great if you could test birds sent out to flyers all over the world where pigeon racing is very popular.


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## Kastle Loft (May 7, 2008)

Anyone who may be interested in the birds from M&D Evans (domestically) can check some out at Pressing On Loft or Kastle Loft.


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## SmithFamilyLoft (Nov 22, 2004)

sunshineracinglofts said:


> As some of you have heard me talk on this subject before, my partner David Trunell purchased the perfect pair ( a pair of breeders from Evans Vandenabeeles, cock is son of shadow) and also wrote the article chronicling the success of the evans birds. He is finishing up the article (part 2) and we talked yesterday and he mentioned some pretty interesting points when speaking with Mark Evans about pigeon racing.
> 
> For those of you who dont know Evans VAndenabeeles they prob have the most impressive race record in the UK, and are up there for all of Europe, year after year and one loft results as well . (2nd in SCMDPR)
> 
> ...


 I am not surprised, as a number of the great Masters have stated that they can't pick out the winners, they can only spot the obvious cull. Once the birds have been raced, then it is fairly easy to pick the winners, you simply look at the top of the race sheet. So you sell a hundred pigeons and then buy back the two or three actual proven winners and/or the proven breeders. It's these proven winners and breeders which are the exceptional, as the vast majority are just going to be plain old average. 

I for one, never believed the future winner could be picked out of a basket, based on it's eyes, wing, tail, vent, etc etc. But, that is what the average breeder has learned to look for. So, it's not surprising to me, that breeders have been able to breed some very average racers with "perfect" eyes, wings, back, vent, etc etc. that can't fly for crap. So for the breeder merchant, it makes a lot of sense to offer 3,4,5, or 10 times what the customer paid for the bird, since maybe only 5% of pigeons produced, even from "good" birds, are going to turn out exceptional. Makes a lot of sense from the breeder/merchant's perspective, to go ahead and sell all that you can, and if 1 out of 20 turns out to be really exceptional, it is still a bargain to pay many times what you paid for it to get it back. 

From the buyers perspective, you may very well have to buy a dozen to get a decent one in the bunch, if you happen to luck out and get a good one in the bunch, would make no sense to me to sell it back for even 10 times what you paid for him or her, as the 10 or 11 you are left with, are just going to be plain old average. And average pigeons can be purchased locally here at the farmers market for about $2 each or less.


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## donald campbell (Oct 30, 2011)

*M&D EVANS birds*

Hi my name is Don Campbell from PRESSINGON loft previously known as C&S loft I have M&D EVANS Imports and GR Children off the top M&D EVANS birds purchesed direct from JOHN MARLES of SYLVAN LOFT, here at my loft and have won futuritys for three years now. One thing stressed by the Evans Loft is proven M&D EVANS birds as we all know just because you purchase birds off the best pairs does not mean you will get winners, so when purchasing birds make sure the cost is resonable and resurch the flyers curent record and previous record. I have seen many people in our sport selling the pedigree of birds only. I have labled them as the flim flam sellers of our sport. I will be posting a web site soon for PRESSINGSON LOFT


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## Kastle Loft (May 7, 2008)

I hear great things about Mr Campbell's birds


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## TheLaw818 (Mar 12, 2012)

thank you all.. great readings


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## sunshineracinglofts (Sep 1, 2011)

my partner David Trunnell owns that bird, you can see her here (http://davidtrunnelllofts.com/The_Perfect_Cock.html). a phone call into him and he can explain to you the birds background. Not sure if he has birds for sale off that hen or not, i know he has her and his other hens on a bull system right now with the perfect cock.


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## SmithFamilyLoft (Nov 22, 2004)

donald campbell said:


> Hi my name is Don Campbell from PRESSINGON loft previously known as C&S loft I have M&D EVANS Imports and GR Children off the top M&D EVANS birds purchesed direct from JOHN MARLES of SYLVAN LOFT, here at my loft and have won futuritys for three years now. One thing stressed by the Evans Loft is proven M&D EVANS birds as *we all know just because you purchase birds off the best pairs does not mean you will get winners, so when purchasing birds make sure the cost is resonable and resurch the flyers curent record and previous record.* I have seen many people in our sport selling the pedigree of birds only. I have labled them as the flim flam sellers of our sport. I will be posting a web site soon for PRESSINGSON LOFT




I agree with you 100% that a bird's pedigree does not in any way guarantee a winner. I always looked at it like buying a lottery ticket. So when purchasing a pigeon buy one which has already demonstrated it is a winning racer and breeder. Otherwise you just might have to purchase quite a few to get that winning racer and breeder. 

Unfortunately, I'm not sure there is a correlation between the owners current/previous record, and whether or not the bird one is attempting to sell you is going to be a winner or not. One could in theory produce a few hundred pigeons each year and 2% or fewer could turn out to be real champion material and make the fancier famous and keep him in the pigeon selling business. Maybe 8% or 10% could be pretty exceptional and could move most average lofts ahead. The rest might be graded from above average, average, and below average, hopefully some smaller percentage falls to below average. Any way you throw those genetic dice, the odds are the birds sent to you will fall somewhere below the top few percentage.

In a hypothetical example, say I can point to several One Loft events that I win every year, and can point to a long history of annual 1st Place wins. Say I can also point to a hundred 1st place wins from people who have flown my birds. Would be an outstanding record, who could disagree ? Perhaps I could sell birds by the ton based on such a record. 

But, what if I had more then a thousand breeding pairs and I enter a dozen or more birds into every One Loft event in the World, and have sold thousands of YB's every year for decades. When one looks at the numbers of birds produced, and the numbers of events and races entered, perhaps far fewer then 1% of my birds produced turn out to be winners. 

Now, compare my hypothetical example above, to a hypothetical small back yard loft operation, where fewer then 40 YB's are produced every year, and let's just say 4 or 5 every year out to be substantial winners. Now who is really producing a larger winning record, who has produced more 1st Place wins to their credit etc. Why the first hypocritical example of course, but who is producing a much greater percentage of winners ? Who might very well be producing the better birds ? I used somewhat extreme examples to illustrate my point. 

There is another example, of fanciers who amassed a huge number of wins to their credit over a number of years and then something changed. They relocated to a different location, and moved the loft and their birds. Then the winning stopped........draw your own conclusions, but in my mind, the loft location apparently played a huge factor in their wins. Once the loft location was taken from the equation, the fancier's "good" birds turned into very average performances. 

So the problem with measuring the quality of a fancier's pigeons based on club or combine competition, is that when you buy a pigeon from a person based or their local win's, is that their loft, loft location, and the fancier's management and training skill does not come in the box with the birds.

In conclusion, acquiring good, decent, sound stock, can be much more challenging then one might imagine. If it was as simple as simply clicking on a web site, or picking up the phone, and ordering some "good" pigeons at a very reasonable cost, then everyone would have done that by now. And then as we would look over the race sheets for the season, we would find that the vast majority of pigeon fanciers out there, would still be turning in fairly average results.


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## donald campbell (Oct 30, 2011)

hi Warren, yes being rated 3rd in the us for dog trainer and previous boxer, Great anology as I myselfalways win the task ahead in m mind first; however I was refering to someone selling pedigree birds without testing them and their youngsters but as I have seen pigeon huxters say but the blood, yes they all have the blood but most should go in the happy pigeon place. The problem is, flim lame sellers see only a buck because they have the BLOOD


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## TheLaw818 (Mar 12, 2012)

Hey DONALD !!! How are you I sent you a private message


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## donald campbell (Oct 30, 2011)

Hi, Hows it going. I have 2 ybs already banded and others will hatch in a about a week. Did you enter the pigeon talk race because I just banded the bird I donated to the winnner of the race, the other is banded for my friend Walt Thomas allias Conditionfreak Two years ago I gave him the father which bred last years winner from my 11 flight hen, winner of the Ohio Classic Race, last year her daughter was equal 2nd She was mated to a son of the perfect pair. This pair bred every yb winning at least one race and some multiple race winners. give me a call anytime. DON


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## TheLaw818 (Mar 12, 2012)

Hey buddy.. I didn't enter do to my limit stock as I just started. I'll give you a call tomorrow.. Thanks for everything,,,


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