Nolan Frederick, a science teacher at Highlands Ranch High School, might seem like your average guy at first glance. But once you dig a little deeper, you find out he has quite a full nest…literally. “I have 7 kids; 6 girls and one boy, a dog, some fish, and 6 homing pigeons.”Frederick said.

   Frederick came across his first homing pigeons at a wedding where a guy was going to release them during the ceremony. After talking with the man, Frederick was hooked.

   The man with the pigeons explained to Frederick that homing pigeons, once you release them, fly straight home. “This is so cool!” Frederick said to the man.  However Frederick did not hop on the pigeon bandwagon right away; it took a few more years for him to get some of his own.

   While explaining his first homing pigeon encounter to one of his science classes, a girl told Frederick that she had homing pigeons and gave him the information of a guy who sold them. Frederick didn’t buy pigeons right away; he wasn’t quite sure he really wanted them, but Frederick said he kept running into the man around town every once in awhile.

   “This has got to be a sign,” Frederick said after seeing the man several times, so he finally got his homing pigeons. He started by building a loft for them to live in and then went to the man to get his homing pigeons

   It truly must have been a sign because Frederick said, “Since I’ve built the loft, I have not seen the man.”  Today, Frederick takes his homing pigeons to several places all over the country, and lets them fly home. He also enters them in homing pigeons races.

   Frederick also connects his pigeons to his job, as he takes them into his classes and lets his students hold them. Students enjoy when he does this.

   One student, Natalie Alvarado, freshman, said, “…It’s nice to know what a teacher’s background is and what they enjoy doing and it was cool to see that homing pigeons were his passion because you wouldn’t think that out of all things, it would be pigeons.”

Sam Mate, Guest Reporter