CREATURE FEATURE : Coop Scoop

For most of us city dwellers they’re an urban cliche, but for thousands of Southern Californians, pigeons are the ultimate athletes.

“Pound for pound, there is no comparison in terms of athletic performance,” says Ron Steinbrenner, owner of San Diego’s 7-11 Loft, which houses more than 100 of the winged wonders. A racehorse, he says, can manage about 35 m.p.h. over a mile-long oval, but racing pigeons can sustain speeds of 50 m.p.h. (twice that with a tailwind) for more than 500 miles.

That, on top of their ability to find their way home across hundreds of miles of unfamiliar terrain, makes them the perfect long-distance competitors. Pigeons have carried messages since ancient Egypt, but pigeon racing is only about as old as the telegraph, which unseated the birds as the fastest way to send news. Worldwide, more than 1 million pigeon fanciers, including 1,000 or so in Southern California, now race 40 million pigeons in contests that range from back-yard matchups to races with six-figure purses. One of the 20-week racing season’s biggest annual contests, the Snowbird, begins on Thursday. Sponsored by the 72-member San Fernando Racing Pigeon Club, the race will draw more than 2,000 birds to a 400-mile course that begins north of Sacramento and ends in lofts throughout the San Fernando Valley.

These are not your average pigeons-on-the-street, of course. These birds have fancy bloodlines and cost anywhere from $100 to $100,000. Owners pamper their flocks, feeding them vitamins, electrolytes and various secret concoctions. But, says Steinbrenner, “We never really have any problems with things like doping because nobody knows how these birds find their way home. If they tried to dope ‘em up, the birds might not come home at all.”