By Thomas Hellmann
Whitesides are indeed a special marking in our pigeon world, as it
is limited to just a few breeds and the stunning thing about it is that
none of them is a color pigeon, a group where you would expect such an
exceptional making. But we find them in a variety of Tumbler breeds (Vienna
Whitesides, Dutch Highfliers, Old Dutch Tumblers, Danish Tumblers,
ELFCL and ELF Muffed) and also the Trumpeter family has some whitesided
members k\ust think of the Dresden, Franconian, Harzburg or the English
Trumpeter). Finally, we think about whitesided Chinese Owls (which were
created in Sweden) and surely also of the whitesided Frillbacks. While
seeing mostly only red and yellow whitesides in the show room, the black
whiteside marking has something fascinating about it, more than rare and
even more difficult to breed. If you study the available literature you
will surely find tid-bits about black whitesides and the numerous crosses
done to spawn them. Contrary to their red and yellow counterparts, the
black whiteside must already hatch as whiteside while the other two colors
molt into a whiteside. The whiteside marking is the climax of spreading
white on the shield, one step below is what we call a "Shield tiger" (found
in Dutch Highfliers) and a further step below you can find the Rosewing.
In breeding black whitesided birds you will have by far more stock birds
in your loft than show birds and this hempers, of course, the popularity
of this gorgeous variety. While the black whiteside is already a tough
task, who has ever heard of blue whitesides? I haven't but I once read
of a reward put up in the beginning of the century for the creation of
a blue whiteside. It's still at stake so what about getting adventurous?