Do fancy pigeons fly much?

[Helen_Jayne]

I was thinking of archangel pigeons or white fantails or any of those fancy breeds? Do they tend to spend most of the time in the loft or on the ground? Thanks

 

[backyard pigeons]

What do you mean? on the ground? Like outside of the loft? They enjoy free flying, but will be hawk food. so build an aviary to avoid major losses.

 

[Serin]

They fly but don't have the energy of homers. My owl pigeon flies from place to place but walks much more than flies.

 

[333113]

If you want flyers, you might want to consider Birmingham rollers, west of England rollers, or one if the homing or racing pigeon breeds. You won't have to fly them but if you do they will have a better chance of evading predators than the fancy breeds would.

Otherwise, your birds will enjoy an aviary with nesting and roosting areas. They will probably prefer to eat on the ground. A pan of water on the ground will give them something to drink and bathe in...stand back if you don't want to be splashed!

 

[Helen_Jayne]

We live in a city with lots of cats, they will have a loft but I want them to come and go, hopefully to perch higher up rather than on the floor. We actually live in terraced housing with lots of little yards separated by low walls / fences. We have bantams, including a sebright cockerel which free ranges fine and the cats have come to actually fear the chickens and go the long way round to avoid them. But they may not be like that with the pigeons. Luckily our neighbours are great and agreed to take the partitions down so we all share 3 gardens, as they love the chickens.

We have agreed to take some pigeons from a wildlife rescue place, but they will be ferals, I would just love to also have a few ornamental birds (might keep the neighbours happy too because they look nice, rather than a load of feral pigeons perching on the roof). But I'm not sure if the space would be suitable for them if they tend to spend a lot of time on the floor and don't fly anywhere. I was hoping they might perch on the roof tops and go for a little spin round the neighbourhood, birds of prey aren't a problem. Or do they tend to stay in a lot? Do you find cats a problem?

 

[CCUK]

I was thinking of archangel pigeons or white fantails or any of those fancy breeds? Do they tend to spend most of the time in the loft or on the ground? Thanks

I have both archangels and fantails. The only ones I would chance flying are the fantails. Not because the archangels are inept flyers but the difficulty and cost of trying to replace any lost birds. The fantails would fly reasonably well around your house and garden but wont home like a racing pigeon. I dont fly mine at present as I need to train them to come trap when I want them in. The archangels I may trap train but not until I have sufficient numbers. The only other thing with flying any fancy breed of pigeon is the risk of people trying to trap and steal your birds. I am paranoid but this does happen.

 

[cavemanrich]

We have bantams, including a sebright cockerel which free ranges fine and the cats have come to actually fear the chickens and go the long way round to avoid them. But they may not be like that with the pigeons.

Cats just LUV pigeon dinners. For some reason they don't eat my chickens,,, even the tiny Seramas.(note my Avatar)

We have agreed to take some pigeons from a wildlife rescue place, but they will be ferals,

The rescued ferals are likely to flee on you if set loose. In their genetics,,, since most ferals are homing pigeons. There are ways to homeset them,,, but does get involved. If you get to that stage,,, we can tell you how.
WISHING YOU BEST,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

 

[333113]

I agree with cavemanrich...cats will eat pigeons. My favorite cat caught and ate my favorite Birmingham Roller pigeon, and never apologized for it.

 

[Helen_Jayne]

Ok thanks this is helpful. Honestly there is so little information out there about keeping pigeons, pigeon racing people seem to pass it down the generations and I don't know anyone who keeps fancy pigeons or rollers.
What is trap training? Is that when you get them to fly into a crate?
So in a way the fancy breeds are better for pets because they will have been used to staying confined to the loft, over the generations. Do you think thats true? Or are they desperate to get out all the time?
We rescued a feral pigeon and as soon as he got mature he was desperate to leave so we had to hand him to a wildlife sanctuary which had a flock of 200. I don't want birds which are desperate to be free, that's why I don't keep caged birds. To me the appeal of pigeons is that they don't have to be caged all the time and can behave more naturally like birds.

 

[Qwerty3159]

Ok thanks this is helpful. Honestly there is so little information out there about keeping pigeons, pigeon racing people seem to pass it down the generations and I don't know anyone who keeps fancy pigeons or rollers.
What is trap training? Is that when you get them to fly into a crate?
So in a way the fancy breeds are better for pets because they will have been used to staying confined to the loft, over the generations. Do you think thats true? Or are they desperate to get out all the time?
We rescued a feral pigeon and as soon as he got mature he was desperate to leave so we had to hand him to a wildlife sanctuary which had a flock of 200. I don't want birds which are desperate to be free, that's why I don't keep caged birds. To me the appeal of pigeons is that they don't have to be caged all the time and can behave more naturally like birds.

Trap training is the process of teaching the bird to "trap" itself back into its living quarters without having to be caught.
A lot of people have bob wires which hang over a cutout into the loft which act as a one way door that the pigeons can come in through but not exit back out of. Normally this is done through the use of a settling cage placed over the trap (so the birds can get a good look at their surroundings as well as trap back in without being able to just fly off) and then coaxing the birds through with food. Someone else can probably explain it better but it's a pretty simple process.
Even if you won't fly your birds if they're a breed that CAN fly well I think it'd be a good idea to trap train them on the off chance they escape.

The ferals probably won't handle confinement well. The ones you rehabilitated in the past were probably eager to be set free to rejoin their flock and their mates. However, to my knowledge there are many, many show breeds that are not flown regularly if at all and handle confinement well. I don't keep any of these, but we have other members who do. I have a small group of homers who unfortunately have to spend a lot of time cooped up because I have such a rampant hawk problem (in the past few weeks they've been migrating and I've had a different one crash into the sides of their cage pretty much every day). So instead I went with the option of building them a small aviary so they can at least stretch their wings a bit. They've adjusted well to this more relaxed lifestyle but I still feel bad that they can't fly as much.