Pigeon > west by east

This is the story of CU 558, that's him in the above photograph if anybody is wondering. By posting his image I hope put any rumors that I did not catch a racing pigeon to bed. Anyway, I caught a pigeon, and by doing so have unknowingly exposed myself to the bigger-than-Rick world of Racing pigeons, which if you didn't know, may or may not be bigger-than-yourself in the same way that it is bigger than me.

First of all, context is everything... last friday Renee and I were coming home from errands in town when she noticed a pigeon underneath the mailboxes, "that does not look like any ordinary pigeon," says she. Noticing the tags on it's feet, "I think you're right," says I. So, being inquisitive, I gather some bird seed we feed the Chickadees with, and lure said pigeon to me. As I feed it I'm wary to lunge out and grab it, fearing it might fly away. I do, however, get a glimpse of the tags around it's ankles, "CU 558," and "GUELPH," they read.

After phoning the Peterborough and then Guelph Humane Societies, I am suddenly in touch with an entire network of Pigeon people that are very concerned about the well being of this one bird. Apparently, "CU 558" was one of many pigeons released from the nearby village of Fowler's Corners (where the absolute best Apple pies are made). They should have flown west toward Guelph, which I'm sure many did... except CU 558, who decided the best way to go west would be to go east, find a softy like me who would go out of his way to catch it. So west by east it is.

I managed to catch the pigeon simply by pretending it was a chicken... which are easy to catch if you do it right. So he is now beside me eating his millet, waiting for his ride home this evening.

As I was driving home from Toronto today I noticed the grackles and assorted other birds take part in their annual waves of wings, gathering in the sky and just swarming toward the same direction, it made think of a quote from John Livingston, who in Rogue Primate offers this very lovely passage to portray animals as possessing a unique form of intelligence that may or may not be in the grasp of humanity. The reason I say it may is because these type of things may only occur at the subconcsious level, I say it may not occur among people because of my current dissaproval of many things human at the present. So if things like imperialism and over exploitation are part of some subconscious intelligence among humans, I wish I had been a pigeon instead. Anyway, so Livingston indicates that, yes, indeed, animals think in their unique expressions, like pigeons in flight,

There is awareness involved, and that awareness is shared across the collective participating consciousness of the population concerned. Cues come in to the individual, the group, and the community (mixes of many species are often involved at both ends and during the journeys). Those cues are local interpretations or particular versions of greater regional, continental and planetary promptings. Wild, whole beings would appear to have full sensibility not only to local signs, but also to the greater orchestration which they themselves will now perform.

Wild whole beings sensitive to the bigger-than-Rick orchestrations that guide them from Peterborough to Guelph. Is this what draws people into this practice of letting loose hundreds, sometimes thousands of pigeons? Watch the video I posted below of the two guys in California releasing the pigeons. Its an interesting video because of the before and after action, as well as the child like anticipation and elation in the voice of the camera man. Now, I can see the whole commodification of wild whole beings in birds like CU 558, after all they are unseen in a metal crate... and my Grandfather told me last night about a racing friend of his who once famously said, "if the bird gets lost it's best if he stays lost because he's obviously not smart enough to find his way home." Obviously this is the ugly side of pigeon racing, commodities to charm, useless if they find their own paths. I'm sure this same type of efficiency is appreciated by all with a cartesian bent that see no inherent value in life other than the value it gives to their pleasure. Everybody I have talked to over the past few days, however, has expressed nothing but compassion for the well being of the bird, and I assume they share the same sentiments as the pigeon racer in California video.

Wild and whole beings that are bigger-than-many-selves when in a group of a thousand eyes and a thousand wings that can only see their way home. Does this mean that CU 558, separated from it's group is somehow less than whole? If one takes the notion of collapse into mind, then maybe yes, CU 588 is less than the whole now that it is separated from it's kin. This makes me think of something my advisor Ray Rogers once said about the Cod fisheries off the Atlantic Coast, yes they have collapsed, but that does not mean the Cod are extinct? No, the cod are still there, but because all of the larger Cod had been swept up for the commercial fisheries, the younger ones that got through the nets were left without the older generations to teach them (or imprint them) with the necessary information to make it to the spawning beds.

I'm not necessarily saying that my friend CU 558 is lacking in any respect, or is less-than-others because he went east instead of west. Instead, he may be showing an even greater-than intelligence by manipulating me into feeding it millet and arranging to have him chauffered to Geulph. West by East.