ATTN Mystang! You have GOT to see these pigeons!!!

I was at a feed store in Bakersfield yesterday, and happened to start talking to a fellow who raises "Modena Pigeons". He pulled up some images of them for me on his phone, and to say I was amazed and flabbergasted, and not a little tempted to start raising them myself is an understatement!

When I mentioned that we were going to the ARBA Convention in Texas, he asked if it was in Fort Worth... he himself has made several trips there to get Modenas from some of the top breeders in the nation. So, who knows? Mayhaps I will have to get some... :twisted: ...or see you in Fort Worth, perhaps? :mrgreen:

So, without further ado, here are some images of them:








You can see more images here:

https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/ ... na+Pigeons

He said that they are supposed to be rounded with no straight lines anywhere, and ideal conformation is that of a baseball with two straight legs and a head placed on top, lol!

They look pretty meaty to me! You must get some, so I can enjoy them vicariously through you! :gettowork:

They're very pretty... but they look more like fancy pigeons than meat birds to me. How much do they weigh?

Wow!

their shape makes me think ornate porcelain teapot! like I should find a handle in those tail feathers and tipped over tea would pour out the beak! The ones with the colored head and wings especially!

MaggieJ":3ox58gpq said:

How much do they weigh?

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I don't know... I asked if he ate them, and he said no. They are so round and plump that they look like they would have lots of breast meat to me!

I know that young pigeon is called squab- but don't know how common it is to eat more mature birds. :? I'm assuming he culls later than you would for squab.

Miss M":3ox58gpq said:

Wow!

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That's what I said! :lol:

Wheels":3ox58gpq said:

their shape makes me think ornate porcelain teapot! like I should find a handle in those tail feathers and tipped over tea would pour out the beak!

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MaggieJ":366v3wk5 said:

They're very pretty... but they look more like fancy pigeons than meat birds to me. How much do they weigh?

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I raised Swiss mondaines for a while. A bit different breed but similar. They're about 1-2lbs.

MOST pigeon fanciers I've talked to online NEVER eat they're birds and would shun you for even mentioning it. The only pigeon forum online bans discussion of it. Most pigeon fanciers I've met IRL don't eat they're pigeons but don't care much if you do. So if you want to raise them for meat don't go to the pigeon forum. This is also why they're so colorful, likely.

I'll add a photo of my Swiss mondaines.. They were huge. They couldn't even fly. If I set them on the roof they'd fly as hard as they could but just slowly to down and down and down.... lol.


Edit: ok here's a photo I just grabbed. Don't have them anymore but want to get them again. Sold 6 of them to a friend. Lost 1 to sour crop. She crossed them with king pigeons (the most common one used for squab) and has some beautiful babies. I need to get them again, but only have homers are this point.



__________ Tue Oct 28, 2014 3:54 pm __________

Squabs are usually butchered at 4 weeks, just when they're getting ready to fledge. Even a normal homer creates a lot of meat. They breed and lay an egg a couple days later, incubation is 18days, and raising to edible size is 4 weeks. So about 6 1/2 weeks for 2 squabs. You get 2 per nest. Rarely, if ever, more.

CochinBrahmaLover":7qty18rf said:

The only pigeon forum online bans discussion of it. Most pigeon fanciers I've met IRL don't eat they're pigeons but don't care much if you do. So if you want to raise them for meat don't go to the pigeon forum. This is also why they're so colorful, likely.

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I've browsed through a few pigeon forums and just by looking at a few of the topics I could tell that those weren't the places I would find anything out about squab so that's why I came to a rabbit forum, because, you know....that's where anyone wanting to know about squab goes right :?

MamaSheepdog":7qty18rf said:

:choir: I'm a little squab-pot, short and stout :choir:
:choir: Tip me by the tail feathers, and tea pours out! :choir:

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I'll be embarrassed for you. My wife supports your efforts though which makes my analysis even more correct.

MamaSheepdog":7qty18rf said:

He said that they are supposed to be rounded with no straight lines anywhere, and ideal conformation is that of a baseball with two straight legs and a head placed on top, lol!

They look pretty meaty to me! You must get some, so I can enjoy them vicariously through you! :gettowork:

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LOL, they really do look like baseballs with 2 feet and a head. I actually looked some up on Craigslist and found them fairly close to me. They didn't say how much they were though.

They look like mini chickens. Actually, I think they might just be bigger than my chickens lol. They are pretty though. I liked the colors of the ones in the pictures. If they were all meat I might actually have to invest in some. They looked tasty. :chicken: :giraffe: (My wife wanted the giraffe)

Mystang: what type of pigeons DO you raise?


...and how's the little broken wing dude?

mystang89":2trwrbmn said:

MamaSheepdog":2trwrbmn said:

:choir: I'm a little squab-pot, short and stout :choir:
:choir: Tip me by the tail feathers, and tea pours out! :choir:

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I'll be embarrassed for you.[/i] My wife supports your efforts though which makes my analysis even more correct.

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Hey now, hey now! Dr. Demento made millions, and he wasn't exactly a musical genius!

And hey... Mystang's wife?

Hello-ooo-ooo! Allow me to lend you Miss M's chair :chair:, because clearly your husband has not been disciplined properly of late.

(Slacker! Making US do all of the work to keep him in line! Hhmph!)

mystang89":2trwrbmn said:

(My wife wanted the giraffe)

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Personally, I want a hippo. A pygmy hippo so it wont kill me. Hopefully... <br /><br /> __________ Tue Oct 28, 2014 9:43 pm __________ <br /><br />

CochinBrahmaLover":2trwrbmn said:

MOST pigeon fanciers I've talked to online NEVER eat they're birds and would shun you for even mentioning it. The only pigeon forum online bans discussion of it.

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That's just ridiculous. Very few people would want a pigeon (or pigeons) as pets- even really cute baseball-with-head and legs-pigeons... so what do the breeders do with their culls?

Sadly, the guy I spoke to buries his culls. Nothing even gets to eat them, which I think is a huge waste.

MamaSheepdog":658bzt2q said:

That's just ridiculous. Very few people would want a pigeon (or pigeons) as pets- even really cute baseball-with-head and legs-pigeons... so what do the breeders do with their culls?

Sadly, the guy I spoke to buries his culls. Nothing even gets to eat them, which I think is a huge waste.

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Those birds look like food to me. Not much different than the doves my hunter/husband brings me.

MamaSheepdog":3454cfj8 said:

:choir: I'm a little squab-pot, short and stout :choir:
:choir: Tip me by the tail feathers, and tea pours out! :choir:[/align]

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Just wanted you to know I found myself humming that tune with your lyrics more than once today....

MamaSheepdog":3454cfj8 said:

Personally, I want a hippo. A pygmy hippo so it wont kill me. Hopefully...

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And just wanted you to know that when I read this I immediately flashed in my mind to an old episode of "The Beverly Hillbillies" (yes, we watched High Culture programming on the one or two t.v. stations that actually were broadcast in the boonies back in the day of my youth...) where Granny finds a hippo wandering around, thinks it's a really huge pig, then chalks an outline on it where the ribs, chops and other choice parts are so she's ready to butcher. So, with that visual in mind, might I ask what, exactly, would you do with a hippo, pygmy or other, should you get one?

And now, back to the baseball-with-head & legs pigeons, did we ever figure out if they are worth eating, or if they're just ornamental fluffy round circles? I can't sneak chickens into this area, but pigeons who just happen to look really fancy...hmmm...hadn't considered raising & eating them before, but....

Mmm I really want to get fancy pigeons this summer. I was looking at French Mondains, which are a utility breed. From asking around, people do eat the older birds, but they say only the breasts are worth eating, the rest is too much effort for a lower quality meat. I'd feel bad about wasting that much meat normally, but with a raw fed dog, we could take the breasts and give the rest of the carcass to the dog. You could probably find someone nearby with raw-fed animals who would buy carcass after you remove the breasts if you don't have dogs/cats.

The jacobins are another personal favourite of mine. ^-^

CochinBrahmaLover":179fel4d said:

Mystang: what type of pigeons DO you raise?


...and how's the little broken wing dude?

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I raise Homing pigeons. I'll take a picture of them sometime when i think about it and post them. The ones I just bought have a small tuft of hair on the back of their head that sticks up. I think it's pretty neat but nothing like the ones that Olimpia posted, those are pretty cool looking.

And MSD...you don't need to give her a chair to hit me with, there are plenty of objects around here that she uses daily lol

MamaSheepdog":1amgo8h2 said:

CochinBrahmaLover":1amgo8h2 said:

MOST pigeon fanciers I've talked to online NEVER eat they're birds and would shun you for even mentioning it. The only pigeon forum online bans discussion of it.

Click to expand...

That's just ridiculous. Very few people would want a pigeon (or pigeons) as pets- even really cute baseball-with-head and legs-pigeons... so what do the breeders do with their culls?

Sadly, the guy I spoke to buries his culls. Nothing even gets to eat them, which I think is a huge waste.

Click to expand...

Show birds and homing birds. Or rollers. They're pets in a way. Some cull the older ones, some sell the culls. There Swiss mondaine club has nothing regarding eating them, and they don't advocate it (emailed them when I had some). But they were originally bred for eating, it's just fallen out of fashion for them.

Mystang - cool! Do they maybe have some roller in them? I had some fantail pigeons with swoops on their head. I don't personally like them