My name is Calvin Gall, I am 37 years old and live in Belgium, Wisconsin.  Yes, you heard that right I live in Belgium named after the country that is the pigeon mecca of the world.  What better place can a pigeon fancier live?  My wife is Jamie and I have 4 kids, Jordan, Makayla, Jeremiah and Rebekah who we lost in 2016.  I also have a new granddaughter named Eden.  

I have been involved in pigeons my entire life. As a young child there was a swing in the backyard that my parents would sit me in and I would watch the birds outside, so when I say that I have been involved with them my entire life it’s not an exaggeration.  Once I could walk, I followed my dad into the pigeon loft and the rest as they say is history.  My dad taught me so much in the pigeon world and is one of the best judges of pigeons I have seen picking out pairs that can produce champions time and again.  His name is Richard Gall of Gall Lofts.  

We flew as a partnership most of my childhood in the tough Milwaukee area flying against almost 80 members in the early 90s all the way up until after graduating from high school in 2005.  We competed against some top pigeon men the likes of the Pieper Family, Richard Blankenheim, Lenny Gigowski, Roman Wytascz, Toni Rossi, Tim Riordan, Fred Hopper, Ken Sweeney and many more.  In those years we won concourse races, champion loft, champion bird, average speed awards as well as winning American Ace Pigeon awards twice.  Summers were a time for getting up early to train the birds every day and watching the races in the alley waiting for birds to fly over.  A funny story about racing during my high school years, the coach of the high school football team wanted me to play for the team, but when I found out games were on Friday nights I told him I couldn’t, I said, “I have to ship my pigeons for the race.”  You can imagine the look he gave me, but that’s always how it has been for me.  

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For a short time we moved to Georgia where my dad worked for Global Pigeon Supplies and was the loft manager.  He flew the team for Global and I had my own team of birds in my backyard.  I was only 13 years old at the time and in my very first race I finished 1st-8th.  Then in my first old bird race the following year I only shipped 2 birds and again won the race.  It helped me become a lot more independent when it came to making decisions for training and preparing birds for races.  

I have made a few trips over to Europe, once as a 10 year old going over to visit Mike Ganus when he was racing in partnership in Holland and getting to watch the return of races.  Plus, we got to visit several different famous fanciers.  You can imagine the experience and this for a 10 year old kid.  I got to meet Louis Janssen and sit in the famous chairs in their living room.  I got to visit with Jos van Limpt (De Klak) after no one had been allowed to visit him anymore.  Louis van Loon, Herbots, Ad Schaerlaeckens and the list could go on.  I then went two more times to attend very special auctions and got to handle Barcelona champions, 1st National winners and some real top notch birds.  

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I have worked with Toppigeons auction house now for close to 10 years as their sales agent for the USA.  I initially helped them translate sales lists from Dutch into English and promote their sales.  Then I started up my own website (euro-usaconnection.com) that focused on bringing European imports into the USA to offer to American fanciers so they didn’t have to worry about or deal with importing or quarantine issues, and also didn’t have to worry about getting involved in a bidding war.  I have made a lot of good connections and friendships through this and also serve as the exclusive sales agent to the USA for Falco Ebben, Mitja Kobal and Oliver Eschenberg.  The references of people succeeding with the birds I have selected to bring into the USA continues to grow and 2024 was very successful with clients winning over $50,000 in races.  

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I stopped actively flying in 2016 after losing our daughter Rebekah and only recently returned to club racing in 2023 after moving to Belgium in 2021.  I served as the chairman for the Midwest Convention in 2024 which became a very popular race with over 1,100 birds being entered, seminars by Raf Herbots and record-breaking auctions for the Midwest Convention.   Below I will highlight the results of the only 3 races I have entered since returning.  Many people questioned my method of not entering any birds in the short club races before these 3 money races which were all 315 miles without ever having been released with other birds or on the race truck, but I am confident in knowing how to prepare birds for a certain race and getting them to peak at the time.  This past year for the Midwest Convention I trained them out 127 and 180 miles prior to the race, so I was treating them as in a type of mini one loft race already. 

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2023:

Green Bay Auction Race: entered 8 birds winning 4th, 10th, 12th, 14th having most birds in the top 10% and this with winds against me.

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Valley Club Auction Race: entered 3 birds winning 6th & 7th with winds against me.

 

2024:

Midwest Convention vs. 517 birds: Extremely tough race with only 9 day birds. I had 3 of the 9 day birds, the first bird on the second day, 10 in the top 26 and most birds in the money winning: 3rd, 4th, 7th, 9th, 12th, 15th, 17th, 21st, 23rd, 26th, 34th, 49th, 52nd.

 

I look forward to training and testing your birds to find the very best birds, not looking for one hit wonders, but birds that are consistent.  By doing this I hope it will also help you learn what you have in your breeding loft and what can stand up to the test and competition.  I hope it also helps you improve your own breeding loft through selection of what can do it and what cannot.  Come join me in what will prove to be an enjoyable competition over a 4 race series of 150, 200, 250 and 325 miles, where each race counts as much as the next one for Ace Pigeon title with the Ace Pigeon competition being decided based on the lowest coefficient over the 4 races.  I can promise I will do my very best with your birds and can guarantee you they will get top care, no over-crowding, personal hands-on care, hand scanning for each race and also handling each bird prior to every training toss to ensure the well-being of each bird for every training.  No shuttling birds down a hall and into a truck where injured birds or birds who have lost condition are missed.  A race where your bird is not just a number, but part of a team!