Racing Pigeons & Rail

[Caboose Class]

In years gone by, pigeon racing was a very popular hobby /sport. Pigeons transported by rail, were liberated by the station master for the race. Does this still happen? Do pigeons still get transported by rail? Anybody have any recent sightings?​

 

[randyrippley]

No. it doesn't happen

 

[Rescars]

When did it stop? I remember seeing this happening in Worcesteshire in the early 1970s. I think the pigeons came from somewhere near Birmingham.

 

[peteb]

When did it stop? I remember seeing this happening in Worcesteshire in the early 1970s. I think the pigeons came from somewhere near Birmingham.

Yes there used to be wicker baskets of pigeons on the platforms at Stourbridge Junction usually headed towards Worcester

 

[Harvester]

It ceased around the mid 1970s, when BR stopped transporting unaccompanied birds and animals.

 

[John Webb]

Homing pigeon rail traffic ran from the early 1900s to the mid-1970s. While carried by ordinary passenger trains for training flights, on Fridays special trains ran during the Summer for weekly races organised by various clubs. Some trains even ran to the Channel Ports where the pigeons were transferred to ferries to be taken to the Channel Islands or the continent for the longest races. (Information from "The Oxford Companion to British Railway History", Simmons & Biddle, OUP, 1997)

 

[Ken H]

There were some empty pigeon baskets on a platform when we were on a family day out and I was a kid. Think Northallerton. Anyway Mum spotted an egg in one of the baskets. She contributed to a funny story bit in the local paper, so she made this into an essay on how the egg hatched and the tales of mum and chick getting reunited! Think she got 7/6 for that!

 

[Merle Haggard]

It ceased around the mid 1970s, when BR stopped transporting unaccompanied birds and animals.

I recollect that legislation regarding livestock transport was introduced as a result of public pressure concerning the export of live large mammals in poor conditions. The legislation was worded in such a way as to include all animals and birds, not just the ones originally focussed on.

As an aside, my clear recollection (although I am open to correction) was that the legislation also meant that small animals such as hamsters could no longer be conveyed in the guards' compartments of H.S.T. power cars on welfare grounds. The union, not unreasonably, then argued that, if the environment was unhealthy for hamsters it was also likely to be so for guards, and that's the reason for the T.G.S. being introduced.

Before the ban, there was considerable small livestock traffic including un-accompanied dogs as part of the B.R. Parcels business. For example, dog breeders in west Wales sent puppies in number by train from Carmarthen unaccompanied to Paddington where they were collected by agents.

 

[Gloster]

My recollection, quite possibility erroneous in detail, is that live chicks continued to be handled in 1978 or 1979. Was this a specific exemption or were they Royal Mail traffic, rather than BR?

 

[181]

My recollection, quite possibility erroneous in detail, is that live chicks continued to be handled in 1978 or 1979. Was this a specific exemption or were they Royal Mail traffic, rather than BR?

I remember sharing the tip-up seat area of a then-new class 150 with a box of chicks between Machynlleth and Tywyn in 1986; they may have been a Red Star parcel, but I'm not sure about that.

I'm no expert, but I think very young chicks may not need feeding or watering as they can live off the remains of the egg yolk for a while, so it's possible that the rules for them could be, or have been, different.

 

[Trackman]

I remember sharing the tip-up seat area of a then-new class 150 with a box of chicks between Machynlleth and Tywyn in 1986; they may have been a Red Star parcel, but I'm not sure about that.

I'm no expert, but I think very young chicks may not need feeding or watering as they can live off the remains of the egg yolk for a while, so it's possible that the rules for them could be, or have been, different.

It was a thing back then, well early 80's.
In a guards van (sans guard) and my mate said 'what's that noise?'
Must have been about 6 crates of them, and you couldn't see them.

 

[Ostrich]

I recall a spotting trip to Ashford (Kent) station as a kid, probably in the mid 1960's. A hot, slow, summer's day, sat on a parcels trolley, everything quiet, no movement anywhere.
Then the porters threw open a number of wicker baskets of racing pigeons.
Cue a minute or so of sheer pandemonium - birds and feathers going every which way, desperately trying to get out from under the platform canopy, before regrouping up in the sky and heading off in a long straggle .... never forgotten it!

 

[snowball]

I seem to remember an episode of "Till Death Us Do Part" soon after the original WCML South electrification in which some homing pigeons supposedly took a lift on the roof of a Liverpool-London train, thus affecting the outcome of a bet (probably between Alf Garnett and his son-in-law). The few seconds' clip in which they were shown on the roof of the train did not show any overhead wires.

 

[WesternLancer]

There were some empty pigeon baskets on a platform when we were on a family day out and I was a kid. Think Northallerton. Anyway Mum spotted an egg in one of the baskets. She contributed to a funny story bit in the local paper, so she made this into an essay on how the egg hatched and the tales of mum and chick getting reunited! Think she got 7/6 for that!

Great anecdote! Well done for posting that.

What would have been the approx date of that?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 Mar 2022 ==

I recall a spotting trip to Ashford (Kent) station as a kid, probably in the mid 1960's. A hot, slow, summer's day, sat on a parcels trolley, everything quiet, no movement anywhere.
Then the porters threw open a number of wicker baskets of racing pigeons.
Cue a minute or so of sheer pandemonium - birds and feathers going every which way, desperately trying to get out from under the platform canopy, before regrouping up in the sky and heading off in a long straggle .... never forgotten it!

another great personal anecdote. Having spent time on Ashford station (albeit in the early 1980s) on hot summer days I can just imagine this happening in my minds eye.

Also some good pics and info on this web page (albeit from LNER days)

Pigeon traffic - Steve Banks

Railway historical research (all companies) especially workings on the LNER and BR. Railway modelling of coaches and carriages on a professional basis.

www.steve-banks.org

 

[Rescars]

Just how I recall the process. Wait until the platform is clear before opening the baskets. Then pandemonium whilst the birds work out how to escape from under the platform canopy. Quite a spectacle!

 

[John Webb]

Arthur Ransome in his book "Pigeon Post" (set in the early 1930s) recounts how the children had trained pigeons to carry messages. One of the first illustrations in the book is of two of them releasing a pigeon, sent by train to "Strickland Junction", in reality Oxenholme station, before they travelled down the branch line to Windermere! In this case they walked clear of the overall station roof at the suggestion of the porter before releasing the pigeon.

 

[WesternLancer]

It ceased around the mid 1970s, when BR stopped transporting unaccompanied birds and animals.

Well, my search found this - which is rather interesting - an exchange / debate in Parliament July 1976 - in the extract it gives relevant dates and consequences of related rules, and the impact this was now having on the pigeon racers. I see Bob Cryer MP (v strong connections with K&W valley railway as I am sure people know) is, amongst others, listed

It also makes reference to the Transit of Poultry Order 1919 which may perhaps be of relevance ref the remarks on continued carriage of small chicks up thread

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require the British Railways Board to continue to accept unaccompanied racing pigeons for freight carriage.

RAIL TRANSPORT OF PIGEONS (Hansard, 28 July 1976)

RAIL TRANSPORT OF PIGEONS (Hansard, 28 July 1976)

api.parliament.uk

RAIL TRANSPORT OF PIGEONS​

HC Deb 28 July 1976 vol 916 cc657-60657
§3.57 p.m.

It sounds like it may have been a '10 Minute Rule Bill' as explained here:

https://www.parliament.uk/site-information/glossary/ten-minute-rule-bill/

 

[Ken H]

Great anecdote! Well done for posting that.

What would have been the approx date of that?

Umm. I left primary school 67 so before that. I think 65. I think we did Leeds - Northallerton via Harrogate and Ripon, then on to Durham from there. (Day out in Durham). I even think we went from Leeds Central. I think the egg was at Northallerton. But I am less sure of these details which is why I omitted them from my post. I was a small boy!

 

[Gloster]

I have a recollection of reading somewhere that release of the pigeons was often done around the change of shifts in the middle of the day so that you would have another member of staff to open the baskets: anybody available would be grabbed, including signalmen. The point was to get the baskets opened in as short a time as possible, so as to minimise the advantage of those in the first basket opened over the last. I don’t know if the staff got extra pay or were merely tipped a few bob by the official(s) of the pigeon club who oversaw the release.

 

[WesternLancer]

Umm. I left primary school 67 so before that. I think 65. I think we did Leeds - Northallerton via Harrogate and Ripon, then on to Durham from there. (Day out in Durham). I even think we went from Leeds Central. I think the egg was at Northallerton. But I am less sure of these details which is why I omitted them from my post. I was a small boy!

Thanks for digging through the memory banks!

 

[Caboose Class]

As a kid, I remember loads of pigeon baskets being loaded onto Goods wagons at the old Bradford Exchange station on a Saturday morning back in the 60s. When I asked a Station Porter where they were going, he told me "Over the hills and far away".

 

[Ken H]

As a kid, I remember loads of pigeon baskets being loaded onto Goods wagons at the old Bradford Exchange station on a Saturday morning back in the 60s. When I asked a Station Porter where they were going, he told me "Over the hills and far away".

so how far were these baskets of pigeons carried? Were there rules on length of time in the baskets? Or were birds from Plymouth sent to inverness sometimes?

 

[Jim Jehosofat]

I can remember accepting baskets containing racing pigeons in the parcels office at Erith station in 1973. My memory seems to remember a pink coloured sticky label with the word 'LIVESTOCK' in large letters.

 

[Trainfan2019]

Hard to believe that pigeons and numerous other types of livestock were transported by rail. Genuinely a fascinating and interesting thread.

Could livestock be sent and received at any staffed station or was it just larger stations?

 

[Gloster]

Larger animals could only be handled at stations and goods depots with the appropriate facilities (cattle/sheep pens, horse docks, etc.). Smaller animals were effectively treated as parcels, so could be handled at just about any station with a sufficient level of staffing to handle parcels: small halts with only part-time staffing probably couldn’t handle them. As BR gradually cut staffing levels the number of locations handling them would have slowly fallen, probably ending up as being pretty the same as those with parcel offices. (From memory, although I only came in at the end.)

 

[randyrippley]

so how far were these baskets of pigeons carried? Were there rules on length of time in the baskets? Or were birds from Plymouth sent to inverness sometimes?

Back in the 1960s most summer weekends there were birds at Weymouth which allegedly came from the midlands and north.
The many crates were always stacked on the westernmost platforms - the Bristol arrivals, but I've no idea which trains they arrived on, though I'd guess the first -ex Bristol, with an overnight journey from origin to Bristol. That would minimise the need to water/feed the birds. We'd see them on the platform around 10:30 AM

Sometimes it wasn't just crates - it was dedicated pigeon vans with the crates rigged to allow simultaneous exit via vents in the side of the van

Just remember next time you curse the flying rats at the seaside, it's the railways fault for bringing their ancestors there

 

[Magdalia]

Homing pigeon rail traffic ran from the early 1900s to the mid-1970s. While carried by ordinary passenger trains for training flights, on Fridays special trains ran during the Summer for weekly races organised by various clubs. Some trains even ran to the Channel Ports where the pigeons were transferred to ferries to be taken to the Channel Islands or the continent for the longest races. (Information from "The Oxford Companion to British Railway History", Simmons & Biddle, OUP, 1997)

The distinction between training flights and races was something I'd not appreciated.

Pigeon racing was concentrated in the North of England and Friday pigeon specials from the North of England are a frequent topic in the Southern Region traffic reports in Railway Observer, as they occasionally brought unusual locomotives to the Southern Region.

The most famous example is probably B1 61313, which worked a pigeon special to Lewes on 26 June 1964, failed with a hot box and was dumped on Redhill shed for 3 months.

Pigeon specials were heavy trains, sometimes loading up to 15 vans. That's a lot of pigeons. I wonder how the start of the race was executed? Did all pigeons get a fair start, or did the best birds get "pole position" and first release, or were the best birds handicapped and released last?

A lot of bureaucracy would have been involved to ensure accurate recording of the release times. Would that have involved the Greenwich time signal on the radio, or the speaking clock on the phone?

And of course all the pigeon specials had to work back empty!

 

[Snow1964]

I remember seeing (and hearing) perforated boxes of live chicks stacked on platform at my then local station, New Milton, end of 1970s or 1980s, got loaded in guards van along with other red star parcels, so perhaps they went red star.

 

[DerekC]

Nothing to do with pigeons, but I vividly recall standing on one of the old suburban platforms at Kings Cross and seeing a cattle train coming up out of the City Widened Lines, behind an N2 at full chat. The poor cows must have been coughing away, but I don't remember that!

 

[Bevan Price]

I remember at Thatto Heath, the local pigeon club used to assemble (often) weekly in the waiting room, and put their pigeons into baskets, ready to be loaded into the guard's compartment of a passenger train later that evening. I think they suspended activities during winter.