2009 Training Tosses 1 through 5

Here is the basic information on the first 5 training tosses. 

We were missing an extension cable and I was having problems with the Tipes software for these first five tosses, so we were unable to use the Tipes Clock for them.

Toss 1, 2, & 3  -   8/8 through  8/11  - 1 Mile:  The first three tosses took place from approximately 1 Mile at the top of the mountain that sits off to the east of us.  I think we lost 1 or 2 of the lazy roof-sitters among these three tosses.   The birds can pretty much see the loft shortly after take off, so it's not really much of a training toss but it does get the birds used to the baskets and being basketed plus taken up the road.  On the other side of this hill it drops down quickly into what is the small town of Garden Valley.  The birds usually don't route in that direction, so the other side of the mountain can be a whole new world to them and sure enough as you will see in Toss 4, it was a problem this year.

Toss 4  -  8/12  -  2 Miles (Garden Valley):  This toss did not turn out well at all.  It was only 2 miles but the first time the birds were dropped to the other side of the mountain and being as that they don't usually route in this direction it's very easy for them to get going in the wrong direction to the north or south and have problems.  This happened to our own YB team a few years ago and we lost several birds.  The birds took off fine but only 3 or 4 birds arrived within the first 15 minutes.  Sometime later a single bird quickly followed by a  large flock came in from the wrong direction.  It looked like they may have gotten together with another flock of birds.  That still left close to 20 out and some of them trickled in throughout the day.  I believe we were down 12 or 13 overnight and a few came back the next morning.  Another one came back the following day and yet another one came back today (8-17) so I won't be surprised if another one or two make it back.  Hopefully some of the birds learned from this toss.

Toss 5  -  8/15  -  2 Miles (Garden Valley):  We took the birds back to the previous spot of the bad toss from a few days before and they had no problems this time around.  Most of the birds came home right away on the drop.  A few of the lazy roof sitters trickling in later in the morning.  Luckily they all made it back.  This was the last toss we had before I got the extension cable and the one-loft program working again.

Toss 6 and so on are posted individually on the Training Results page.