# Some News on My Iranin High Flyers.



## sufiness (May 12, 2009)

Someof you might hve read my post of about 2 weeks ago.

Basically I was looking for advice on trying to get the 2 squeakers I had bred to fly. Well the Good news is they are now flying about 45 min - 60 minutes the last 3 times I have flown them.

The only sad point is I have to throw one of them up in to the air and the other then follows.

What really amazed me was how High they climb. And they are already tumbling. It actually is a wonderful sight seeing them fly high and tumble. I just need them to get on longer times now.

If you have any tips do let me have them.

Pics here


----------



## RodSD (Oct 24, 2008)

I think that is normal. LOL! I think some people flags their high flier or make a loud sound to scare them to fly. So throwing one of the birds is like "forcing" one to fly. May I ask if you are using droppers or perhaps some flag signals to call them down. I mean how are you going to call them down?

Nice looking birds.


----------



## sufiness (May 12, 2009)

RodSD said:


> I think that is normal. LOL! I think some people flags their high flier or make a loud sound to scare them to fly. So throwing one of the birds is like "forcing" one to fly. May I ask if you are using droppers or perhaps some flag signals to call them down. I mean how are you going to call them down?
> 
> Nice looking birds.


Well at the moment I just have the 2 youngsters flying and they aren't flying so long. i.e. 1hour. Not sure how I can get them to fly more than that, any advice.

One thing I do have is pair of rollers tht I am using to sit on eggs so I cn get more Iranians back this year. Last time round I only got one egf from the high flyers so I saved one of the roller eggs. Maybe I can use that as dropper?

If you have any tips please let me know as I would love to see my highflyers fly for longer.

Thanks for the comment


----------



## Birdman79 (Aug 9, 2007)

You can use birds as droppers.You want them white or mainly white,and some thing that doesn't take off like a fantail etc.You can use your young roller as a dropper,till it fully grows then it's going to want to fly with the other birds.


----------



## NetRider (May 6, 2007)

Hey sufiness, good to hear that your birds are now flying for an hour.

With high fliers you have to toss them, most high fliers wont just fly by themselves unless they get scared off the roof, so just carry the birds outside and toss them, soon they will all climb to the skies.

You also say that they tumble, are these high fliers, or tumblers? I have no experience with Iranian highfliers or tumblers, but if you have an idea of how long they are supposed to fly, you can change your training methods a little to achieve that result.

Here is what I do with pakistani high fliers:
Let them sit in the aviary for about a week or two. Then settle them to the loft in a cage for a day or two making sure they come inside when I call them. Then I remove the cage, and they now venture out exploring the loft roof, soon they will start flapping their wings and might take off. Usually they just fly a round or two and land back on the roof. Once they are settled, I start tossing them, they will now climb higher and fly longer for each time they are outside. I fly them every day for about a week, now they are usually flying between 1-3 hours. Once they reach that mark, I fly them on alternative days, that usually make each bird increase its time with about an hour or two. The more you fly the young birds, the more they will fly, and when flying on alternative day they get some rest, and will fly longer on their next training.

As for droppers, I never tried. I know that tippler fanciers train their birds to drop when they signal them, but I dont. I let them fly as long as they want, and since my birds are solo fliers, some might fly an hour, while others might do 10 hours, its all up to them, and how much they wanna fly on a given day.


----------



## RodSD (Oct 24, 2008)

NetRider,

Well said. Some people like to call them down though because they don't want them flying past the night if they released their birds rather late!


----------



## NetRider (May 6, 2007)

I wish I could train them like that  But I just dont have the heart to keep them hungry in order to train them to respond to the droppers. Also in our competitions, we are not allowed to use droppers.

Many people also say that its better to keep the young birds hungry when you are settling them, I on the other side think thats wrong. A hungry youngster will only think about food, and wont observe as much. Also my young birds are eager to fly, and in case one of them does take off too early, I atleast expect them to return, while a hungry youngster might as well join the ferals. Of course it might depend on the location etc, as where I keep my pigeons there is a feral flock of around 200 birds only a block away where many people feed them breads and all.

Anyhow the reason for me talking about this is that each fancier should try to find out what works for him. A lot of the things I learned from others worked perfectly well for them, but they didnt work for me. Then there are methods I use, which dont work for others. I shared with sufiness what works for me, now its up to him to try it out, and change things so they fit him and his birds


----------



## Lovebirds (Sep 6, 2002)

NetRider said:


> I wish I could train them like that  But I just dont have the heart to keep them hungry in order to train them to respond to the droppers. Also in our competitions, we are not allowed to use droppers.
> 
> Many people also say that its better to keep the young birds hungry when you are settling them, I on the other side think thats wrong. A hungry youngster will only think about food, and wont observe as much. Also my young birds are eager to fly, and in case one of them does take off too early, I atleast expect them to return, while a hungry youngster might as well join the ferals. Of course it might depend on the location etc, as where I keep my pigeons there is a feral flock of around 200 birds only a block away where many people feed them breads and all.
> 
> Anyhow the reason for me talking about this is that each fancier should try to find out what works for him. A lot of the things I learned from others worked perfectly well for them, but they didnt work for me. Then there are methods I use, which dont work for others. I shared with sufiness what works for me, now its up to him to try it out, and change things so they fit him and his birds


I think you're the first fancier that I've heard say what you said about the birds being hungry. I agree with you in some respects. It actually drives me NUTS to think about my birds being hungry, but it also drives me NUTS when they sit on the roof and look at me like I've lost my mind when I call them to come in..........LOL and I know it's MY fault, not there's. 
I've gotten to the point that I don't worry about them not responding to my call when they're loft flying and then land. My experience has been that once they start training and racing, when they get home, the last place they want to be is on the roof. HOME, inside, is where they want to be and that's where they head. 
Of course, I have racers, not high flyers, so things may be different.


----------



## LittleJohn (Jan 1, 2009)

> Many people also say that its better to keep the young birds hungry when you are settling them, I on the other side think thats wrong.


It works, and if you want to disagree, then you have answered your own question as to why your pigeons are having difficulties with training. 

There are methods for training any and every type of animal, food happens to be what works for pigeons. You dont have to starve them, but you do have to control the amount that they eat in order to keep their attention on what you want them to do.

Political correctness will just let you stroke your own empathetic ideals...nothing more. 

Use a method that works, and learn how to be a master of it...that is all.

LittleJohn


----------



## NetRider (May 6, 2007)

LittleJohn, I am sure it works, but as I said there are methods which work for others which dont work for me, and vice versa. I do not need to train my birds, as I do not need the droppers, so no I am not having any difficulties with my birds at all.

Here is how I do things though... Instead of keeping my birds hungry, I create a routine. I feed the birds around the same time every day, lets say 5 pm. After a few days with this the birds will automatically start coming inside by this time. I have a 12 feet X 6 feet aviary infront of my loft, and the entrance to the loft is placed on top of this aviary. Almost all my birds will land on the aviary after training, and most of them will walk straight inside after landing, those who dont will come inside when I call them.

Lovebirds, its pretty much the same with my high fliers as your homers. A high flier which has been out and flying for 8-10 hours wont sit on the roof top and chill, he will do his best to land and run "home" as quick as possible. Last year I had problems with a few birds who would land on the roof top, and just hang out for hours. This year all my birds go inside as soon as they land.

Another thing which I noticed with high fliers is that if you keep the birds outside more, they will fly longer. They are smart birds and learn that even if they do land earlier they would just need to sit and wait for me to open the door so they can go inside, so rather than just sitting and laming around on the aviary, they continue flying.
As for homers, I know a guy who dont loft fly his birds, he just takes them out and toss them, and when these birds come home, they dont even look around, they trap instantly. Thats what works for him!


----------



## RodSD (Oct 24, 2008)

I think we are talking about different levels of hunger. When you release high flyers, obviously, they are not hungry per say, but rather still has reserve. Once they stopped flying, then they become hungry or tired and will drop down. Starving is not the one we are talking about. They just wont fly starved! I think full bird will not also like to fly.

I think some Tippler people measured body loss after flights which is not unusual. The birds used lots of energy. It is obvious that they are hungry then after they get down.


----------



## sufiness (May 12, 2009)

I dont think its about keeping birds hungry, except maybe when trying to settle them as on a full crop may venture too far away, but what i would say after reading a bit about diets and energy is that not over feeding them thus ruining their condition but feeding them to keep them in peak health and condition. Plus they are birdsof habit they get used to a paticular regime of being fed and let out at certain times.

I read somewhere giving them a little wheat 30 - 60 mins before fling them will improve their performance by 2 hours. 

Another interesting point I read was on long distance flights pigeons use energy consisting of fat generally from their breast muscles.

Also that barley takes longer to digest than wheat. barley stas in the crop longer. However we have to also understand the pigeon digestive system which is not just the Crop, that is just basically a store of food. 

I feed my pigeons a light breakfast in the morning and give them the rest of the feed in the evening. Approximately an ounce per bird, when you weight the ounce of food out and see it in your hand its actually quite a lot. I generally fly them in the evening after i arrive home from work.


----------

