Plan No. 561. Raising Homing Pigeons
Both patriotism and profit are what prompted an Ohio man to raise homing pigeons for war purposes, and the business has proven a great success, from every point of view.
From early boyhood pigeons have interested him more than anything else in the world, and he understood these remarkable birds very well.
These pigeons are not the soft, cooing dove of fiction, but are beautiful in color and line, alert, strong, tight-feathered, athletic, gamebirds with bright, farseeing eyes and marvelous courage. They are used in war for carrying messages from the front trenches to the bases back of the lines, and 97 per cent of these messages, upon which either victory or defeat may hang, reach their destination.
A section of this man’s pigeon loft shows separate apartments for each pair of birds, painted alternately black and white.
The birds manifest the most intense loyalty to their mates, and he has raised thousands of them for the cause of the Government, and, as they can be utilized with equal advantage in peaceful pursuits, a certain means of revenue is thus opened to thousands of other breeders of these wonderful birds.