# White Utility/homing pigeon?



## Nancy (Nov 7, 2001)

Dear Experts,
How would I tell a very large homing pigeon from a white utility pigeon. Would there be some differences easily seen if I just knew what to look for?
Thank you.
Nancy


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## bigbird (Aug 19, 2000)

Nancy,
Lets begin by defining the utility pigeon.
The word utility refers to a pigeon used in some utility way such as for raising lasrge squabs for the food industry. They use White Kings as utility pigeons, and some other breeds as well. They are usually very large, somewhat heavy and not good fliers.
Now, with regard to a racing homer, they are not usually as large or fat and they can fly very well. There are different breeds used for racing and they are all often refered to as homers (American Beauty Homer, etc.)
There are specific head shapes and body shapes in different breeds of utility pigeons and also in homing pigeons. So your question is not easy to answer.
Pictures would help.
Regards,
Carl


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## turmani (Aug 29, 2001)

Carl,

That's not a bad simplified overview.

A couple items tho:

German Beauty Homers (neither Germanic or American sub-varieties) are NOT used for racing. Like American Show Racers, Dutch Beauty Homers, Exhibition Homers, Genuine Homers, Show Racing Homers, etc. they are strictly a development for the show pen and are mediocre fliers at best. By far, I think it is safe to say that 99.99% of the birds used to race world wide are typical Racing Homers which we will simply classify as "Belgian Voyageuer" pigeons (true original name). Only rarely will one see other breeds raced and in the United States its extremely rare to see other breeds raced and its often not even allowable by some clubs. On a few occassions, some Mid East breeds have occassionally been raced in organized clubs in the USA. So for example, a few years ago an Arab friend of mine was racing "Sheapard" (this is just a homing ancient Oriental Frill bred in certain portions of the Mid East). He beat the hell out of people at short distance sprint races with them, but they began to slow down past 250 miles (they still got in the top 20). The next year they passed a motion to outlaw non traditional Racing Homers from competing in their club, so he was out after that, but you get the idea. Its not only rare, but the Racing guys don't like it!

Either way, you'll NEVER see a Beauty Homer in a race and they're rather clumsy fliers anyway.

As to the Utility breeds, well in reality, a large number of these white Racing Homers have their origin as Utility birds. At one time, Squabbing Homers were more prevalent in the squab industry than other breeds simply because despite their smaller size, they could out produce most of the Utility Crosses of their day. Before 1900, in the United States, the only REAL competition Homers had in squabbing were the Duchesse. The Duchesse was larger than known breeds except for Runts and they bred as fast as the Homers, but they did have one fault - huge muffs!

In the mid 1890's this all began to change. 
Carneau were imported from Belgium and in addittion, the White King and the Swiss Mondain were developed through crossbreeding Duchesse, Maltese and Squab Homers (more or less). In addittion, the White Carneau, Silver King and Indian Mondain were also developed a few years following. Both the Duchesse and the Squabbing Homer ended their reign by 1920 in favor of these other breeds which were all in all, large, rapid and uniform producing birds.

In today's squab industry, the dominant breeds are really the two King varieties, the Texas Pioneer and the Hubbel. The rest have fallen into rarity and to a degree, nearly extinction.

K.D. Spurling - http://members.tripod.com/ultrarare/ 

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## mamoo (Nov 25, 2001)

really you can tell the differance in quality wise such as clean feathers bright eyes white wattles


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## crazyroller (Nov 4, 2001)

I think there is quite a difference between a homer and a utility. You can tell by their beaks, and a homer has a longer, narrower neck. I have some homing/racing pigeons and they look nothing like a utility.


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