wood pidgeon life span
 

Hi
My wife wants to know how long do they live and how often they mate and rear
their chicks each year
TIA

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...


As to how often they mate; IME (from keeping them), males think of
little else but sex, all year round.

That's not just pigeons though ...

Mary

Janet.

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "DB01" contains these words:

Hi
My wife wants to know how long do they live and how often they mate
and rear
their chicks each year

Most pigeons lay only two eggs at a time, which produce one male and
one female chick. Because the chicks are fed on regurgitated parental
stomach contents (called "pigeon milk") they mature incredibly fast and
the parents can lay a new brood of 2 every 6 weeks. This is why doocots
used to be a very popular source of all-year meat.

As to how often they mate; IME (from keeping them), males think of
little else but sex, all year round.

Don't we all!(:-)

Alan


Janet.

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "DB01" contains these words:

Hi
My wife wants to know how long do they live and how often they mate
and rear
their chicks each year

Most pigeons lay only two eggs at a time, which produce one male and
one female chick. Because the chicks are fed on regurgitated parental
stomach contents (called "pigeon milk") they mature incredibly fast and
the parents can lay a new brood of 2 every 6 weeks. This is why doocots
used to be a very popular source of all-year meat.

As to how often they mate; IME (from keeping them), males think of
little else but sex, all year round.

Janet.

Many thanx Janet
We started feeding birds last year, mainly sparrows, blue tits, robins etc.
This year a pair of wood pidgeons have built a nest in one tree.
Should we encourage the pidgeons or will they drive all the small birds away

eugene

wood pidgeon life span
 

"DB01" wrote in message
...

We started feeding birds last year, mainly sparrows, blue tits, robins
etc. This year a pair of wood pidgeons have built a nest in one tree.
Should we encourage the pidgeons or will they drive all the small birds
away

No, they're vegetarians. We have several varieties of small birds as well
as collar doves and wood pigeons nesting in out tree - the only suitable one
for some distance. The only birds we discourage are magpies, I've seen them
take fledgling collar doves.

Wood pigeons are beautiful creatures and they feel happily on the ground
with our bantams, sparrows, dunnocks, robins and blackbirds. The tits don't
feed from the ground but they're safe from pigeons of all kinds too.

It's difficult to discourage them in any case :-)

Mary

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Mary Fisher" wrote in message
. net...

"DB01" wrote in message
...

We started feeding birds last year, mainly sparrows, blue tits, robins
etc. This year a pair of wood pidgeons have built a nest in one tree.
Should we encourage the pidgeons or will they drive all the small birds
away

No, they're vegetarians. We have several varieties of small birds as well
as collar doves and wood pigeons nesting in out tree - the only suitable
one for some distance. The only birds we discourage are magpies, I've seen
them take fledgling collar doves.

Wood pigeons are beautiful creatures and they feel happily on the ground
with our bantams, sparrows, dunnocks, robins and blackbirds. The tits
don't feed from the ground but they're safe from pigeons of all kinds too.

It's difficult to discourage them in any case :-)

Mary

Many thanx Mary
you have put our minds at rest
How do you discourage the magpies? We do get a couple trying to enter the
ivy covered poplar that all the small birds live

wood pidgeon life span
 

On 3/8/06 10:58, in article ,
"DB01" wrote:


"Mary Fisher" wrote in message
. net...

"DB01" wrote in message
...

We started feeding birds last year, mainly sparrows, blue tits, robins
etc. This year a pair of wood pidgeons have built a nest in one tree.
Should we encourage the pidgeons or will they drive all the small birds
away

No, they're vegetarians. We have several varieties of small birds as well
as collar doves and wood pigeons nesting in out tree - the only suitable
one for some distance. The only birds we discourage are magpies, I've seen
them take fledgling collar doves.

Wood pigeons are beautiful creatures and they feel happily on the ground
with our bantams, sparrows, dunnocks, robins and blackbirds. The tits
don't feed from the ground but they're safe from pigeons of all kinds too.

It's difficult to discourage them in any case :-)

Mary

Many thanx Mary
you have put our minds at rest
How do you discourage the magpies? We do get a couple trying to enter the
ivy covered poplar that all the small birds live

They're a pest and a pain, handsome though they are. The old country people
used to inject an egg with poison and put it into nests the magpies were
plundering - or shoot them, I'm afraid.
--
Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(email address on website)

wood pidgeon life span
 

"DB01" wrote in message news:XMjAg.66404

How do you discourage the magpies? We do get a couple trying to enter the
ivy covered poplar that all the small birds live

It's VERY difficult. AKA I don't know.

When some were building at the top of our VERY high tree Spouse got a very
long ladder and dismantled the nest. It was built on a hard mud base with
intertwined long twigs and WIRE! I couldn't believe the amount and size of
the lengths of thick gauge wire - as well as wire border fencing and wall
ties. I took a picture but I can't find it now.

We were very concerned because we had a broody sitting on eggs and her
chicks would have been vulnerable, as well as the wild birds.

Spouse wants an air rifle for next year :-(

Mary

wood pidgeon life span
 

On 3/8/06 11:59, in article
, "Mary Fisher"
wrote:


"DB01" wrote in message news:XMjAg.66404

How do you discourage the magpies? We do get a couple trying to enter the
ivy covered poplar that all the small birds live

It's VERY difficult. AKA I don't know.

When some were building at the top of our VERY high tree Spouse got a very
long ladder and dismantled the nest. It was built on a hard mud base with
intertwined long twigs and WIRE! I couldn't believe the amount and size of
the lengths of thick gauge wire - as well as wire border fencing and wall
ties. I took a picture but I can't find it now.

We were very concerned because we had a broody sitting on eggs and her
chicks would have been vulnerable, as well as the wild birds.

Spouse wants an air rifle for next year :-(


I'm sorry to say that I think he's right. We had a very few magpies coming
into the garden which were 'despatched' and we haven't had any this year, x
fingers and we have seen an increase in thrush babies around the place. The
magpies seem to have a favourite spot about 2 miles from here, in open
country, where they nest but I suppose that if their numbers increase,
they're bound to have to search for wider areas to occupy.
--
Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(email address on website)

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Reginald" wrote in message
...
Not long in my garden.

OK
tell me where you live and I'll tell my birds not to go there :)))

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Malcolm" wrote in message
...

In article , DB01
writes
Hi
My wife wants to know how long do they live and how often they mate and
rear
their chicks each year

No-one seems to have answered your first point.

Only about a quarter of the chicks born in a summer will survive the
winter to breed in their first year. Then, roughly one-third will die each
year thereafter. This means that the expected life-span once the bird has
become an adult is only 3-4 years. However, ringing has shown that
individuals can live much longer than that, the record being about 16
years.

If the birds weren't shot, the mortality would go down and their
life-expectancy up.

Janet responded with information about "pigeons" rather than Woodpigeons,
by which I assume she means domesticated birds, descended from Rock Doves.
They are much more fecund than Woodpigeons which can, in theory, manage to
breed three times in a year, but this is rare, most have two clutches and
even then only a small proportion rear young from both broods. Predation
and shooting are the main causes of loss.

The Woodpigeon breeding cycle takes longer than Janet said, too, being
about 7-10 weeks, made up of 2-12 days to build the nest, 3 days to lay
two eggs, 17 days incubation and 20-34 days for the young to fledge, plus
at least another week before they are independent of their parents. The
very variable fledging period is thought to be related to disturbance
which can see the young leave quite prematurely.

--
Malcolm

Wow and thanx
I'm impressed with your depth of knowledge. My wife and I have just seen two
fledglings come out of their nest and be fed by one of its parents. then
lots of wing flapping.
Since I built a conservatory for my wife to sit in, she now watches the wild
life more that the TV.
I've bought books but when you need an answer to a specific point its a lot
easier to use this NG
Thanks to all who responded to my questions

Eugene

wood pidgeon life span
 

In article ,
Malcolm writes:
|
| If the birds weren't shot, the mortality would go down and their
| life-expectancy up.

That is extremely unclear, and might be the converse of the truth. It
will depend very much on how close they are to overpopulation at the
stressful times of year.

It is quite possible that stopping shooting them would cause an increase
in their population, and a consequent increase in their mortality rate
and a reduction in their life expectancy. That is what often happens
to prey species with effectively no predation - as is the case for
wood pigeons in many parts of the UK.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
...

In article ,
Malcolm writes:
|
| If the birds weren't shot, the mortality would go down and their
| life-expectancy up.

That is extremely unclear, and might be the converse of the truth. It
will depend very much on how close they are to overpopulation at the
stressful times of year.

It is quite possible that stopping shooting them would cause an increase
in their population, and a consequent increase in their mortality rate
and a reduction in their life expectancy. That is what often happens
to prey species with effectively no predation - as is the case for
wood pigeons in many parts of the UK.


Are you saying that, for a given ecosystem, only a certain maximum number of
a population of birds can be expected to survive the winter, regardless of
how many more than that number started the winter?

wood pidgeon life span
 

In article ,
"BAC" writes:
|
| Are you saying that, for a given ecosystem, only a certain maximum number of
| a population of birds can be expected to survive the winter, regardless of
| how many more than that number started the winter?

There are circumstances under which that is the case. It is true for
red deer in many parts of the Highlands. I cannot say whether or not
it is true for wood pigeons in the UK.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

wood pidgeon life span
 

"Nick Maclaren" wrote
Malcolm writes:
|
| If the birds weren't shot, the mortality would go down and their
| life-expectancy up.

That is extremely unclear, and might be the converse of the truth. It
will depend very much on how close they are to overpopulation at the
stressful times of year.

It is quite possible that stopping shooting them would cause an
increase in their population, and a consequent increase in their
mortality rate and a reduction in their life expectancy. That is what
often happens to prey species with effectively no predation - as is
the case for wood pigeons in many parts of the UK.

That's the general feeling round here in Norfolk. A couple of decades
back the farmers would have regular organised county-wide woodpigeon
shooting days. That doesn't seem to happen now, and we do have many more
pigeons around. You sometimes see vast flocks of them feeding in fields,
and there are definitely more making a nuisance of themselves in our
garden than there used to be when we moved here in 1980.

--
Sue