I am always a bit more interested not in what a fancier says, but in what he actually does. Sometimes fanciers will articulate their theories, that they themselves do not actually put into practice. So in your situation, he is suggesting if my math is correct, around one single square foot per occupant. Does he actually only provide a square foot per bird in his own YB loft or in his breeding loft ?
At the risk of sounding argumentative or some kind of know it all, I would suspect if he does, that perhaps he would win even more and have healthier happier pigeons if he didn't, but if he is already set in his ways, then perhaps he is already as good as he ever will be ? Perhaps his greatest seasons are already behind him ? Does he have power fans or other mechanical devices which might negate some of the negatives from a more dense loft population ?
Perhaps some years, just for fun, and just to "prove" me wrong, keep track of how many pigeons you have at end of the season with your higher bird count at the start with the 1 per square foot. Along with your wins and loses and the numbers and types of health issues. Then over the years reduce your starting count, giving more space and air to the remaining birds, and again track the numbers at the end of the season.
There are seasonal differences and variables so one might need a decade of numbers to demonstrate the theory that less is better, especially if only making small changes, ie 45 vs.38. A larger decrease in population might provide more pertinent data, such as 33 vs. 45 (25% reduction) if we use 2sq ft then 24 vs 45 (about 45% reduction)
I am not sure that anything we say here in terms of how many will fit, will have any bearing on what the author of this thread will do a few years from now after several breeding seasons and gifts of birds. As many fanciers will agree they "have too many" but reducing numbers often takes a level of discipline that many fanciers, even good ones, fail to implement.
Having said all of this, I must say, I do not know what the ideal # per square foot might be, for one thing few lofts are exactly the same. Are located in different climates, face different directions, or anyone of 100's of things that make their particular loft unique. And that's includes things like air flow, ventilation, dust particles per million, number of baths per week etc. etc. all of which could affect the air quality and the ideal numbers which can be comfortably housed in any particular loft. Those variables could mean identical lofts spread throughout the country with different fanciers could in theory have different ideal #'s for their particular lofts because of these factors which haven't even been discussed since we all sort of focused on square footage, one size fits all kind of thinking.
