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thousand's of pigeons hit devon


bevs
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A few thousand passed through again today,not the numbers previously.

I believe the migration to be coming to an end down here in south Wales.

 

Well Goober, you seem to be very clued up about this migration thingy...so, where are they all going...........?

 

They're not coming anywhere near to Herts, Beds or Bucks, that's for sure. :yes:

 

I will e-mail my friends in the Pas De Calais and Picardy regions in France tomorrow to see how many extra birds thay have noticed..?

 

Still not convinced about this theory of mass pigeon migration, but, hey ho, what do I know..... :hmm:

 

Cat.

Edited by Catamong
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Well Goober, you seem to be very clued up about this migration thingy...so, where are they all going...........?

 

They're not coming anywhere near to Herts, Beds or Bucks, that's for sure. :yes:

 

I will e-mail my friends in the Pas De Calais and Picardy regions in France tomorrow to see how many extra birds thay have noticed..?

 

Still not convinced about this theory of mass pigeon migration, but, hey ho, what do I know..... :hmm:

 

Cat.

The French shoot them on migration lol.

 

Karpman

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The French shoot them on migration lol.

 

Karpman

 

They do, but only in the south of France. The Spanish and the Portuguese shoot even more.

 

My theory, as per post 48, is that they leave the south coast of England and head across the channel to the south of France, over the Pyrenees and onto Spain and Portugal. There are videos posted by yickdaz showing tens of thousands of pigeons arriving in the mountains of these regions.

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Well Goober, you seem to be very clued up about this migration thingy...so, where are they all going...........?

 

They're not coming anywhere near to Herts, Beds or Bucks, that's for sure. :yes:

 

I will e-mail my friends in the Pas De Calais and Picardy regions in France tomorrow to see how many extra birds thay have noticed..?

 

Still not convinced about this theory of mass pigeon migration, but, hey ho, what do I know..... :hmm:

 

Cat.

Hi Catamong,yes I have learned a lot through research but not to the the extent that I'm any form of expert!

After viewing the huge numbers 7 years ago passing,I was told by an 'old timer' that they were travelling to Ireland but as I started to research I found that this was not so and they were infact travelling to France,up over the Pyrenees and onto Spain/Portugal.

I have since watched the footage of Portugal mentioned on a thread about migration and if you watch this you'll see huge flocks which I presume are birds passing us but mainly birds from other major routes through Europe.

I read somewhere that there are two major routes down mainland Europe and a third smaller route through the UK.

I also learned that the timing is by the length of daylight and that tail winds from Scandinavia are the triggers for the main flights.

It takes a few days for us to see them after reported migrations depending on our weather at this time(this year the migration took longer due to low pressure making passage hard in strong head winds).as soon as we have high pressure/clear skies passage is swift and this is when you see larger flocks at great height.

From what I've read on threads on here it seems the pigeons are feeding on their way down but down here they don't seem to hang around,possibly making France in the same day maybe?

JDog seems also to have a good idea on these migrations.

You say you've been shooting for many years -as they say,you're never too old to learn!

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Interestingly, Chris green has always maintained the winter flocks we see at this time of year are young birds. Of the few I have downed, they have all been young birds, going through the molt. The other "trundlers" are fine plump and obviously more senior birds. Just an observation :yes:

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It would be nice to have some proven evidence of this supposed migration of pigeons overflying us from Scandinavian countries.I just do not believe that pigeons fly hundreds of miles over the north sea to pass over the UK on the way to the south of France and beyond.At the moment it just seems to be based on conjecture of what people want to believe.

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Well Goober, you seem to be very clued up about this migration thingy...so, where are they all going...........?

 

They're not coming anywhere near to Herts, Beds or Bucks, that's for sure. :yes:

 

I will e-mail my friends in the Pas De Calais and Picardy regions in France tomorrow to see how many extra birds thay have noticed..?

 

Still not convinced about this theory of mass pigeon migration, but, hey ho, what do I know..... :hmm:

 

Cat.

that puts a CAT amongst the PIGEONS :lol:

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It would be nice to have some proven evidence of this supposed migration of pigeons overflying us from Scandinavian countries.I just do not believe that pigeons fly hundreds of miles over the north sea to pass over the UK on the way to the south of France and beyond.At the moment it just seems to be based on conjecture of what people want to believe.

 

If you look at their flight path you will see that the uk is en route to Spain/ Portugal.

They avoid mountain ranges,travelling over the Pyrenees by it being necessary to reach Spain/Portugal.

I found an article which suggested they follow magnetic fields and it stated that they deviated very little even with cross winds.

Another article stated birds travelling down through mainland Europe flew parrallel to the alps through to the Pyrenees.

Bits of info from here and there seem to add up and birding forums here and in Scandinavia and also Sweden talk of the migrations as common knowledge.

Pigeon migration on YouTube shows clips of migrations over the Pyrenees in October and November which works in with birds passing over the UK.

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If you look at their flight path you will see that the uk is en route to Spain/ Portugal.

They avoid mountain ranges,travelling over the Pyrenees by it being necessary to reach Spain/Portugal.

I found an article which suggested they follow magnetic fields and it stated that they deviated very little even with cross winds.

Another article stated birds travelling down through mainland Europe flew parrallel to the alps through to the Pyrenees.

Bits of info from here and there seem to add up and birding forums here and in Scandinavia and also Sweden talk of the migrations as common knowledge.

Pigeon migration on YouTube shows clips of migrations over the Pyrenees in October and November which works in with birds passing over the UK.

Like i put it just seems to be based on conjecture.

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pigeonblasterian

 

You have made the point more than once that you have never seen an inward migration of pigeons over your part of the East Yorkshire coast. That does not mean it does not happen and from the reports I have seen the migration definitely does happen. If the birds are at 2000' you are never likely to see them.

 

This weekend there will be the largest influx of the year of woodcock from Scandinavia. What is absolutely certain is that they come in over the Yorkshire coast in great numbers. Next week let us know how many you have seen in flight coming in over the sea. I do not mean those that have already landed and might be flushed along the coast.

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pigeonblasterian

 

You have made the point more than once that you have never seen an inward migration of pigeons over your part of the East Yorkshire coast. That does not mean it does not happen and from the reports I have seen the migration definitely does happen. If the birds are at 2000' you are never likely to see them.

 

This weekend there will be the largest influx of the year of woodcock from Scandinavia. What is absolutely certain is that they come in over the Yorkshire coast in great numbers. Next week let us know how many you have seen in flight coming in over the sea. I do not mean those that have already landed and might be flushed along the coast.

Just because of some reports you have seen does not mean i have to blindly believe you that a migration occurs.It might happen as you say but i have never seen any evidence to convince me that it does.

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You say you've been shooting for many years -as they say,you're never too old to learn!

 

Of course you're dead right, I'm still learning, but not only that, the feeding habits of the pigeons have changed noticeably during the period that I've ben shooting them, take a crop of peas for instance, 30 years ago they were an absolute magnet for pigeons from the day they were drilled until after they were combined, nowadays the birds simply ignore them, in my area at least.

 

Anyway, I digress, this thread started on the topic of thousands of foreign migratory birds arriving in the UK, I personally have never seen any evidence of that.

 

I don't dispute for one minute that there are large movements of birds through France and down into Spain, I just don't subscribe to the theory that we get vast numbers of foreign birds over-wintering here.

 

Cat.

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