Pidgeons have been used since early times as a postal service. From there pidgeon racing was developed in the 19th century in Belgium and England.
Competing pigeons are specially trained and conditioned for races that vary in distance from approximately 100 kilometres to 1,000 kilometres. Despite these lengths, races can be won and lost by seconds, so many different timing and measuring devices have been developed.
In 2009 a pidgeon beat the local Internet Service Provider to deliver a 4GB memory card from Howick to Durban by delivering the file in 1 hour and 8 minutes. At the same time the file was only at 4% completed using the ISP services.
The area is an open field, therefore beware of some of the pidgeons natural predators.