Iron Mike coos over

BY CELESTE KATZ
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Source: New York Daily News

Mike Tyson's favorite hobby is for the birds. The former heavyweight champ, who has a fight coming up shortly, is turning again to his beloved flock of pigeons for focus and friendship.

Steve Lott, a former assistant manager of Tyson's, said the heavyweight "has a love, a sensational love, for the great legendary fighters," Lott said. "At the turn of the century, a lot of the fighters had birds as a hobby. What they did back then, he does to some extent now."

Tyson's prized pigeons are tumblers - birds that suffer seizures while flying so it appears they're doing somersaults in the air.

Back when Lott worked with Tyson in the 1980s, "it probably relaxed him a great deal," he said of the fighter's feathered friends. "Coming up, there was tremendous pressure on him. The birds gave him relaxation."

Brooklyn-born Tyson, 38, will face Kevin (The Clones Colossus) McBride in Washington, D.C., June 11. Tyson is hoping for a better outcome than his last bout, when British heavyweight Danny Williams knocked Iron Mike to the canvas in a four-round victory last July.