pigeon Interview with Ollie Harrispige

This Interview was taken from the Performing Roller Association (P.R.A) bi-monthly magazine July-August 1989 issue:

Mr. Ollie. D. Harris Birmingham England
Feb. 28, 1986.
Interviewer: William Crosby McRae
Place: The home of Mr. Harris

McRae: How long have you kept Rollers? How many years?
Harris: Well, I’ve been with these rollers now since 1916.

McRae: Did your family keep them then?
Harris: Yea! I’ve been with them right the way through, and my father had em, and his grandfather. I was more or less brought up with them, and I’ve stuck to them ever since.

McRae: Did you ever have breaks from them? Like the war?
Harris: Only one break I had, that was six years away, but me father, he looked after them until I came back from the war.

McRae: Did you obtain your pigeons from your father? And if so where did he get them?
Harris: Only one or two of me fathers pigeons, those were blues. By all accounts his father used to go with Richards father up Kings Swinford on pony and trap and pick these pigeons out.

McRae: So he knew the great Bill Richards father!
Harris: Yea, well they lived down Ladywood together. Pensom come from Ladywood as well, down Monument Road, they all came from Ladywood mainly, then they all went over the Harborne.

McRae: You must feel pretty lucky to have grown up amongst real rollermen?
Harris: Well! They was all roller blokes around Harborne! As far as I can remember there must have been twenty odd members in Harborne - Horborne alone!

McRae: Were they members of the Harborne Club then? When did that start?
Harris: Most of them were members of the H.R.C. yes, and I can remember it when I was a kid, and they had M.R.S. (Midland Roller Society) as well, which Ken Payne took over. When he packed up a chap from Yardlywood took over from him…but of course in that society they reverted to the (tumblers) Red Badges, the Magpies and the Black Badges - competition short workers.

McRae: When did you first come in contact with Bill Pensom; How far away did he live?
Harris: Well, when he came from Ladywood, he went to live up Tennal Road in some little cottages, and then he moved from there to Vicarage Road, and from there he moved to Victoria Road - two houses down from us see - and seeing all these rollers around Harborne - which I don’t think he’d seen before this - he seemed to get “the bug!” and he went all the way! He was everywhere after them! And I think a lot of Harborne blokes let him have pigeons and then a bit later he stretched his wings and went down the Black Country, Quinton, and all around there, and that’s where he met Skidmore, Bellfield, and all those other blokes.

McRae: What was the difference between Bellfields stock and the Richards birds? Did you see them when you were growing up? How often? (I was rather excited, hence run on sentences!)
Harris: I saw them pretty regularly when I used to go up with Bill (Pensom). Skidmore was the first chap he took me to - in Blackheath, from there he took me to Bellfields, and he’s got a wonderful place. Right on top of a sand pit or knoll. I’ve told you before today you could see his pigeons roll down in the knoll! It was a sight you could never forget!

McRae: What were they like in type - the Bellfield stuff?
Harris: Well, they were more cobby than other peoples, and more deep in the keel at the front. They were lighter coloured birds, bellnecks, mottles, and a few light blues, oddsides and what not. Where as Skidmores were all a mixed up lot. Richards’ were more less all selfs.

McRae: On the Richards birds what colours did he have?
Harris: Well, Richards were red chequers, blues, black chequers, red selfs with white center tails, and a few chequer badges out of them. A few red cheq badges and saddles - not many.

McRae: Eye color?
Harris: More or less all pearl. A really lovely pearl eye.

McRae: What were these Bill Richards birds like on the ground?
Harris: Well you look at one you’ve seen the lot! All the same type! They were beautiful pigeons!

McRae: I was told by Bill Pensom they were nice small compact pigeons.
Harris: Oh! they were - very, very nice!

McRae: What were they like in the air? You once told me you used to watch Bill Richards kits from school.
Harris: (Laughs) Oh yea, we used to go to Station Road school which was at the back of Richards backyard and we used to watch his pigeons fly through the back window. I’ve never seen pigeons like them at all! They used to roll that fast. It was really like they were rolling up again. And I think they were the fastest rollers that have ever been known.

McRae: How deep were they?
Harris: No, No, they weren’t too deep, say about 7-8 yards, that’s as deep as they were. They had to drop on the roof to drop and there were very few casualties with his birds - they were that sound.

McRae: How many did he keep?
Harris: Not many birds, about 30-40. Not many more. He’s never sell a pigeon. The only bloke that ever got any - I’ve told you, was Austin Fellow, a mate of his from Upton-on-Severn. That’s the only bloke he let have any pigeons.

McRae: So the only Richards birds around were “catched” pigeons?
Harris: Oh yes, he lossed some and people caught them. Yes.

McRae: So did you get a hold of a few?
Harris: Yes, I had a few off Tommy Richards, (Bills brother) who got them back from Austin Fellows - after Billy Richards died. When old Billy died Tommy let Bill Pensom and Ken Payne have most of them. But old Tommy picked out what he thought was best before they had them.

McRae: Were fanciers such as Bellfield, Skidmore, Richards etc. pals did they see each other?
Harris: Well they all knew each other, yea.

McRae: Did they see each others pigeons?
Harris: They did. They used to visit each other occasionally.

McRae: Did Bill Pensom go and see Richards then?
Harris: Well, he did but Richards was always cautious of letting anybody up his backyard. I remember when I went to see him as a kid, and he looked at me a bit quizzically, and I said “Have you got any pigeons for sale Mr. Richards?” he looked at me and squinted with that one eye - he had a squit, - and he said “you aint got enough for tail feather! (laughs) But I did visit him regularly afterwards, he would never sell. You could never get a pigeon from him. But I used to go and look at em. He'd got some in the coal house, more or less his stock pigeons, and these little two pens with his youngsters.

McRae: So when you started. Who did you try to acquire pigeons from? There must have been a few other good fanciers too.
Harris: A part from these blue (badges) of me fathers, I did have 2 off Billy Armshaw, he lived on Northfield Road, on the back of the allotments. Well, I too had a flying place back of the allotments, not far from where Bill Pensom went to live, next to old Joe Thompsons. Of course I’ve told you I caught that red necked hen and the dun badge cock.

McRae: Yeh! Tell me that story about that white, red necked hen, I know Herb Sparkes has an old photo of her.
Harris: Well… It was flying about for days. At the time I was a kid at school. Everyone was after her. Joe Edwards from Northfield Road, and Horace Wright were trying to catch it! And I walked out of the house one morning, (I was supposed to be going to school) and I saw this pigeon fly over from one place to another and roll, so I got my pigeons out, very cautiously, and got this red necked hen down! And around come Joe Edwards who said “have you caught that red necked hen?” I said “ah” I got it Joe. He said “ah, ooh! ah! I’ve been after that for days!” but any rate I had it mated it to a black saddle cock than Steve Stanly bred, and bred one good youngster from it - I only got the one - and it was a champion. Bill Pensom come around once and said “I’ll have that, and bought about five, and what he did with them - I don’t know!

McRae: You’ve told me that Bill Pensom once kept a number of whites, and these days we rarely see any whites - let alone great ones.
Harris: Yes, they come down from a white cock Albert Wyers let him have, and one of Bellfields, and I think he had one off Ben Homer. He mated these pigeons together and bred some real good self whites.

McRae: They were as anything in the air?
Harris: They were good rollers. The best whites I’ve ever seen in me life. I used to watch those birds up every day, for weeks and weeks and one day I looked and the pigeons never come up, so I went round to Bill and I said “where’s those whites Bill?” And he said “They’ve gone, I’ve sold them” (Mr. Harris shakes his head and laughs) But those were good pigeons.

McRae: Weren’t you near Elija Tomkins? He lived in Horborne.
Harris: Ah! Elija Tomkins! Well, he was dead when I went round, but Joe Tomkins (his brother) we saw, and I had two pigeons off him, a black chequer hen, and like a black chequer mottle cock, that what I had off old Tomkins. I bred some good pigeons off those.

McRae: He must have been getting good birds everywhere!
Harris: Well, he had a lot from Harborne, there was only Bertie Goode and myself that was left with em. He never cleared us out. Horace Wrights went to Bill, Joe Edwards, Harry Prestons, Bill Armshaws, Joe Thompson, a bloke named Walker, a bloke named Perry, Jimmy Broadfield, Oh! they all went to Bill, he cleared the lot out. But what he done with them I don’t know. There were certainly pigeons that Bill sent over the America - particularly those first lots that were very good. Some of those come down from that chap from Stourbridge - Albert Wyers, the one he had the white cock off. A light red chequer bald hen from him went over.

McRae: Ah! that’s it. Wasn’t she pearl eyed one? There’s a photo.
Harris: Yes.

McRae: So that’s that pigeon!
Harris: That come from Albert Wyers, that did. Of course Bill sent the good odd wing cock too.

McRae: Did you see that red chequer bald hen in the air?
Harris: No, never saw her, the only time I saw her was when Bill had got her in breeding in the stock loft on the allotments. She was a beautiful hen! That was definitely from Albert Wyers.

McRae: And that red necked hen was a “catched pigeon”?
Harris: She was a catched pigeon yes but she was a marvelous roller!

McRae: Did you ever see any of the youngsters off 463-1613, the red odd wing cock and dun hen? I know Bill sent those two to America in 1936.
Harris: Well, he bred that red odd wing cock off the old spangled cock and an old black badge hen. If I remember right? He was a red white wing with a few white feathers in his secondaries wasn’t he? (sorry Ollie, I don’t go back that far!) And he was a bit flat on the top of his head. He couldn’t roll, he was a good roller.

McRae: The dun hen, 1613, didn’t Bert breed that?
Harris: Bertie Goode bred the dun self hen. He lost it, that chap from Borl Street caught it, a chap above Bertie Goode bought it, then Herbert Hitchcock caught the hen, let this other chap from Ball Street have it, where Bill picked it up from there! But he picked it up when the old chap Bob Harrison was on his last legs - he picked up the dun hen and a black self hen before Bob’s son killed the lot. His son killed the lot after that! But that dun hen was a real good stock pigeon. She bred some good uns.

McRae: A lot of people in England and America got pigeons from that pair - they were responsible for a lot of good pigeons.
Harris: Yea. Well, in 1937 Jim Skidmore gave me a black mottled hen - off a young one off 463-1613, a dark chequer white winged hen that Bill let Jim have. He’d mated this chequer white wing hen up to a spangled cock which was off half Skidmores and half Richards. This youngster - the mottle hen - was a real rattler.

McRae: Which were the best pigeons you’ve ever seen?
Harris: Well…a part from the birds of Richards, Joe Edwards had a spangled dun tailed hen, which may have gone to America, I am not sure. Also he had a white black necked cock - another terrific roller! (all Edwards birds went to Bill) I bred a blue - oddity hen in 1951. Unfortunately I let Ron Adams have it and he lost it.

McRae: You mentioned a black badge hen you bred in 37.
Harris: Bill got that. That was off one of Joe Edwards, a rosewing cock, and Albert Wyers little chequer white winged hen. She was another terrific roller she was! Bill also had that, and what became of it I don’t know. (We both had a fit of laughter here - we shared lots actually!) He had some real good pigeons from Harborne and some real good pigeons from Bellfield and Skidmore - and Richards, I do know that.

McRae: A lot of these Black cheqs we’ve got now, (referring mostly to the stock Sparkes, Guthormsen, myself and others have in North America) Bill sort of finished up with - a lot of those - the black cheq bronze, go back to the 463-1613 and a black self hen I believe Alf Roper caught, but I think Skidmore bred it.
Harris: Skidmore bred that hen off a black self cock, and a chequer badge hen. Roper was a bloke who’d drive all over the country to buy a kit for one pigeon, and that black hen was in one of those kits, and when Portman was going around he happened to pick that hen up from Roper. Portman paired it to a cheq beard mixed tailed cock and bred 4 good youngsters. One went to America at the finish (ome sired 514’s father - McRae) Barrett had one, Bertie Goode had one, chap up Quinton had one, I think Skidmore had one didn’t he? Black badge cock?

McRae: I don’t know.
Harris: That black badge cock ended up with Ken Payne, and then Bob Brown barrowed that cock off him, and Bob never give it to him back! He kept the cock! Bob bred some real good ones from that pigeon.

McRae: You’ve talked about a red chequer badge cock Bill sent over in 51?
Harris: I think it was 51. Sent him to Ken Payne. He sent him a few birds over - 4 or 6 pairs - and every pigeon could roll! Every pigeon was a good un. But the one that was best was a dark rimmy tailed red cheq badge cock. Of course they mucked him about - never mated him up to anything to suit him, really mucked him round - but I’ve seen him in the air - ah he’s a good un! He was a good bird. Outstanding. Joe Thompson saw him, as did Harry Preston (who bred the father to Bills famous old red spangled cock) He was marvelous roller. Marvelous.

McRae: What became of the red chequer badge cock?
Harris: He let Wilf Portman have it. Portman lost it. Put a reward out, got it back, let Adam Jones have it from Blackheath, he lost it. Another bloke caught it and kept it in the bedroom! (hidden) Ron Goodby. He had it up in the bedroom. That’s the last we seen of that pigeon! It’s no wonder we never get our lost pigeon back!
Harris and McRae: Keel over with laughter.

McRae: A few pairs of your birds were sent to Guthormsons, Kiser, and Borges about 5 years ago in Canada and California. Is there any pattern you follow in matings. Your birds have a lot of “roll” and I also think they make excellent outcrosses.
Harris: All those these pigeons are bred close, and I’ve kept them as pure as I can, I always make sure I use a good cock, a good sound cock, if it’s paired up to a hen that can roll 2 or 4 or 10 yards - the cocks for me have always seemed to dominate that roll, that’s what I look for, a good sound stock - cock.

McRae: Are there any colours you’ve found more successful?
Harris: All colours are good. There’s only the yellows that they seem to condemn. But I have seen some good yellows - that chap up Quinton, “Leggy” they called him - a farmer - he’d got some good yellows. But unfortunately they got killd off by drinking the slop out of the cow manure!

McRae: Has fit!
Harris: They started drinking slop - and that’s it, they died!

McRae: I’ve never seen any yellows out of your pigeons or out of Bill (Pensoms) do they ever come out?
Harris: No. No. No.

McRae: I never did…
Harris: No, never.

McRae: Most of your strain come into the roll fairly early - say six months. Have you ever had any good ones come late?
Harris: Yes. For one that silver hen (blue grizzle) I had off a pair of Jim Skidmores - a black badge cock that couldn’t get off the pen for tumbling - he was mostly frightened to fly - and the black mottle hen I mentioned earlier I had off Jim in 37. That silver hen took 3 years to turn out! But when she did she was terrific! But again unfortunately I lost her - and some of her youngsters.

McRae: Did you ever get anything off her? Did you lose all of them?
Harris: No. I’ve still got that breed now, some of that breed. The duns, blues and mealies (lavenders) and odd mottle one.

McRae: if you compare the fancy today with the pre-world war II days, how does the fancy birds and the birds compare?
Harris: Well, there seems to be more fanciers around - worldwide. But from what I’ve seen the quality does not seem the same! As was when I could remember - in the oldish days.

McRae: Where do you think it’s gone wrong then?
Harris: Well really I don’t know. Could it be the money matter? Could it be that money has stepped into it - commercialized it. Like everything else today. Like sport. Also when you have to fight for something you seem to do good with it.

McRae: I think people are more impatient too. It’s an impatient age. Fanciers don’t fly theirs birds out, stock on pedigree, and aren’t putting the hours of study in. People like Skidmore and Bill Richards were probably more harsh on birds for the stock pen and culled hard - kept fewer stock birds than most do today.
Harris: That’s right. And if they’d got a “Humpty-Dumpty” pigeon as they called it, they’d soon neck it, or put it in a bucket of water. I’ve known Richards put a dozen in a bucket of water. He could tell em. Sometimes he could tell em in the nest even by looking at the heads!

McRae: Did you ever get to the bottom of how he mated up his pairs?
Harris: He seemed pretty well the same - good cocks all the time, and he never entertained a cross to them. Never. In the beginning I was told by his brother Tommy he got a couple from Whittingham - from Worchester, there was a little staley white wing hen from Bill Budd from Selley Oak and that’s all I know. I don’t know where he got the others!

McRae: It makes you wonder how long rollers have been around - where they come from….?
Harris: Well! I don’t know! According to me father, his father was messing around with them in the eighteen something. They must have been around hundreds of years back.

McRae: Did you ever see that stuffed roller old Jack Taylor owned?
Harris: Oh, Jack Taylor! He was an old bloke! He was on his last legs when I seen him! But I’ve seen a couple of good stuffed rollers in Somerset, when I was in the forces I visited a house (public house - ie a pub) and the young lady there showed me these two pigeons in a glass case, a spangle and a blue oddside. They were typical rollers. It seemed they were a tidy age then! That was about 1941. Smallest pub in England - in a little village called Godmanston. Whether or not they’re still there I don’t know. Her husband was a prisoner of war.

McRae: Skidmore didn’t feed his birds very well I’m told.
Harris: No, No, No, he fed them on the rough stuff. But Richards and Bellfield fed them on good stuff - tares and dari. They always carried a little tin of hemp seed with em - little tidbits, and when the pigeons had come down, they’ve give a little of this.

McRae: Sometimes you hear fanciers say Ken Payne didn’t fly very good birds but you were a friend of his and should know what of his kits?
Harris: The only trouble with Ken was that he gave em too good of food. Therefore, they went a little bit seldom. He used to feed them un peas, tares, milo, dari, and canary seed, and of course the “ruddy” pigeons ended up flying like tipplers at the finish. But, they was all good bred pigeons. All good pigeons - I’ve seen em roll as youngsters, but he fed em that way. Portman had em in the end - and Bertie Goode. I still remember those birds Bill sent to Ken Payne! And every one was a good roller!

McRae: When Bill was over in England in 65 he took a number of pigeons from you - which you can talk about - and he also took a gorgeous black badge hen from Portman NBRC-6230-63 - actually a 61. There is a little controversy as to where that hen came from.
Harris: Well Bill thought it was one of mine. But it was a caught pigeon and we found out later it belonged to Barnsley. Barnsley of Blackheath. He lived right below Skidmore, and he’d got a lot of Skidmores pigeons. She was a good roller - she only come about six yards - but she was good, straight, sound, and stopped dead fast.

McRae: She did look like one of yours.
Harris: She did. She looked like the black badge I let Bill have in 65.

McRae: Was Bill over in 65 for 2 weeks?
Harris: No, a month.

McRae: Did he stop with you most of the time?
Harris: Mainly. He did spend some time with Portman and Barrett. But I told him “I can’t stop away from work all this time! You’d better have the car and do with it as you want to! He used to come and pick me up when I closed the shop.

McRae: What birds did he take from you?
Harris: Well those birds I let him have in 65 - he just picked em out and that was it! There was mealy self splash cock, a red chequer badge cock, a mottle cock, which came down from Bellfields - there was a dun saddle cock, a mealy badge cock 1673 - I think Kiser got him at the end. There’s a blue badge - bald hen (1605), a black badge, a black saddle hen - I think he took eight. The black badge and the black saddle were the best in the roll. The black badge had pearl eyes, her brother (1673) had yellow. He had all these as youngsters. I’d been flying black badge and he’d seen it roll and said “Oh” I must take that! And the mealy splash self cock (lavender) he saw roll.

McRae: Aside from the fact he liked your pigeons in the sky, do you think there was any other reasons he took them?
Harris: Well, he saw em up, seen em roll, and he took a liking to the colour as well. He said his pigeons were nearly all dark pigeons. He thought these would make a good cross with them.

McRae: Can any difficulties arrive from dark chequers continually together?
Harris: They go seldom. I found out they really go seldom. But if you cross em out again, they seem to come right again.

McRae: What would happen with mating whites together? I’ve rarely seen anyone do it even. They used to.
Harris: Well I think if you continually bred whites on whites and reds together they might deteriorate in time. You’ve got to cross a darker colour into them and then cross em back again. Like to the grandparents.

McRae: With your pigeons it seems any combination of pairs will produce almost any colour offspring. You must be deliberately mixing them.
Harris: Yes, old Skidmore said “If I got a pair of pigeons that keep breeding the same colour each time, I know there is something wrong!” He said “I like em to knock out a few different colours”

McRae: Your own pigeons tend to be small and of very good type. You must have concentrated on that.
Harris: Well, they’ve a good type of pigeon - and they’ve got good bodies on them. When you handle them the keel seems to vanish below the vent bone. They always should seem a bit deeper in the front - not too flat, cause you can lose that many pigeons with these flat keels. They don’t roll so nice and neat as the one’s with deeper keels. They are likely to wobble - like a raft on the water. Aren’t they! A flat raft goes any which way.

McRae: You’ve said your general goals and ideals have stayed fairly steady. Who did you learn the most from?
Harris: Skidmore was one and watching Billy Richards perform. Horace Wright and Joe Edwards. They were the main blokes. I used to concentrate on - the old timers. You watched their movements and seen how they mated their pigeons up. The way they studied the beak settings, the head, and eyes, and the body. Most of these good pigeons look as if you’ve been shoving their tail into the body. Not long cast, a shortish tail. More robust at the chest, power at the butts, plenty of power. You learn by watching.

McRae: Smallish and very powerfully athletic.
Harris: Now Pensom. I was with him all the time when I was a kid and watched his performance, but I could never be completely sure what exactly he was trying to do (laughs).

McRae: He was always writing, but he still never really got himself across. I can’t totally explain it, and I spent years with him too.
Harris: I know he did a good thing by writing and putting these pigeons on the market, making them popular. He did a good thing there I think. The amount of blokes that’ve got rollers now is vast isn’t it! Worldwide! And it’s only due to Pensom.

McRae: I bet the fanciers of sixty years ago would never have imagined it.
Harris: No! No! Before when people had those pigeons they only did it as their hobby - serious - but still only for their personal pleasure. But, he could see something more in it - something bigger and he commercialized it. It was a good thing in one way and a bad thing in another.

McRae: The old families were kept as pure as practical, with performance as the judge. It seems to me one of the problems is that fanciers with the blood of say…Bills’ birds seem ready to cross with all sorts of strange blood. What do you think of that? They crossed yours too.
Harris: They don’t seem to know they’re all about! They don’t seem to know the background of these pigeons do they? Or the roll. If I wanted a fresh pigeon to add to mine, I’d want to know the background of it. It’s the same as these pigeons your having from America now (refers to my July 86 importation from Herb Sparkes and my resident study) they’ve come from some of those that Bill sent over there. I can more or less tell by looking at your pigeons what the background is. Those are the rollers I’d like to cross into mine, to see the results. I wouldn’t try any other blokes pigeons. You’ve got to know what you’re doing and their a bloody headache at times! (laughs) Oh dear! My Mrs. says if I’d put my mind to something else but pigeons I’d be a millionaire today.

McRae: Didn’t Bill Pensom have a job working as a bus driver as a carpenter over here?
Harris: First of all he went to work at Simsons, the shed people as a carpenter, and his old man did as well. When he chucked that up he went on the busses. He was on busses until he went to America.

McRae: The story goes that when Bill was driving, if he saw a kit of pigeons up, he’d stop the bus. Is that true?
Harris: Yea, that’s true! And many’s the time he’d spot me on the road, stop, and chat away about pigeons for five minutes! You could see the people on the bus getting aggitated! Then he’d say “Well, so long, I’ll see you tonight” and roll off! When he went up to Quinton driving the number 9. He’d park the bus at the termanus, with the passengers waiting, and go see the old fancier Harry Thatcher, have a chat and tea - spent quite a time with him! He used to roll back to the bus and that was it! (I nearly passed out laughing here!) If he saw a kit of pigeons up, he’d stop! He’d stop the bus and get off to have a look. When he started with these rollers seriously, in the early twenties, his mind seemed to go all one way. They got under his skin. In his blood. Everything was put aside bar rollers. Course he had racers. Also, tipplers and modenas. But the main one was the roller. He always stuck to the roller. He had some good tipplers from Sheffield once, when he lived next door but one from us, he sent away to Bob Storey for em, Bill bred these youngsters off em, started training em, and he used to say “Blimey, those flew all day today” (sometimes they did). Anyhow, my father happened to come home one night a bit early and saw these tipplers on the passage, above our lane, and so he said to Bill “How the tipplers doing Bill?” and Bill said “alright, their flying a hell of a long time!” and my father said “oh yeah? They’re upon the passage sun bathing!” any rate that upset Bill! And he gave em some wine in their drinking water, he loosed them up the next day and they were gone! Never seen again! They just went barmy!

McRae: Have you ever put anything in your rollers drinking water?
Harris: Not dope. But I generally give them a bit of iron sulphate in their water (a pinch) which tittles em up. I give em Epsom salts, skip a day, then pinch of iron sulphate. They should perform after that. Should liven em up.

McRae: Bill once told me that as a kid an old man used to pay him to pee on crushed brick - then the old man used to feed this stuff to his pigeons.
Harris: They used to, ah. Some of these old tumbler blokes used to piddle on bread, then give it to em. They reckoned that made em work. But that was a funny trick! I’d never do that! I’d never do that to me worst pigeons!

Mrs. Harris: (Enters after shopping trip) Hello! What have you two been up to?
Harris: We’ve been on the tape, talking pigeons all morning!
Mrs. Harris: Well that’s nothing new! Stop and have a cup of tea.
Harris / McRae: Right!