WILLIAMS BROTHERS & SON & BURGHAM of TREDEGAR
1st OPEN BICC ALENCON 2013.
This latest win in National competition makes it a total of 5 x 1st National for this likeable Welsh partnership. I first visited their Tredegar loft in 1977 following their 1st WGNFC Thurso win of that year and at that time Lyn was competing in partnership with brother Jason. However, Jason's interest waned in the early 1980's and Lyn's son Byran joined the partnership with continued success.
I can still recall handling the sire of their 1977 Thurso National winner a lovely dark chequer Westcott cock bred by the late Derek Watkins of Merthyr. I rate this dark cock as one of the three finest pigeons I have handled and rank him alongside Geoff Cooper’s Bulldog and John Woodsford’s Black Velvet.
My father and I played some small part in the origins of the 1977 Thurso National winner as her dam, a blue hen, was bred by the late Haydn Pike of Trealaw in the Rhondda and gifted to us as a baby. We raced her and she won minor prizes and when we moved loft and sold up in 1972 we gave her back to Haydn who then gifted her to Lyn and Jason where she bred the Thurso National winner. Incidentally the blue hen was also of Westcott bloodlines via a fancier named Skaife from Yorkshire.
To return to the present and the reason for my first visit to Tredegar in over 30 years - the BICC Alencon winner, a yearling widowhood hen. The sire is 100% Boscheind fliers bloodlines being a grand son of the 499 cock and also Sweetheart. He has proved to be a top class stock cock at the Williams loft as he has bred 3rd National Bonn and 3rd National Carentan young birds to mention just two of his offspring. The winner’s dam is a small red hen bred from a mealy cock which won 1st Irish Yearling National for Walker& Watson. This mealy was loaned to the Williams’ by John Wheat croft and he was mated to the Williams’ Eastbourne National winner to breed the red hen. The red hen in turn is sister to cocks that have won 10th National Metz, 8th & 12th National Bonn and 17th National Bonn plus another cock that topped the Fed from 5,500 birds from Newbury. So you could say that the Alencon winner is absolutely drenched in top class winning bloodlines within her immediate family.
As mentioned earlier, the Alencon success makes it a total of FIVE National wins for the partners as they had previously won 1st WGNFC Thurso in 1977, 1st National Eastbourne in 2006,1st National Folkestone 2010 and 1st National Lillers 2012 and what is even more amazing is the fact that the 2006 Eastbourne National winner is the dam of the 2012 Folkestone National winner.
THE LOFTS.
There is a range of lofts set around three sides of the garden with the widowhood cocks and young bird lofts facing west accross the valley. A stock loft and associated aviary sits at right angles to this facing north with the widowhood hens and racing hens loft on the opposite side of the garden to this facing south east.
The widowhood hens are confined to their boxes for 23 of every 24 hours only being allowed out for their once daily exercise spin of one hour in mid afternoon. Once their exercise period is over they are called in and immediately locked in their boxes where they find food and water as well as grit and minerals.
THE BIRDS.
Are a combination of top class local bloodlines via their silent partner, John Burgham augmented by some superb introductions via John Wheatcroft, Boscheind Fliers, Mark Gilbert and Mark Sparey. The Burgham pigeons in particular were really impressive "racey" pigeons just on medium sized with good muscle development and light and buoyant. Some of the Boscheind Fliers pigeons were impressive looking specimens and I particularly liked an old chequer cock of Reynaert bloodlines obtained from John Wheatcroft. All birds handled well and were, as you would expect in a multi National winning loft, in excellent condition.
So much for my personal impressions - I'll leave the partners to outline their background in the sport and their thoughts on the conditioning of their National winning team of pigeons as outlined below by senior partner Lyn Williams.
"My brother Jason started in the sport in 1968. I used to clock for him some times if he was working and started to keep pigeons in 1970 when I joined Tredegar Central F.C to start racing in 1971. My first loft was a 8 ft x 6 ft. loft situated on the mountainside above the terraced houses. My brother built it for me and it contained 8 nest boxes and 22 box perches.
The first birds I had were bred by my brother, and several bred by other club members. My brother and I formed the partnership in 1974 to compete as “Williams Bros” to fly from his loft.
Today Jason has left the sport, and my son Byran flies with me in partnership as well as good friend John Burgham, formerly of the National winning Burgham Bros partnership of Cwmtillery. At present we keep twenty pairs of stock birds and race 25 cocks on widowhood and 12 widowhood hens.
We pair the stock birds up the weekend after Blackpool also the widowhood cocks are paired up the same time so we use them to rear the stock birds eggs. Then we pair the widowhood hens up to take some of the stock birds 2nd round of eggs.
Before this takes place all birds are injected for paramyxo and parathyphoid. They are also treated for cocci, canker, respiratory and worms.
When they are sitting and rearing we do not leave them out because of the persistent hawk problem. Once the youngsters are weaned off, the cocks will go out in the afternoon also hens. We only leave them out then because afternoon seems to be the warmest part of the day at that time of the year.
Once they are flying well we give the cocks two 5 mile tosses and hens have the same.
Once racing starts cocks have no more training but hens have one more 16 miles toss to teach them their system then no more training. They only go out once a day around the loft in the afternoon as stated.
All the stock birds are fed three breeding mixes mixed together also a hopper full of beans, a hopper full of peas and pots of hormoform. We like to give youngsters a good start in life and we inject the youngsters in the nest whenever possible.
We rear up to 100 youngsters and from these we pick some to go to breeder buyer sales also some for charity sales. We like to keep 80 youngsters for ourselves.
All youngsters are raced on the darkness system and we like to train them as often as possible. The last two or three seasons we have left them together so they can pair up if they want. All youngsters are feed a light mix of hormoform and depurative in the morning and farm beans and peas in the evening as much as they would like to eat. We change the youngsters evening meal to "Superstar plus" about a month before the first young bird race.
All the widowhood cocks and widowhood hens are fed as much as they like both morning and night. Our widowhood hens are boxed so are fed in boxes the only time they are not in their box is when they are at exercise.
We have five lofts in the garden, one stock loft with aviary . The widowhood loft is 18ft x 10ft for 26 widowhood cocks in three sections, our widowhood hens loft is 12ft x 6ft with 12 nest boxes. Our young birds loft is 16ft x 13ft with three sections and 24 nest boxes for motivation. Also a 8ft x 6ft loft with aviary with two roosts for hens to perch. (this loft is for the widowhood cocks' hens)
Our main families of pigeons are :
Burgham Bros, "Nationalman "and Grizzles
Boscheind Flyers
Plus pigeons from our good friend John Wheatcroft plus a few pigeons recently introduced from Mark Gilbert.
We like to pair Burgham’s lines to Boscheind for racing as it’s first cross but for stock we like to keep Burgham’s line together to keep the line strong and use the same principle with the Boscheind birds. Any pigeons brought in during the winter are put to stock and these are mated to our best pigeons. We compare youngsters against our own to see what stock birds stay.
I like to handle a family of pigeons that handle not too deep , but as I have found out it takes all shapes to make the world go round.
Some of our best present day pigeons are:
Cheq Pied hen (66) 1st Welsh S.R National Eastbourne 06
Cheq Pied cock (50) 1st WNR Fed Epsom 07
Cheq W.F cock (49) 19th Welsh National Lillers and 10th Welsh National Metz
Cheq W.F cock (11) 17th Welsh S.E National Bonn (only 22 birds home on night)
12th Welsh S.E National Bonn
8th Welsh S.E National Reims
Blue W.F Cock 6th Welsh S.E National Maidstone
The above five pigeons are all brothers and sister
Cheq Pied hen (66) is dam of 1st Welsh National F.C Folkestone 2010
G.dam of 1st BICC Alencon 2013
Cheq Pied cock (50) G.sire of 1st Welsh S.E National Lillers for Derek Flowers of Pontypool.
Cheq W.F cock (11) G.sire of 2nd Welsh South Road Fed Chale
8th Open High Littleton Tours Y.B (for Mark Sparey).
8th Welsh S.E National Lillers
The program we use for medication is mentioned above, and we also use ‘Retford Vets’ for testing.
We do like feeding a lot of homoform especially when rearing.
At the end of the day we try to keep pigeons as simple as possible."
There you have it then straight from the horse's mouth so to speak. Congratulations Lyn and Byran - not forgetting John Burgham the silent but active partner on yet another National win to add to your already impressive C.V.
Gareth Watkins
1st OPEN BICC ALENCON 2013.
This latest win in National competition makes it a total of 5 x 1st National for this likeable Welsh partnership. I first visited their Tredegar loft in 1977 following their 1st WGNFC Thurso win of that year and at that time Lyn was competing in partnership with brother Jason. However, Jason's interest waned in the early 1980's and Lyn's son Byran joined the partnership with continued success.
I can still recall handling the sire of their 1977 Thurso National winner a lovely dark chequer Westcott cock bred by the late Derek Watkins of Merthyr. I rate this dark cock as one of the three finest pigeons I have handled and rank him alongside Geoff Cooper’s Bulldog and John Woodsford’s Black Velvet.
My father and I played some small part in the origins of the 1977 Thurso National winner as her dam, a blue hen, was bred by the late Haydn Pike of Trealaw in the Rhondda and gifted to us as a baby. We raced her and she won minor prizes and when we moved loft and sold up in 1972 we gave her back to Haydn who then gifted her to Lyn and Jason where she bred the Thurso National winner. Incidentally the blue hen was also of Westcott bloodlines via a fancier named Skaife from Yorkshire.
To return to the present and the reason for my first visit to Tredegar in over 30 years - the BICC Alencon winner, a yearling widowhood hen. The sire is 100% Boscheind fliers bloodlines being a grand son of the 499 cock and also Sweetheart. He has proved to be a top class stock cock at the Williams loft as he has bred 3rd National Bonn and 3rd National Carentan young birds to mention just two of his offspring. The winner’s dam is a small red hen bred from a mealy cock which won 1st Irish Yearling National for Walker& Watson. This mealy was loaned to the Williams’ by John Wheat croft and he was mated to the Williams’ Eastbourne National winner to breed the red hen. The red hen in turn is sister to cocks that have won 10th National Metz, 8th & 12th National Bonn and 17th National Bonn plus another cock that topped the Fed from 5,500 birds from Newbury. So you could say that the Alencon winner is absolutely drenched in top class winning bloodlines within her immediate family.
As mentioned earlier, the Alencon success makes it a total of FIVE National wins for the partners as they had previously won 1st WGNFC Thurso in 1977, 1st National Eastbourne in 2006,1st National Folkestone 2010 and 1st National Lillers 2012 and what is even more amazing is the fact that the 2006 Eastbourne National winner is the dam of the 2012 Folkestone National winner.
THE LOFTS.
There is a range of lofts set around three sides of the garden with the widowhood cocks and young bird lofts facing west accross the valley. A stock loft and associated aviary sits at right angles to this facing north with the widowhood hens and racing hens loft on the opposite side of the garden to this facing south east.
The widowhood hens are confined to their boxes for 23 of every 24 hours only being allowed out for their once daily exercise spin of one hour in mid afternoon. Once their exercise period is over they are called in and immediately locked in their boxes where they find food and water as well as grit and minerals.
THE BIRDS.
Are a combination of top class local bloodlines via their silent partner, John Burgham augmented by some superb introductions via John Wheatcroft, Boscheind Fliers, Mark Gilbert and Mark Sparey. The Burgham pigeons in particular were really impressive "racey" pigeons just on medium sized with good muscle development and light and buoyant. Some of the Boscheind Fliers pigeons were impressive looking specimens and I particularly liked an old chequer cock of Reynaert bloodlines obtained from John Wheatcroft. All birds handled well and were, as you would expect in a multi National winning loft, in excellent condition.
So much for my personal impressions - I'll leave the partners to outline their background in the sport and their thoughts on the conditioning of their National winning team of pigeons as outlined below by senior partner Lyn Williams.
"My brother Jason started in the sport in 1968. I used to clock for him some times if he was working and started to keep pigeons in 1970 when I joined Tredegar Central F.C to start racing in 1971. My first loft was a 8 ft x 6 ft. loft situated on the mountainside above the terraced houses. My brother built it for me and it contained 8 nest boxes and 22 box perches.
The first birds I had were bred by my brother, and several bred by other club members. My brother and I formed the partnership in 1974 to compete as “Williams Bros” to fly from his loft.
Today Jason has left the sport, and my son Byran flies with me in partnership as well as good friend John Burgham, formerly of the National winning Burgham Bros partnership of Cwmtillery. At present we keep twenty pairs of stock birds and race 25 cocks on widowhood and 12 widowhood hens.
We pair the stock birds up the weekend after Blackpool also the widowhood cocks are paired up the same time so we use them to rear the stock birds eggs. Then we pair the widowhood hens up to take some of the stock birds 2nd round of eggs.
Before this takes place all birds are injected for paramyxo and parathyphoid. They are also treated for cocci, canker, respiratory and worms.
When they are sitting and rearing we do not leave them out because of the persistent hawk problem. Once the youngsters are weaned off, the cocks will go out in the afternoon also hens. We only leave them out then because afternoon seems to be the warmest part of the day at that time of the year.
Once they are flying well we give the cocks two 5 mile tosses and hens have the same.
Once racing starts cocks have no more training but hens have one more 16 miles toss to teach them their system then no more training. They only go out once a day around the loft in the afternoon as stated.
All the stock birds are fed three breeding mixes mixed together also a hopper full of beans, a hopper full of peas and pots of hormoform. We like to give youngsters a good start in life and we inject the youngsters in the nest whenever possible.
We rear up to 100 youngsters and from these we pick some to go to breeder buyer sales also some for charity sales. We like to keep 80 youngsters for ourselves.
All youngsters are raced on the darkness system and we like to train them as often as possible. The last two or three seasons we have left them together so they can pair up if they want. All youngsters are feed a light mix of hormoform and depurative in the morning and farm beans and peas in the evening as much as they would like to eat. We change the youngsters evening meal to "Superstar plus" about a month before the first young bird race.
All the widowhood cocks and widowhood hens are fed as much as they like both morning and night. Our widowhood hens are boxed so are fed in boxes the only time they are not in their box is when they are at exercise.
We have five lofts in the garden, one stock loft with aviary . The widowhood loft is 18ft x 10ft for 26 widowhood cocks in three sections, our widowhood hens loft is 12ft x 6ft with 12 nest boxes. Our young birds loft is 16ft x 13ft with three sections and 24 nest boxes for motivation. Also a 8ft x 6ft loft with aviary with two roosts for hens to perch. (this loft is for the widowhood cocks' hens)
Our main families of pigeons are :
Burgham Bros, "Nationalman "and Grizzles
Boscheind Flyers
Plus pigeons from our good friend John Wheatcroft plus a few pigeons recently introduced from Mark Gilbert.
We like to pair Burgham’s lines to Boscheind for racing as it’s first cross but for stock we like to keep Burgham’s line together to keep the line strong and use the same principle with the Boscheind birds. Any pigeons brought in during the winter are put to stock and these are mated to our best pigeons. We compare youngsters against our own to see what stock birds stay.
I like to handle a family of pigeons that handle not too deep , but as I have found out it takes all shapes to make the world go round.
Some of our best present day pigeons are:
Cheq Pied hen (66) 1st Welsh S.R National Eastbourne 06
Cheq Pied cock (50) 1st WNR Fed Epsom 07
Cheq W.F cock (49) 19th Welsh National Lillers and 10th Welsh National Metz
Cheq W.F cock (11) 17th Welsh S.E National Bonn (only 22 birds home on night)
12th Welsh S.E National Bonn
8th Welsh S.E National Reims
Blue W.F Cock 6th Welsh S.E National Maidstone
The above five pigeons are all brothers and sister
Cheq Pied hen (66) is dam of 1st Welsh National F.C Folkestone 2010
G.dam of 1st BICC Alencon 2013
Cheq Pied cock (50) G.sire of 1st Welsh S.E National Lillers for Derek Flowers of Pontypool.
Cheq W.F cock (11) G.sire of 2nd Welsh South Road Fed Chale
8th Open High Littleton Tours Y.B (for Mark Sparey).
8th Welsh S.E National Lillers
The program we use for medication is mentioned above, and we also use ‘Retford Vets’ for testing.
We do like feeding a lot of homoform especially when rearing.
At the end of the day we try to keep pigeons as simple as possible."
There you have it then straight from the horse's mouth so to speak. Congratulations Lyn and Byran - not forgetting John Burgham the silent but active partner on yet another National win to add to your already impressive C.V.
Gareth Watkins