The Pigeon Pastime

In the Bronx, a hidden sport

Reported and produced by Molly Messick

At the United Pigeon Association, headquartered in an anonymous storefront in the northeast Bronx, a crowd gathers most days of the week to share coffee and talk pigeon. The association’s single room is cement-floored, fluorescent-lit and crowded with pallets of pigeon feed. Seated in a ragtag circle of lawn chairs and mismatched castaways from old living room sets are men with nicknames like Mikey Pop and Goodhearted Lou. They smile and nod hellos, but they cut the unschooled newcomer off at her first question.

“Whydyya want to know about pigeons, hm?” they ask.
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Sit for a while and gradually they give in.

“A clinker, that’s what we call a street bird,” someone volunteers, waving a hand dismissively toward the few pigeons that strut and peck in the gutter out front.

The pigeons these men keep are worlds apart from those, he says. Others nod and take up the lesson. The birds they keep are called homers, tipplers and flights; rollers, tumblers and droppers. They’re specialty breeds. Some birds are for racing and some for endurance flying. Several men confess they keep pigeons for the pure pleasure of watching them circle and swoop and turn in unison as they fly. Before long someone demonstrates how to hold a pigeon.

“You get his feet and you hold his feet, you see that?”

He cups his palm and grasps the bird’s legs between his index and middle fingers. He hooks his thumb over its tail feathers. The pigeon sits, calm in his open hand. These men have lofts in backyards and on rooftops where they keep dozens of birds. Some keep hundreds.

One of the United Pigeon Association’s youngest members, Andrew Franze, 27, took over its business arm last month. He sells feed, medication and wooden carrying crates from the storefront, and he hosts a weekly pigeon auction. Franze breeds pigeons, and says he has shown them as far away as California and Germany. He calls the birds a sport, a hobby, and a way of life.

And it's been a way of life for a long time. Check out this 1936 article on pigeon-racing from Popular Science to see how the sport has changed.