|
Pigeons: There's No Place Like Home
Thousands Rush Home with Race Season Underway
 *Listen to the call of a male pigeon, "coo roo-c'too-coo."
Listen to Scott Simon's interview with pigeon racer Jim Arnold.
Listen to David Kestenbaum's report on how pigeons navigate.
 | |
Champion Racer: IF 00 GE 0098, flown by Darryl Glover, won the 2000 Lou McElroy Futurity Race.
Pigeons are motivated for a fast fly home by the most basic of desires: good food and homesickness.
Photo courtesy Darryl Glover/Lou McElroy Race |
March 16, 2002 --
Pigeon fanciers across the nation are gearing up for the spring pigeon racing season. Some 20,000 pigeon racers in the United States spend hours every day doling out the special care and training that they hope will turn their birds into 15-ounce champions. As the season gets underway this weekend, Weekend Edition Saturday host Scott Simon talks with veteran fancier Jim Arnold, who keeps a loft of 600 pigeons in Antioch, Tenn.
Owners pay thousands of dollars for pedigree birds -- homing pigeons that have been specially bred to get home in a hurry. Gaining size through breeding and their strenuous workouts, "racing homers" are bigger than the average "street rat" pigeon found scavenging for scraps on the city streets. And racing homers are treated like prize fighters: They live in well-kept, spacious lofts, get the best food and medical treatment, and have plenty of clean water and fresh air.
Pigeons learn to race as they learn to fly. Handlers start by releasing the birds a few blocks from home, gradually increasing the distance to hundreds of miles. The best are entered into competitions where the birds are released en masse from the same spot and clocked as they rush home.
 |
|
Natural Navigators
Scientists have yet to figure out exactly how homing pigeons find their way home when released at distances as far as 1,000 miles away. Several unique systems may be at play:
Magnetic Navigation: Some bird brains secrete a mineral called magnetite. This magnetic substance acts like a compass, helping pigeon's get their bearings by the Earth's magnetic fields.
Solar Navigation: During the day, pigeons use the sun to figure out which way's which.
Eyes, Ears and Nose: Pigeons can see color, but also ultraviolet light. And they can hear much lower frequencies than humans. Somehow, their super pigeon senses -- including smell -- may help them find their way home.
|
|
The pigeon with the fastest average speed is the winner. Races vary from 100 miles up to 1,000; prizes range from a modest award certificate up to a rare $1 million.
The key to a fast pigeon is motivation and building a desire in the bird that will push them even harder to get home, says Arnold. When they're young, they're motivated by feed and their home loft. As they get older, it's about returning to their family.
"The pigeon is probably the strongest athlete to participate in any event," says Jim Arnold. "These birds can compete from daylight to dark and still give you a 100-percent effort at the end of the day."
But sometimes in a race, homing pigeons don't return home. Thousands of pigeons that are released inexplicably lose their way home, and there are some spots in the United States that have developed a reputation for being Bermuda triangles. And as NPR's David Kestenbaum reports, scientists aren't exactly sure how homing pigeons find their way home, or why, sometimes, they don't.
In Depth
 Browse for other NPR stories about pigeons.
Other Resources
• Read a beginner's guide to pigeon racing.
• The American Racing Pigeon Union offers a free getting-started racing kit.
• Find out more about the sport at the International Federation of American Homing Pigeon Fanciers Web site.
• Read about the famous World War II pigeon hero, Cher Ami.
• Learn about Cornell University's Project PigeonWatch.
• Read quick pigeon facts.
• Learn some pigeon genetics.
• Learn about the bird's anatomy at Clickable Pigeon.
* Audio courtesy Steve Pantle, Cornell Lab of Ornithology
|
