Saturday 28 May 2011

Todays Race

Well the birds finally were liberated at 4.30pm today into a strong head wind. I had the webcam setup and was ready for the birds. The first one arrived at 6.58pm and there were big gaps between my arrivals. At nightfall I am still 4 down from the 11 that were sent. These include 2 that were having their first race as well as a white hen that has been pretty consistent for me since a youngster. The other that is having a night out is my fed winner from a couple of weeks ago.
I knew I was in for a sticky one when the race lib time kept being delayed as the birds were not fed yesterday in anticipation of an early liberation today. Needless to say that has backfired. The fed website is showing early times around the 40-50 mark so my first bird will be behind by some 10-14 minutes.
The webcam proved to be a success apart from my f'ing and blinding because of the brightness affecting the camera and me not realising the microphone was on! So apologies to anyone who had to witness that fowl language I was blurting out unaware I was being recorded! hehehe.
Today was just a trial and at one stage had 11 people viewing the stream, so that was pleasing! I just wish the birds had come in a bit better time.
The proper cameras will be here early next week and these will be installed over the next week so next week the whole loft will be going live on the web!
I have been checking the forecast for next weeks race from Lilliers and the wind is seriously bad for me with a fierce north wind forecast. This is terrible news for me and with the birds crossing the channel for the first time I am unsure if they will be going at present. The WNRF had a disastrous race yesterday from Lilliers and suffered huge losses so I dont want to be in the same position as a lot of them come next Saturday evening! The wind is forecast to be NNE wind between 20mph -30mph so that could cause huge damage when the birds are trying to cross the channel. I will monitor the forecast the coming week but unless it changes I really can't see me entering the race.

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