Stanley Ogozalek / 14 Feb 2001

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Tippler Subject Category: 

Droppers should be active............ meaning that they just won't sit on
the rooftop motionless after being released. They should be able to fly up
and join the kit, providing that the kit is ready to come down and is flying
at a lower height, and by doing this bring the kit down to the loft. It is a
pulling action that is performed by the droppers. There are some breeds that
are used by the homer fanciers that just fly right to the landing board thus
attracting the incoming homer to follow it. That is not enough for the
tippler. It needs more coaxing than just seeing a bird flying to the landing
board. Then again, the kit maybe be 'spent' and might drop without the
dropper being shown and so the appearance of only one dropper may be all
that is necessary. This does happen though usually on Contest Day when the
birds are 'pushed to the limit'.

With some experience, a fancier will get to know when to release the
droppers. A kit of trained Tipplers should respond within a short period of
time but that depends and it could be about 15 minutes or so. You wouldn't
want for the Tipplers to fall onto the roof just after the droppers are
released. It should take a few minutes or so, this would show that the kit
wasn't totally spent of its energy.

Training the droppers isn't all that hard and it can be fun. But the idea is
to get good droppers. Another thing is to drop a kit of hens using hen
droppers and vice versa. You wouldn't want cock droppers treading the kit of
hens on the loft top! Some fanciers are known to raise enough young droppers
and in that case their sex wouldn't come into play.

How many droppers? I'd say 6, 3 cocks and 3 hens. A friend of mine uses all
white Kormorners and says that they're quite good.

The hen droppers could be housed with the young tipplers at the initial
stages of their training so that they become accustomed to them and are not
frightened by them. Afterwards, the droppers should be kept in a group box
by themselves so that you can keep them sharp. This is done because a
dropper that isn't hungry will not respond or act as it should. When the
droppers are released and having flown a few minutes and then drop to the
loft, they can be moved about by throwing a few canary seeds from one end of
the loft to the other. This would create the attraction necessary to bring
the kit down. And if you really want to get into it, if you have the time
and the patience, you could hand feed the droppers and get them used to
flying to your hand from the loft roof, back and forth many times. I knew a
fancier that lived on Long Island, NY years ago that had these White Self
Tumblers that would do this for him. It was something to see!


Submitted by Stan Ogozalek on 14 Feb 2001