Jerry Hilliard raises racing pigeons

[pigeonperson]

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Jerry Hilliard raises racing pigeons

by Clay Coppedge - Telegram Staff Writer
Published March 12, 2007

Homing pigeon - Jerry Hilliard holds one of his homing pigeons in his hands at his home near Belton. "It's just a very beautiful thing to see, when they cup their wings and land after flying several hundred miles to get here," Hilliard said. (Photo by Tom Gaulin)
BELTON - We may not know how homing pigeons can make their way home with such unerring accuracy, only that they have been capable of doing just that since the days of the early Egyptians.

For people like Jerry Hilliard, the science of the matter is secondary to the joy of breeding and racing the pigeons.

“It’s just a very beautiful thing to see, when they cup their wings and land after flying several hundred miles to get here,” Hilliard said last week at his home near Belton. He has about 100 homing pigeons, also known as racing pigeons because that’s what people who raise the pigeons like to do with them. About 34 of his birds are racers; the rest he raises for breeding purposes.

Hilliard is a member of the Heart of Texas club, one of several in Central Texas that race their pigeons over distances ranging from 150 to 500 miles. The process of staging a race might sound a bit convoluted but in the end it’s no more complicated than any other race: the pigeon that flies the fastest from one point to another is the winner.

A couple of days prior to race day, a designated pigeon hauler, using a truck designed for the task, picks up as many as 2,000 pigeons and drives them to a predetermined release point. Individual birds are banded and identified by a scanner board much like a scanner at a grocery checkout stand. The scanner reads the band and a computer records the bird’s identifying number.

On cue, the birds are released and the race is on. Their progress to the finish line - home - is measured by determining which bird flies the fastest-per-yard. The finish line is the bird’s roost, where they (almost) invariably return. When they walk into their roost, the computer records the time.

“Nowadays you lose a few,” Hilliard says sadly. “Since we don’t know exactly how their homing devices work, we’re not sure why we sometimes lose some. People blame cell phones, transmitting towers, satellites - you know, electronic interference. We don’t know why, but we do lose a few more than we used to.”

Researchers are still at odds over exactly how homing pigeons do that thing they do. A study in Britain concluded that birds follow roads and highways, turn at cross streets and even make detours. This might be considered the MapQuest theory of homing. That there weren’t many roads in days of early Egyptians, who took advantage of the birds’ homing abilities, doesn’t figure into this equation.

Another study suggests that pigeons will take a more efficient path home when they fly in pairs, suggesting that the birds will take the short way home if a smarter companion recommends one. (It’s not known if the male pigeons are more reluctant to stop and ask for directions than their female counterparts.)

Scientists have said the birds operate with an internal compass and clock, and that they determine which way to go by comparing the position of the sun with their internal clock. Pigeons with nerve damage in their noses can’t find their way home, so it’s possible they follow their noses home. Other studies suggest that the earth’s magnetic field comes into play.