“We’ve had some devastating losses this year,” said Tina Webster, who operates Webster’s Wings with her husband Derik, who hauled a crate of 50 homing pigeons off his truck and onto a high spot near the lodge at Camp Loughridge in West Tulsa.

Homing is risky training, and baby birds simply get lost in flight. Some of Webster’s are now “living under bridges,” having gone astray. Other homers just don’t quite make it home. “Cooper hawks pick them off as they land,” Tina said, adding that redtail hawks generally prey only on the young ones.

Since the 1500s, “fanciers” have been training rock pigeons to fly out and back again. “Once you train a bird,” Tina said, “home is forever.” One of Webster’s birds left Eufaula and found Denver.

Finding home is one thing, arriving safely is another. On a windy day, gusts sometimes send birds smashing into their lofts.

“It’s not hazardous to fly them,” Tina said. “They’ll fly from dawn to dusk until they get home. Mostly it’s just landing.”

The race is on

Pigeons race in daylight, and not in the rain. The clouds Sunday over Camp Loughridge were patchy and purple-gray. The wind was blowing up something, but not a storm. The Great Pigeon Race is the organization’s big annual fund-raiser.

Race sponsors and gatherers amassed in the parking lot, ready to rubberneck for their homers. These birds were headed over the hill to Sapulpa. “This isn’t even a sprint,” Tina said.

Tina and Derik’s birds are part of the Northeast Oklahoma Racing Pigeon Federation, an 11-member club that stretches from Ponca City into Missouri. When their birds aren’t racing, they’re floating over weddings, memorials and 21-bird military salutes. You can hire one at tulsaworld.com/websterswings.

Sunday, the 50 Great Pigeon Racers trickled from the cage and soared over the leafless oaks. They circled the grounds several times in a group, which they’ll sometimes do when the home loft is near. Then, one will break and the race is on.

Sunday’s results were to have been shown on a screen at Loughridge, from a remote camera located at the loft in Sapulpa. But technical difficulties ensued and the results had to be phoned in. The big winner was a homer dubbed “Restoration,” sponsored by Pastor Alan South and the congregation of Restoration Church in Sand Springs. The big prize was a flatscreen TV.

“The Restoration bird came in five or 10 minutes before the others,” said Maridee Lindley, executive director of CCE. “I guess the rest were out playing.”