How come pigeons come back home?

A lot of research has been done about how pigeons find their home (so-called “homing”). If a pigeon leaves somewhere, it must be able to determine both the direction and the distance (unlike migratory birds, which only have to determine the direction). She determines the direction in which the pigeon must leave (preferably) with the position of the sun. When the day in the loft and the natural day are not the same (by making the lighting in the loft different from outside for a certain time) the pigeon will make a mistake in direction. But there are now also strong indications that she makes use of the magnetic field around the earth (with a real “compass”!). Once she approaches her loft she can make use of several means: 1. local disturbances in the magnetic field; 2. a “olfactory map” of the area surrounding the lift 3. of visual indications (roads, buildings…). The pigeon has stored a “map” in its memory of all those elements it has registered during training flights; she also creates the scent map with the scents that reach the til from different directions. In addition, a pigeon can switch between the different systems, but it has also been noticed that some pigeons use a certain system rather than another (according to the breeding line from which they descend). So it is a very complex process and many very original experiments have already been done! There is a nice (and correct) entry on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homing_pigeons#cite_note-wild-6) where you will also find some good articles.

It is therefore important for the pigeon fancier to ensure that the pigeon in its loft can absorb the winds from the environment and that it always gets natural daylight, to give the pigeon many opportunities to explore the area (preferably as far as possible) , and of course comes from a good breeding line (but you probably already knew that).

Good luck with your pigeons!