Pedigrees

Jack Prescott
(Internet Published) Jul 3, 2000

My statement criticizing the overvaluation of pedigrees and origins is based on my own opinions and experiences with exchange of letters with U.S. Tippler men for many many years. Some of these men seemed to know which way they wanted to go whereas others went from idea to idea like a bee going from flower to flower yet collecting no "honey". Selective pressure is the key but who is pressing very hard in the USA? Only 12 entries for the Long Day Fly 2000 and the results were not too spectacular. One may ask, what are you guys doing with all of these pedigreed birds?  I agree that your climate is often rather hostile. Nevertheless, I firmly believe that a lack of dedication and effort prevails.

Some men appear to be making the same mistakes year after year. Only a handful of men in N. America are making any progress. Of course, that's my opinion. I state my opinion not that anyone pays attention or takes any kind of action to what I say. The magic formula of mating Best to Best does not guarantee success with Flying Tipplers. If it were so, there would be an improvement year by year.

All too often the very best will never reproduce anything like themselves except in appearance. That is why we all produce culls that fail to respond. Therefore we must fly on a good system that works mostly and in the location relevant. It is no use harping on how well some strain did in Derby England, Sheffield, or Birmingham many years ago. All must succeed under your own management and in your own particular location and you will not do this without careful selection. Good ones, often turn out from rather mediocre pairs and we got some rather awful ones from the best pairs.

This is all fact, not fiction. You may or may not agree with me, but you will have to deal with facts. No man has time to train more than a few at a time. This means that if a man tries to train too many then most of them will not be properly trained and therefore doomed from the start. There must be a little logic in what I say. It certainly pleases me to be so involved. It gets the old adrenaline going. Kind of blows away the cobwebs.

Jack Prescott