Goya Dmytryshchak
It will be race to win at auction.
The 94-year-old home of Yarraville Racing Pigeon Club, at 23 Regent Street, is being advertised for sale for $730,000-$780,000. It is scheduled to go under the hammer on Saturday, November 7.
Club president John Saggers said there were eight remaining members of the Yarraville club.
“The proceeds, we hope to put back into the sport some way or another, maybe with equipment and things like that for the pigeons,“ he said.
“If we fail to put it back into the sport and the pigeon club members then decide that we disperse or wind up, the money will go to charity.
“One of the members actually mortgaged his house to buy the property and the members of the club, back then, paid him back so the money was reimbursed to him.“
Mr Saggers said he had been around pigeons all his life and it was sad to see the clubhouse sold.
His father Max and uncle Les raced pigeons as kids, before being called up to the army.
“After they came out of the service, they started racing pigeons as adults … and they lived virtually across the road from each other,“ Mr Saggers said.
“There’s a lot of work involved in it … you’ve got to train them. You’ve got to sometimes drive 100 miles to give them a bit of a training run.
“Once you’re bitten with the pigeon bug, it’s hard to get away from it.“
In 1998, Mr Saggers’ pigeon, Toey, beat 1500 birds released in New South Wales to fly 965 kilometres home in 14 hours.
Selling agent, Tate Moore of Jas Stephens Real Estate, said the clubhouse had been a local hangout for many years but pigeon racing was now a dying sport.
“For a 200-odd square metre block in that kind of a location is pretty unbelievable,“ he said.
“I think people have spoken to council about trying to demolish it altogether or incorporate what’s there and turned it into a residence, which would be the ideal scenario for everyone, I’d say.“
