Jean Desbouvrie

Jean Desbouvrie (18 February 1843 – 18 August 1905) was a French amateur bird trainer who believed that swallows could be put to use for military communications. During the late 19th century Desbouvrie persuaded the government of France to conduct a study on the feasibility of using swallows as messengers. His early demonstrations showed that swallows could exhibit homing behavior and that when they did so they flew much faster than homing pigeons. Desbouvrie also succeeded in curbing the birds' natural migratory behavior. After obtaining authorization from the government for follow-up testing, Desbouvrie delayed and did not follow through with rigorous experimentation.

Desbouvrie received international attention in the press for two unrelated reasons: the bird experiments, and also for a proposal he made to the Paris Academy of Medicine. The Academy published his paper, which declared chronic alcoholism to be a serious public health problem and offered a solution in the form of a claimed cure for hangovers. Desbouvrie hypothesized that the consumption of food which contained an appropriate balance of fat and albumen would prevent hangovers from occurring. He sent the Academy a selection of homemade chocolates along with his manuscript, with assurances that he had tested the concoction extensively upon himself.

Youth Jean Desbouvrie born Jean Baptiste Desbouvrie, was the son of Frédéric Joseph Desbouvrie, servant, fruit merchant and Catherine Joseph Derain, housewife, and was born in the "Hameau du Triez Saint-Joseph" in Roubaix.

Desbouvrie kept his swallows in a cage and trained them to fly in and out of the cage. Another challenge he overcame was the birds' natural migratory behavior.

He spent over 30 years keeping birds and devoted two rooms of his house to swallows. One room housed a cage for the swallows. The other room was a training space with a balcony used for practice releases. He documented the age and health of each bird in a register, and marked each one by tying colored silk to its leg, with red indicating a trained bird and blue indicating a partially trained bird. Trained swallows were allowed to roam outside their cages, while the others remained caged at all times. Untrained birds were sold as pets.

Four of the little prisoners, the oldest not more than twenty days, were let loose. It was raining in torrents at the moment, a circumstance by no means favorable to the trial. The birds rose in the air, flew round the house several times, and then darted off into the country. Twenty-five minutes after the youngest returned and perched on the balcony; the other three did not come back before an hour. They all then entered the cage-room, when Desbouvrie gave them some food, which they ate out of his hand.

Potential applications of swallow training The 1955 book Bird Navigation describes efforts at training homing behavior in species other than pigeons. An 1892 report in The American Magazine that discussed Desbouvrie's efforts noted the importance of pigeons to that war: "Upon several occasions, indeed, the inhabitants of the beleaguered cities looked upon the successful flights of these birds as their only hope betwixt death and starvation."

Desbouvrie proposed two swallow aviaries at Montmartre and at Fort Mont-Valérien. He called it was a matter of public health to counter the effects of chronic alcoholism. Desbouvrie asserted that the cure required eating albumen and fat in appropriate proportions one hour before alcohol consumption, and had invented a chocolate which he claimed contained both ingredients in an effective ratio. He provided samples to the Academy and assured its members he had tested the cure upon himself.

Honors Honorary diploma and silver-gilt medal at the Bergues International Barnyard Animal Contest 1889