HISTORICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF HOMING. 25 



INFORMATION ON HOMING PIGEONS GATHERED FROM PRACTICAL 



FLIERS. 



We give below a letter written us by a well-known practical flier in this 

 country, Mr. A. E. Wiedering, for many years race secretary of the Milwaukee 

 district of National Federated Homing Pigeon Fanciers. Mr. Wiedering's 

 letter, while in part touching upon theoretical questions, contains also 

 a large amount of material dealing with the training of the birds. 



I was race secretary for several years and took a keen interest in the sport. In the spring 

 of the year we would begin to train the birds over short distances, beginning with 3 or 4 

 miles, and then 9, 18, 33, 45, 66, and from then on 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, and 

 1,000 miles. Speaking about training the birds over short distances, we come to a point 

 that has always been under considerable argument with the fanciers. Some claimed short- 

 distance training of great value and others considered it as a waste of time and labor and 

 as entirely unnecessary. I agreed to a certain extent with the latter, as I was of a firm 

 opinion that little is gained by flying the birds over short distances, that their homing 

 instinct, since it is so called, is not developed or improved by it. The only advantage in 

 short distance flying that I could see was that the birds got good opportunities to get used 

 to the shipping baskets and as they felt more at home in them would more readily begin to 

 feed and drink in them, and in that way remain in better condition for their home flights. 



After several years of participation in the fancy, I advanced the argument that it was a 

 harder task for a bird to get its bearings towards home from a short distance than from a 

 greater distance. Careful observations of the birds' activities brought me to this belief. 



The birds, I believe, home to the locality that they have been used to and not exactly to 

 their loft. I mean that this drawing towards their home location ceases when they get 

 within this locality, and that after that they find their loft through memory of sight by 

 familiar landmarks, etc. I imagine a circle around their home of an imaginary distance of 

 say 5 or 6 miles, and that their homing instinct is not brought into action until they are 

 beyond this locality circle, and if liberated within this circle they have to depend upon their 

 sight memory in order to find their home. I have liberated birds that have had years of 

 experience within 3 and 4 miles of their loft and have seen these birds fly around and 

 around for hours completely at a loss, it seemed, as to their location, and have seen them 

 fly in the opposite direction of their home. Some of these birds had the best of reasons 

 for returning home immediately, such as a hen hatching her egg, or a cock desiring the 

 hen, in which cases they are more eager than usual to return home. 



Then again I have been informed by liberators at long distances that the birds had taken 

 the right direction after making a few circles; the best start was made from 1,000 miles, 

 our greatest distance flown, the birds taking the right direction without circling, but starting 

 for home at once. From distances of 100 miles and less the same birds had circled for over 

 30 minutes and did so repeatedly. From such facts I came to the conclusion that it is 

 easier for a bird to get his bearings from a long distance than from a short one; that this 

 unknown feeling or instinct, or sixth sense, was more intense at a greater distance; and if 

 the bird was liberated in its own locality it did not seem to be in force. 



Little, if anything, can be learned of this homing sense by flying these birds; you ship 

 them to a liberator; he liberates them, giving you conditions at the start; you see the birds 

 returning home and know what your local conditions are, but do not know what kind of 

 storms or air-currents the birds have to pass through, and you may have very good results 

 from a flight on one day and from the same distance on another day may have very poor 

 results, although the weather conditions at start and finish may be the same. 



I used to stamp my address on flight feathers of the birds and used to hear from them, 

 through parties who would catch them in their own lofts or pick them up dead. In most 

 cases the birds would be found dead without any apparent cause. I believe that they would 

 die from exhaustion. 



The speed of a homing pigeon with hardly any winds would average about 1,400 yards per 

 minute for about 100 miles. We have had the birds make it in an average of over 1,900 

 yards per minute with a strong favorable wind, and 600 yards with contrary winds. 



With very favorable weather conditions we have had birds arrive home at 3 p. m. when 

 liberated at 4 h 30 a. m. from 500 miles, in apparently fresh condition. It may seem strange, 



