Where the basket writes the pedigree
2022 Auction season has started and here on NPHPIGEONS our fist of 9 auctions will take place Sunday 13th Oct – Sunday 6th Nov. The auction is on behalf of Mr Eric Higginbottom, Bolsover. The first of Eric’s 2 sales see 16 Lots from his impressive family of top long distance pigeons with the second sale seeing a larger number. Eric is now 84 years of age is finding harder by the day to manage the birds so this effectively is a major reduction sale. He has barely raced for two years now so has a large number of birds that have not even been in a basket let alone been bred from, this fist 16 is some of those virgin yearlings
Eric Higginbottm
Eric hasn’t been racing for the last couple of years, being on his own and ageing by the day he has found it increasingly difficult to manage his birds on a daily basis. It is for this reason that 60+ pigeons will sold in order to massively reduce the number of birds kept, whilst still allowing him to breed from a few pairs of stock for friend to race, as breeding is what he enjoys the most.
For several years now Eric has been sourcing the very best distance bloodlines available, all at great expense. This ultimately lead to Eric’s success from distance from 500 to 700 miles in recent years, noticeably Tarbes in the NFC winning 1st Sec K, 3rd Open NFC Tarbes 694 miles 2019 and in 2018 the same pigeon was 3rd Sec K (Only three birds in race time) these were two of the toughest Tarbes races in NFC history particularly for the Northern lofts), that super pigeon is “All Alone”. Three weeks after Tarbes 2019 a full sister to “All Alone” was 1st NE Sec, 8th Open MNFC 577 miles on the day. As stated, Eric spent heavily on the very best blood DIRECT from the likes of Batenburg v d Merwe, Jelle Jellema, Dr H P Drockamp, N de Fouw.
The bloodlines that Eric houses are also responsible for big winners for several other distance lofts. One particularly successful loft that races Eric’s pigeons is the top Section K loft of H A Rawson, Son & Towers, arguably, in recent years, the best loft in the section, certainly in 2022 their results have been nothing short of tremendous in the Section in the NFC. Including, 1st Sec K, 13th Open Tarbes 2022……… There is no substitute for the right blood needed for the job……!!!