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The Original All Roller Talk Discussion Board Archive >
Combining Kits In Competition
Combining Kits In Competition
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Ballrollers
458 posts
Oct 03, 2006
4:13 PM
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BMC,
On the "angryman" thread, Brian, you digressed for a moment and mentioned to dave that you will be flying birds from different kits. I was wondering if you would share with us, the best way you have found to execute that? I'm in the same boat...15 holdovers in my '05 A-kit, and 17 young birds in the '06 A-kit. I'm flying an 11-bird kit in a couple weeks, and then a 20-bird kit two weeks later. Last year, I shot myself in the foot trying to pull 11 birds from the 20-bird kit. Those 11 scored over a hundred points, but not nearly up to their potential. It seems like they flew around looking for the rest of the kit much of the time! So, I can pull five '06 birds into the '05 A-kit to make 20. I was thinking of releasing those 20 from their different kit boxes this week to see what happens. I was planning to fly 11-birds from the young birds so I don't really want to pull them into the holdover kitbox for the next four weeks. I guess I could fly the 11-bird and then pull them in the last two weeks to be housed and fly together. What do you suggest? Paul, Scott, David..anyone else have any experience flying mixed-aged kits?
YITS,
Cliff
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MCCORMICKLOFTS
737 posts
Oct 03, 2006
4:49 PM
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Cliff, you kind of lost me with all that moving around and flying this and that...lol
I have no problem flying a kit of mixed age (young and old). Kitters kit, regardless of their age, so that shouldn't be an issue unless you are going for broke with a few borderline birds.
My old bird kit are between 1.5 to 5 years old. They were parked for the summer so they can molt. They've been back up in the air for about two weeks now. I just want them to get back into roll fitness. The instinct to break together is set in them unless I have messed them up one way or another. With my birds, the old bird kit can break extremely cleanly, usually with what I call "more precision" than the young kits do. Young kits more or less explode versus break clean.
In regards to my statement you mentioned, I spent a few days with a note pad in my hand and watching the A team, making notes of which birds were are most frequent, breaking with others, and rolling nice while zipping back to the kit.
I then did the same thing with the '06 kit which are pretty much 9-10 months old now. I ended up with about 24 birds total for this new kit. One thing I like about this method is that is shakes up the staleness of a group of birds, especially when a good portion of the group are the more frequent young birds. The youthful exhuberance of the younger birds tends to inspire the older birds to break more. Any birds which don't seem to be inspired by the new arrangements and chemistry, are removed.
I put all of the birds for this new group in a box together for a day or two so they get used to one another. I flew them for the first time on Sunday and they exceeded my expectations. I will fly them one more time tomorrow and let the chips fall where they may this weekend.
You can house the birds you intend to fly separately, but fly them together, as long as they have a few days at least to get used to one another. One thing that is paramount if you are going to add young birds to an old bird kit is that they still must be managed differently. Young birds usually require less of, or a different method of management as opposed to older birds. Though I am housing this new kit of mixed aged birds together, I pull all of the young ones out after the base portion of wheat is given, then feed the younger ones more on the side, then put them back in the box. Specific birds are isolated and fed individual portions according to what I believe they require.
Mixing ages isn't all that difficult. You just have to pay attention and know the differences between your older birds and the younger ones and manage them accordingly.
Brian.
PS--The most unique method I have seen of mixing ages and birds into a new kit was one time when I was at Jerry's house and he flew a nice kit on comp day. He said let several of his kits out at once, and the first 20 that came down after 20 minutes were the ones that became the new kit. It worked quite well.
Last Edited by MCCORMICKLOFTS on Oct 03, 2006 4:53 PM
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Ballrollers
459 posts
Oct 04, 2006
3:36 PM
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Thanks, Brian.
I appreciate your sharing your experience. I've been doing the same thing, pretty much, with the note pad. Think I'll try flying the old bird kit and releasing the best of the '06 birds with them, from anothr box, to see how they do. It will be a little easier to manage them from separate boxes. I've still got plenty of time to adjust.
YITS,
Cliff
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