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How to introduce new flying ES in the loft.
The right thing to do is to purchase the bird or birds from a fancier who doesn’t live in the same neighborhood and preferably from another city altogether.
The new pigeon will be kept locked, away from the resident birds for a few days (2 weeks at most) to make sure it doesn’t carry any diseases. During that period, the bird gets familiar with his new master who feeds him twice a day and cleans his pen daily.
The newly purchased bird is then transferred to a screened cage the fancier has installed on top of the loft. The pigeon will spend the next 2 weeks in there, getting familiar with the surroundings (buildings, top of the loft, other birds landing, noises coming from the street and the neighbors).
The newly acquired pigeon is then given a nest box in which he will be kept locked long enough for him to appropriate it. It’s worth mentioning that the newly purchased birds are usually acquired 4 to 6 weeks before the "heavy moulting season".
At that time of the year, all the birds are locked in their nest boxes as well as the newly acquired birds. A light net is stretched on top of the loft to prevent any bird to take to the sky when they are liberated. On a daily basis, all the pigeons are given time to spend bathing and getting acquainted with each other. The fancier will pay a special attention to his new acquisitions: are the new birds defending their nest boxes with determination? If such behavior is observed then it’s a sure sign the newly acquired birds have adopted the loft as their own.
When the heavy moulting season is over and the birds have replaced all their wing feathers and most of the tail ones, the net is removed and the birds are liberated in order for them to stretch their wings and take to the sky if they feel like it. Cautiously and relying on his experience, the fancier liberates the new birds. No pushing is done at that point as the birds need time to get their wing power back, after being locked for a whole month or so.
A few days later, the fancier starts pushing the birds to take to the sky for short periods of time. He gradually increases the flying periods, still keeping an eye on the new acquisitions and observing any strange behavior in order to correct it at once. Most of the time, the drill (described in the above) the new birds go through, turns out satisfactory results and both, fancier and new birds come out as winners.
A note worth mentioning: it occurs at times that as soon as the newly acquired bird is released, he heads straight to his former loft, which can be sometimes as far as 220 km away.
Another way of making the new birds adopt their new setting is to mate the newly acquired cock to one of the most experienced hens in the loft. This mating is usually done a few days prior to the removal of the net. The trick works only if the hen is cooperative and aggressive.
