A rescued racing pigeon and an exciting find!

9th Sept '11 - The photo above shows cute Pixie, with her feathered feet, that I ringed a while ago - see last blog. She having a little doze on the lawn ...I don't see her now and fear she has died but hopefully just moved on. Other doves I am not currently seeing and wish I was are Peace (came down my chimney on the day my mother died and a very special bird) and Toffee Splodge (Jose's gentle friend from earlier this year). Remember Rusty with the awful bloodied face rescued from Claremont? I saw her this week when I went there to walk round the lake - forgot my camera though. I was very pleased to see her still doing well. The flock there is about 40 strong, and I do worry that come the winter, when people don't visit so much, the doves will go hungry, but I asked at the entrance kiosk and was reassured when the lady told me that the gardeners have a seed store and feed the doves and the birds on the lake morning and evening. Oh yes, said the lady, the flock of doves have been here at Claremont forever, they interbreed with the seagulls you know (ermm, no, I don't think so!, I thought, but I didn't say anything! - maybe she said the wrong word and meant 'pigeons'. Certainly the doves do breed with the pigeons as they are the same species but, having said that, birds, apparently, choose a mate that looks like their parents, and a white dove would, out of preference choose another white dove for it's mate)

While I wait for the eggs to hatch (hopefully this time!) I'll tell you about the beautiful grey ringed racer that I returned to her owner a few weeks ago.


A truly lovely bird, softly grey all over, and ringed, but limping and dragging her wing.

After a few days of throwing her extra peanuts to build up her strength, I managed to trap her in the net when she was eating them with her back to me! And I put her in my hospital box, made nice and comfortable, and placed it on top of Jose's hutch.

Flash checks out the newcomer, while she makes herself at home in the box

I noted down the number on her ring and filled in the online form from The Royal Pigeon Racing Association website - 'report stray' section - http://www.rpra.org/ I've done this before, but that bird was dead. The website informed me that if it was a Friday they would not be contacting the owner until Monday and I might well have to keep the bird til Tuesday. Just my luck I thought to catch a bird on a Friday, but luckily an email pinged into my box giving the owner's full details including telehone number and I was able to ring him straight away. He was a very nice gentleman from Billingshurst, West Sussex (I am in Surrey), grateful for the call and said he would come the next morning for her. I must admit I had wondered if the owner would want to bother to come to collect an injured bird but when he came and told me how much these racing pigeons can cost then I wondered no more! He himself has paid £1,000 for a bird and told me of some (extremely wealthy) man who had paid £45,000 I think it was! Wow!

Calm in her owner's hands - I've got a lovely smiley pic of him, but I didn't mention my blog and it would hardly be fair to put his photo up for everyone to see without permission
The gentleman, having examined his bird (these pigeon fanciers don't name their birds like I do!) felt that she had suffered a hawk strike. He said this damage to her body is consistent with that. I was glad that he said he would very likely be able to help her fully recover - he'd take the weight off her legs by hanging her up in his pigeon loft in a stocking - suspended with her feet sticking out! - and the damaged one set with a little stick. No doubt he would be able to fix her wing too. Out of interest, he told me he had released her - with others - from Petersfield. She must have really lost her way to end up at mine! I also recently found a printed white wing feather - some owners stamp their address on the their birds' feathers, but I've never found one before. That bird came from Saxmundham - approx 80/90 miles away I guess.

And now the exciting news! Today was hatching day - 18 days from when I first noticed Omo and Flash 'swapping' places in the nestbox - and as the last eggs were duds - see previous blog - I was concerned that these eggs wouldnt hatch either. This afternoon when I came home from shopping, I checked under the cote to see if I could spot any 'signs' but nothing there.... no worries, I thought, it might be tomorrow, don't give up hope... and then as I walked up to my door, there on the path was the announcement egg shell!

Can you see the little white blog on the centre line - that's it! I photographed where I found it. Just exactly like when Hope & Glory had Victory & Purity and left an egg shell on the gravel path, Flash or Omo had left their new squab's egg shell for me to find! I am convinced of it! And I am so happy... though it's still early days of course. I will update you soon.

To be cont...

Very UN-happy Mother's Day

Wednesday 25th March 2009 Last photo of Glory. I was taking a picture of him to show you the pink colouring on his tail, which was my only way of marking him.

Warning: Sad blog and a couple of sad photos.

On Mother's Day last Sunday, I fed the doves on the island as usual at about 7.30 am. Glory, my daddy dove, was there amongst them all, and I threw him extra, as I do all the special doves that I recognise. Then, as it was Sunday I went back to bed for a bit. How I wish I hadn't. I got up again about 9.00 am and opened the kitchen door. My first thought was that there were petals all over the step, but after that one split second I realised that they were lots of little white feathers and the trail took my eyes to the left and there was a bloodied dead dove lying in a flurry of feathers in front of the coal bunker. I rushed down to the dovecote and was relieved to see a dove inside, but rushing back I was thinking 'Please, please don't let it be Glory!' but of course, it was. His little body was still warm. If only I'd been in the kitchen I might have averted the attack ... because of course it was a hawk that got him. A dove looks very beautiful, even in death, even if it has been violated like poor Glory - the closed eye, the turned up claws, the tragic limpness. I knew it was definitely Glory as I had marked his tail with pink food colouring (see previous blog). I was just so devastated that I was numb, I think. The horrible hawk had only eaten a small part of him - only a mouthful or so..... what a terrible waste. And the mess.... birds have an unbelievable amount of feathers. And poor Hope, how was she going to manage.....

The first egg had hatched out on the previous Thursday. I had been out in the garden, going to and fro from my 'second' kitchen which is a sort of outhouse and has my washing machine in it, and one trip, there was the egg shell, bang in the middle of the path, where it hadn't been a moment before! It was like a birth announcement - We have a baby! I was so happy. It made my day! I carefully picked the shell up and put it on my kitchen window sill. The next day, when Hope came out of the nest box she had an eggshell attached to her underneath, which quickly dropped off and I collected that too and put it with the other one.

So the poor little new baby squabs lost their daddy when they were only 2/3 days old and I was seriously worried that Hope would abandon them.

I didn't know whether I should show her Glory's body - doves do seem to mourn their dead -and I thought she might go off looking for him if she didn't know he was dead. So, in the end decided to put him on the hedge. She came out of the nestbox, but if she saw him she gave no sign and flew to the house roof, relieved herself, then flew down to the lawn, had some food, a quick drink and then back to the nest box - again ignoring, or not seeing, the body on the hedge.


I then removed him and gave him a little funeral, like I do to all my dead doves. Call me eccentric if you like, but I put pretty spring flowers on his body, hiding the worst of his wounds, and carried him over to the island on a flat woven basket. I did shed tears then - it all seemed so unnecessary - out of 40 odd doves, why poor Glory? I stroked his snow white feathers, humming 'All Things Bright and Beautiful' like I always do. Then I put him in the fast moving river to be swept away forever. R.I.P. Glory, my beautiful daddy dove.

I was going away that afternoon for the night, but there was nothing more I could do anyway, except make sure my husband kept an eye out for Hope. What will be, will be, I kept saying to myself as I drove down to West Sussex to visit my mother. Later that evening my husband rang to say that while he oiled the wood table and chairs in the garden, the hawk had made two more attempts on the doves - maybe I'd disturbed it with Glory and that's why not much of him had been eaten. Maybe it was still hungry and that's why it tried again. Both times my husband yelled and threw something at it, and both times the doves got away. It is worrying that the hawk is bold enough to swoop down on the doves even when someone is in the garden - I am a bit concerned about my little dog too! He's only the size of a large rabbit.

I didn't know if one parent dove could rear the squabs on it's own and emailed two dove blokes that I know - one, Bob Friar http://www.everlastingdoves.co.uk/ (see previous blogs) and two, a man called Dave Frost who sells, or did sell, info about doves from ebay, and kindly gives his email address for advice. Both of them were good enough to email back, and I was relieved to hear that one parent dove will rear the squabs alone, and is often successful in doing so.

Bob also told me that Belle - the dove I took back to him (see previous blogs) - has now hatched a new batch of eggs herself and has babies that are approx a week old. I was happy to hear that news.

Currently, all seems well, and Hope is coping, but I am trying not to have any expectations of what will happen next. The only thing I can do for her is to make sure food is readily available.

At my sister's - my elderly mother lives with her - we were walking round her garden and I found a white egg on the grass underneath her big holly tree. I picked it up and it was cold but heavy and only slightly cracked on the top. She was horrified that I decided to open it up, but I am interested in birds and have never had the opportunity before. I cracked the shell away carefully - the poor little minute baby bird inside was seemingly perfect but dead of course. I think it was a wood pigeon - she has lots in the garden, and it had the same shape of beak as the baby doves have. I pondered on why this egg had been turfed out of the nest - poor little thing, it didn't even get a chance at life. It must be better to have some time alive, as a bird, to be free.... even if you do end up in the vicious claws of a predator.

You know the signs that you see on old doors sometimes - No Hawkers? Well, I wish I could get one for my garden - NO HAWKS!

Hope, today, stretching her wings in the dovecote.

The end

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