Pigeons - why, where, how, what?!

Factual Questions
1

Pigeons.

I was reading a Cecil post about them which left me with questions (happens all the time, bless him).

http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_015a.html

I live in the centre of the world’s pigeon capital, London, and only need to look out of my window to see at least half a dozen of them. I think every city I’ve been to seems to have them, including the Asian cities I’ve visited.

Cecil’s reply says city pigeons are descended from North African cliff-dwelling pigeons and that most are feral, so they have gone back to the wild after being domesticated.

Why were they domesticated in the first place? I’ve heard of homing pigeons and pigeon-fancying (I know pretty much what the former’s about, not the latter - maybe I don’t want to know!).

Are these all these city pigeons the same species, descended from a single domesticated stock? If they’re the same species what was their mechanism for getting to seemingly every city on the planet, including the Americas?

Also, wondering about the little fellas, what’s the range of your average city-dwelling pigeon? Do they have, for example, a territorial area in the city where they like to hang out or do they roam round the whole city? Do they go for day-trips into the countryside or even to other cities?

I also remember reading somewhere about pigeons hopping on Underground (metro) trains and getting off at stops further down the line. It was implied that they were using them to get around the city…! Surely they just accidentally got trapped inside a carriage or went in looking for food?!

Finally, was wondering if they had life mating partners or friends that they congregate with or whether the bunches you see together on ledges are just random assemblages of the greater pigeon community.

I’ve never been so curious about pigeons…wouldn’t call myself a pigeon-fancier, though…

2

Wikipedia is usually good for this type of stuff:

3

Pigeon fancying is breeding pigeons for show/exhibition. But, anyway, in addition to their use as messengers, pigeons were also bred for food.

4

Yes, found lots of stuff on wiki thanks!

It says pigeons were domesticated about ten thousand years ago and were used for communication (homing pigeons) and food. I suspect the “pigeon-fancying” business must have come later when people with too much time on their hands had excess domesticated pigeons.

I guess most urban pigeons must be descended from wayward couriers (“lost in the mail”) or pigeons that were bred for food purposes and that escaped or were otherwise released into the wild.

Maybe some interbred with non-domesticated North African rock pigeons, but that’s me guessing…

5

The question that Wikipedia article doesn’t answer is “when?” In Rome there’s always pigeons hanging around - is that accurate? By what time had the common pigeon spread to every major city in the world?

6

They were raising them for food even before Roman times. Squab (fancy word for Pigeon) was used in both older Egyptian and ancient Chinese dishes. I would guess, but am not certain, that the domestication of Pigeons is similar to that of many other animals in that it occurred and was abandoned by different societies at different times.

Squab wiki

7

Would also be interested to know quite when they became such characteristic of the urban landscape. Does Pliny describe the hordes of pigeons round…er, Trajan’s Column in ancient Rome?

8

They pair up for mating with the same partner from year to year. But, if one of the pair dies, the survivor will find another.

Like all birds and mammals, an individual will have buddies that they’d rather hang around with in preference to others.

neat article

9

It seems unlikely since Pliny the Younger died in 112 AD (it is thought, anyway) whereas Trajan’s Column was not completed until 113 AD. Pliny the Elder is right out.

10

I think you guys are overestimating the domestication of pigeons. Say you’re a cave man, and you find a bunch of pigeons in . . . well pigeon holes. So, you eat a few. Eat some eggs. Later you come back, and it turns out that your predation has had little influence on the pigeon population. Trouble is, your mate says "Don’t bring back any of those damned pigeons! They are tough, and tasteless!

So, you hunt ibex, or some other thing, and ignore pigeons. Then, one day, with no ibex to take home, you stop by the old pigeon rocks. Well, golly gee, all the pigeons are tending their young. “Hmmm,” you say, “now those can’t be all that tough.” So, since they cannot even run away, you grab a couple of dozen, and take them home.

Later your mate asks, “Hey, can you get any more of those itty bitty birds? They are kind of a pain to cook, but they are tender and delicious. What are they, anyway?” “Uh, squabs. Very rare, and difficult to hunt. I’ll probably be out all day looking for more.”

After a thousand years or so, the only real change is building stone towers to make it easier for the pigeons to roost in large numbers, and easier for men to collect the squabs. Then someone noticed the splotched wing pigeon came all the way back to the same nest, even though you chased him away.

Domestication.

Tris

11

It is like this in a lot of ‘domestication’ cases. That was sort of the point I was trying to make with the ‘abandoning and adopting by different societies at different times’ comment. It was just unclear. Sorry about that -

12

What about Rutilius Taurus Aemilianus Palladius and the Column of Marcus Aurelius then?

13

I would be suspicious of any site which claimed to pinpoint the time of domestication. And, let’s not forget that domestication might have happened more than once, and in more than one form. These things tend to be buried in pre-history.

14

The Wiki squab page is pretty much empty. There are big squab farms in South Carolina and California, though.
http://www.palmettopigeonplant.com/squab.html
Palmetto Pigeon Plant sells squab, breeding pigeons, lab pigeons, and silkie chickens.

Pigeon hobbyists compete with each other in homing races. They also compete in breeding for beauty and unusual physical characteristics. There’s pigeon judging at the Indiana State Fair.

My barber has a small flock of white doves. For a fee, he’ll release them at weddings and such. Then they fly back home.

15

I think you should all know that the word pigeon is now nonsense in my head, through repetition in this thread.

pigeonpigeonpigeonpigeonpigeonpigeonpigeonpigeonpigeon :stuck_out_tongue: