Being a great believer in Inbreeding to fix desirable characteristics I was curious to discover whether or not Geert Munnik was going to travel this same path to creating a distinct family of pigeons and I was certainly not surprised at his answer:

“With Johnny Boy and his sons and daughters I’m busy with an inbreeding program. I’m doing this to secure the good characteristics of these pigeons in this race. Out of the line Blitz Boy (Son of Johnny Boy x Franske) x Golden Girl (Johnny Boy x Sprinter) I breed the Wonder Boy 08 a super flyer. This year I mated brother x sister and father x daughter the resulting youngsters are beautiful demonstrating exceptional vigour and incredible muscle with supple flesh”

Personally I think that by initiating and following a tightly controlled inbreeding program Geert Munnik is insuring the long term impact of his incredible “Johnny Boy”. This astute inbreeding program, performance tested in each generation will make this “Johnny Boy” line or family exceptionally desierable for years to come. Anyone fortunate enough to acquire and correctly mate this line with their own quality stock will deliver an explosion in terms of “hybrid” vigour. For anyone looking to top the charts study this line carefully , but do not wait too long to do so.

I remember well the example that was given to me years ago by the American author Bob Kinney who had developed an extremely vigorous and successful line of inbred Janssen/Gordon racing pigeons. In fact two of his pigeons when mated together produced the 1998 winner of the $250,000.00 1 st place win ( minutes ahead) at the South Africa Sun City Million for Bob Qualls and in 2003 he won a further $50,000.00 when another one of his pigeons was 5 th at that same Sun City race. Here is how Bob Kinney explained the value of a properly conceived and executed inbreeding program to me:

“….To put my thoughts on breeding into the very simplest of examples. Consider the following; imagine a jar in front of you with gold dollar coins in it. Imagine that each gold dollar coin represents a winner gene and you want to reach into that jar and pull out another winner. There are say 20 gold dollar coins in that jar. So long as there are only gold coins in that jar, every time you reach into it you will pull out a winner. So let’s imagine that you now decide to bring in a cross, unproven, an unknown quantity, that you now mix into your loft ( or jar).So now your jar is full of the 20 gold coins to which you have just added 20 copper pennies. So it is easy to understand that your odds of pulling a winner out of your jar have just been reduced by 50%.Now do that for another generation because the bird that you imported or bought cost so much and is claimed to be so good and you now have say 60 copper pennies and the same 20 gold coins. If you multiply the number with even more unknown gene packages and the likelyhood of ever finding one of those gold coins is even further reduced. The above is a formula for lifelong mediocrity. When I found that super pair I literally culled everything and worked with that pair and their children. Some were proven as youngsters others were bred for stock. I proceeded to mate them together because I had no choice. With a total of seven pair I started over. I was LUCKY enough to find the “gold mine” my jar was full of gold coins… Over the years I have twice cut back to seven pair only. Each time resulted in a leap forward in performance…” Bob Kinney

Clearly “Johnny Boy” has all of the attributes that are of importance, soft silky feather, moist supple muscle, a motor or vibration that reminds me of super charged Camaro, great intelligence and most important of all the ability to pass on to his progeny his most desirable characteristics including the ability to quickly orient and the determination and urgency to return home without delay. “Johnny Boys” Dam is the “Kanger” a highly successful direct daughter of “Picanol” (of Gaby Vandenabeele out of the super line de Wittenbuik,) when mated to “Sissi”. These pigeons are very tough and fast and easily win to 740 kilometers. The “Johnny Boy” pigeons can compete every week and being tough and resilient they do not require a great deal of roadwork.

Before I continue with the fascinating story of Geert Munnik and the incredible “Johnny Boy” I think it is necessary to delve a little into the history surrounding that truly great Dutch master Mr. Wout Smeulders of Neunen. In order for you to understand the value of a potential Foundation Sire or Dam you must research well, and understand clearly, their genetic heritage.”Johnny Boy is important not just because he won many races and Championships but just as important he has the genetic heritage to assure that he is not just a “sport” but that his ability is genetically preprogrammed.

You cannot truly appreciate the awesome genetic package that “Johnny Boy” possesses unless you understand the origin of his prepotency. You see “Johnny Boy” is no accident, or as the Americans would say “no fluke” he does in fact originate from“racing pigeon royalty” the genetic continuation of a breeding program that began over five decades before his birth. Already by the late 1970’s the reputation of the “Smeulders” pigeons was quite universal in the pigeon world.


Figure 1 Wout Smeulders and his friend Joop Ekstijn in front of the Smeulders lofts circa 1986.

“Kanon” was a truly tremendous racing machine bred by Wout Smeulders from a daughter of the “Vetcher X Witpenneke “ of De Klak. The Sire of the “Kanon” was B646697683 a direct Janssen from the “Bange 51 X Vos Van 48”.



The "Kanon" was 23 x 1st, and definitely Wout Smeulders' greatest racing and breeding pigeon. Smeulders eventually sold the "Kanon" to Helmut Josten of Germany. It is curious to note that three of top lines in Europe during the three decades following the birth of the “Kanon” were, in fact,descendents of the "Kanon" (H67766379), his fullbrother, H67630132, and a halfbrother "Olympiade 08" (H682070608).


A photo of the "Kanon” in later life .His descendants continue to dominate racing in Taiwan, Canada, the USA, China, Australia, Germany, Holland and Mexico

The more that I have observed the more I have come to believe in the value of “The Family” over that of “The Individual”. Champions are rare! Prepotent champions are the rarest of the rare. They are to be cherished, and unlike diamonds, they will not last forever. Use them wisely! To find one is truly like panning for gold. You go through tons and tons of rock and dirt to find only a graina nuggetof
real gold. That is why it has value, because it is rare!

So, Silvio, why do you say this? Well, here is why. Let us say, for arguments sake, that a pigeon only had 25 pairs of genes. If this was the case, then each pair of pigeons would produce approximately 33,500,000 different genotypes. You must admit that this is an incredible number. But how many genes does a pigeon really have? Well he/she has 6,000 pairs, which really means that if each pair was heterozygous they would in fact produce 3 to the 3,000th power different genotypes. Do you understand just how big this number is?

So what becomes only too clear is not that variations occurbecause this is the normbut rather that offspring of a prepotent sire or dam can be so consistent! This is why prepotent pigeons are so rare and valuable. … Only through a welldefined, wellthoughtout and executed plan can you seek to become successful generation after generation.

The following is a photo of “Apollo’s” Sire called “ Good Old Johnny”. I have studied the line of the “Kanon” since 1989 and I know it well. “Old Johnny” is very typical of the old “Kanon” type, color and confirmation.


Figure 3 "Good Old Johnny" is a great grandson of the Kanon and is true to form and definitely carried the golden genes of the "Kanon".

And finally we come to the subject of this brief article the truly incredible “Johnny Boy”. “Johnny Boy” was born 38 years after the birth of his great, great, great grandsire the “Kanon” and yet none of the racing excellence that was initially demonstrated by the “Kanon” has been lost. More incredible still is the fact that “Johnny Boy” is as prepotent as his illustrious ancestor the “Kanon”. “Johnny Boy” has been
referred to by some in the pigeon press as a “White Raven” and I must agree wholeheartedly.

“Johnny Boy” is ( as of 2010) only five years old, he has many great years ahead of him and he is already creating a genetic dynasty that will absolutely insure that he will be counted amongst the worlds greatest racing pigeon sires. Not only do I dare predict that he will be as great a Sire as his incredibly famous ancestor the “Kanon” but he will uniquely mark his progeny and be deserving of the same fame and recognition as
other immortal stock cocks including but not limited to the calibre of the "Kleine Dirk" (Koopman), the “Kleinen” and "Wittenbuik" of Vandenabeele, the “Jong Artiest"of Houben, the "Kletskop" of Verbruggen, the "Witpender" of Engels and so many more. I say this without hesitation.


For those of you who have eyes to see and ears to hear mark well my words as in all the articles that I have ever written never have I been so bold and so adamant in my prediction!

Stock sense is essential and Geert Munnik Has It in Spades!


There are some people who really do have a gift with animals. This gift of recognizing quality in animals is called stock sense. If you are a successful dog breeder, cattle, or horse breeder, or in our case pigeon breeder you probably have this stock sense. This usually cannot be taught; you usually have an aptitude for it or you do not. No matter what you breed, the principles are and always remain the same. Once you come to know what does or does not constitute a quality animal, you are well on your way. Good stock sense stacks the probability of potential success much more in your favour than in that of someone with no such sense. You can quickly see this in how one handles and relates to his stock. Most people, I can assure you, regardless of how much money the spend or how many years they have had their pigeons, do not have any stock sense. unfortunately this is just a fact! Geert Munnik has demonstrated and will continue to demonstrate his stock sense in years to come. “Johnny Boy” is just the beginning as I believe a dynasty is in the making.




Figure 4 Geert Munnik with his two daughters

There is no doubt in my mind that Johnny Boy is a proverbial breeding wonder. Geert Munnik combined the “Smeulders line of his old friend Johnny Nijburg and crossed this with the pigeons of Eppie Koster and the success was immediate and brilliant. The insight that lead to this crossing is the result of that uncommon “stock sense” that I mentioned earlier. The coming together of the line of Smeulders “Kanon” (through "Apollo" 2133209/97 ) and the line of the “Picanol” via the hen "Kanjer" 254/97 (an Eppie Koster hen, of the Scharlaekens line ) was an inspired mating the descendants of which will have a lasting impact on the racing pigeon world worldwide. The “Kanjer” was a direct daughter of “Picanol” and she was both a super breeder and super racer having scored 1 st Nijvel against 2,812 birds, 1 st Mettet against 2,524 birds and 1 st Chimay against 2,127 birds.



In addition to all of the previously mentioned achievements "Johnny Boy" is proving that he is definitely a world class Sire a virtual 'breeding wonder'. As a yearling he fathered 4 youngsters who all won a 1 st prize in the 'District'. It was only the beginning … he is now, mostly mated to "Franske" and "Sprinter", and as such he is the Sire to:





Clearly “Johnny Boy” is a wonder not only as a racer but more important for those who like to progress he is a “Super Breeder”. I was not the first to declare him so not long ago the Dutch racing pigeon magazine “Het Spoor der Kampioenen BV” through one of their key editors Mr. Gert Jan Beute declared “Johnny Boy” “The Incredible Super Pigeon” equal to such super breeders as “Klien Dirk” etc. Once your understand that “Johnny Boy went to the stock Loft in 2007 and when you see his results to date this declaration is not only understood to be accurate but would may in the long term be too conservative as the truth of the matter may actually be that in time he may in fact be declared the “Best that Ever Was”!