Manny and Tammy are 17 and 16 days old now, repectively, and the white is filling in a little more on Tammy’s head. I’ll take a picture tomorrow morning (Thursday morning) before we head out of town and another one when we get back early next week and post them both then.
Another stranger pigeon showed up yesterday while I was away. From the wife’s description, it sounds like the one that accompanied Spotty Head the other day. She said it hopped into the flower box to take a look at the squabs, and she chased it away. This morning, I noticed the silhouettes of three adult pigeons on the curtain as the sun shone this way. Big Pidgee was one of them, but I could not see who the other two were, as all flew away when I opened the curtain. We’re simply not going to allow visitors; they might become roommates! Hope no one new comes around and lays fresh eggs while we’re gone.
We returned home yesterday evening (Sunday evening), and the squabs had noticeably grown a little. Tammy’s face and head are partricularly whiter, and the yellow baby fuzz still sticking out of Manny’s now otherwise dark-gray head gives him a decided punk-rock look.
Here and here are a couple of photos of the squabs last Thursday morning, before we left. In these, Manny is 18 days old and Tammy 17 days.
Then we returned home after three days to find them looking like this and this. In these, Manny is a full 3 weeks old and Tammy 20 days.
And here they are this morning (Monday morning), 22 and 21 days old; Manny is really looking punked out in this one. While I was taking the pictures, Big Pidgee arrived for a morning feeding off camera to the left, and here you can see the squabs’ reaction when they first see and hear him (he was emitting a cooing sound). And one more from today.
The wife and I both think Manny and Tammy are bigger and prettier than their siblings of the first batch, Blackie and Snowy. They’ve yet to leave the flower box yet, although they do stand more often now rather than squat, but when I pull out the camera, they tend to hunch down. I can’t stop petting these guys, they’re so soft, and the wife cannot get much work done at home because she finds it difficult to tear her eyes away from them, they’re so cute. I expect them to hop out of the box maybe sometime this week.
Not much new to report. Manny has lost more of his yellow baby fuzz but still has enough on his head for a punk look. Otherwise, they’re developing about the same as the first batch. They’re 24 and 25 days old now and still in the flower box. Looking back in this thread, I see that Snowy, in the first batch, left the flowerpot at 26 days, Blackie later, so it should be soon for this crew. With the old flowerpot, we thought maybe its depth made it more difficult for the squabs to get out, but with this flower box the dirt in it raises the squabs up, so now all they have to do is make a little hop down to the balcony floor. But they just won’t do it. They’ll look all around, and when a parent arrives they go crazy, squealing and flapping their wings hard, rushing over to the far end of the box, but they just can’t make themselves hop down yet.
I may have spotted Blackie on a nearby window frame this morning. sure looked like it could have been him.
And Manny took the Big Step! Today (Friday), at age 26 days, Manny hopped down from the flower box while I was watching, took a little look around, then hopped back into the box. This was apparently a little too much for Tammy to take, because at the exact moment Manny hopped out, Tammy let loose with a big crap.
Way to go, Manny! I find it interesting he did this at the exact same age – 26 days – that Snowy did it in the first batch, assuming neither one did it before when we weren’t looking. It took Blackie a few days to follow suit; will see how long it takes Tammy.
The parents are acting the same as before at this stage too, flying away if we so much as look at them. When they have the eggs and up until about a week after the squabs hatch out, they’ll stand their ground.
The parents also seem to be preparing to mate again. They have not had actual sex again yet, but they both keep showing up at the same time and indulging in a bit of pigeon foreplay. There’s a bit of kissing going on, and Little Pidgee keeps “grooming” her man around the head area. We’re expecting the mating dance any time now. And Little Pidegee keeps walking around in the dirt of the two small potted trees we have out there. We suspect she’s scoping out a new site for their next nest. We’re going to get a new flower box soon to replace this old one.
BREAKING NEWS! Tammy and Manny have BOTH hopped out of the box! While I was typing the above. Tammy followed her brother out at age 25 days. They’re now scoping out the balcony. Good Tammy!
Just a small update. The squabs are both a full four weeks old now – Manny is 29 days and Tammy 28 days. Manny’s still got a bit of baby fuzz on his gray head, but it’s almost gone now.
It was funny when we cleaned the balcony the other day. I said the squabs had started walking around the balcony last week. Well, I picked up the flower box with them in it and set it over on the other side of the balcony, so I could clean their area. They hopped out and ran back over to their usual side, then stopped and gawked in amazement that their box – the one they had just hopped out of – was no longer there! They seemed stunned that there was no box there to hop back into! Then deciding they needed to get away from the towering monster (me), they both tried to hide behind one of the large potted trees; they could not both fit behind it, so one was standing on top of the other, both scrunched down. The wife was inside watching this and found it hilarious. I finally shooed them back to their box, and the wife said it was very entertaining, like some sort of old silent slapstick film with the squabs running around and past me.
The same as the first batch, they clearly favor their father over their mother, getting noticeably more excited when he appears than when she does. But also as with the first batch, both parents are getting noticeably tired of the kids now that the kids can hop out and swamp them demanding food as soon as they land. The squabs have also been making little half flights across the balcony floor, like they’re practicing. It could also be the parents are trying to entice them to fly, because yesterday they stayed close by on a nearby window frame while the squabs got up on the lower edge of the balcony and seemed to want to fly over to them but just couldn’t make themselves try it.
The parents may have decided to look for a new nesting place. Big Pidgee appeared in our dining-area window yesterday with a twig in his beak, then flew off. No new twigs have appeared anywhere on our balcony. Little Pidgee laid fresh eggs about five weeks after the first batch hatched, so there’s less than a week to go now for new eggs if they keep to that ame schedule. Twig-bearng signals nest-building somewhere. Maybe they got tired of us disturbing them.
The wife returned home yesterday (Tuesday) while I was out and found the balcony empty! The squabs had flown over to the nearby window frames. So at ages 29 and 30 days, they left our balcony for the first time. They’ve also discovered the water dish we keep out there, as both were in it taking a bath yesterday morning.
Today they’ve been wandering around the balcony – they seem full of curiosity – and flew to the window frames and back at least once. They’re resting in the flower box now. Big Pidgee was over on the frames, too, making his little coo-ing sound, like he’s trying to entice them to fly over there. He gave them a feeding on the window frame.
I may have seen Snowy from the first batch this morning, too. A white pigeon sailed past very slowly. Looked like it may have been her, but there are a few white ones around.
Will post new photos in the next few days. These two have turned out very pretty.
Well, I almost thought this saga was about to end. We were disheartened that last night (Thursday night), the squabs disappeared completely! And no parent has stayed here since the squabs were a week old or a little over. So it was our first completely pigeonless night since returning from up North on May 12 and discovering the pigeon eggs in the first place.
But this morning, both squabs and both parents were sitting over on the window frames. The squabs have flown off again somewhere, but now both parents are hanging out on the balcony, including in the flower box. This is heartening, because if Little Pidgee keeps to the same schedule as before, she should be laying some fresh eggs about this coming Sunday or Monday. They were doing some little affectionate stuff, too, although we’ve not seen them having actual sex this time. Still no new nest-building, though, and I saw Big Pidgee flying off to somewhere with a twig some days ago. We were afraid maybe they’d grown tired of our attention and found a more secluded nesting spot. This is now encouraging.
This set of squabs is much more adventurous than the first batch. Without looking back in the thread, I believe it was close to this age that Snowy disappeared only once for about 28 hours and returned completely exhausted, while Blackie did not disappear at all until he was 50 days old, when he up and left for good. Even then, except for that one night for Snowy, they stayed close by until 49 and 50 days; the new batch began flying far off yesterday at ages 31 and 32 days, only a week since hopping out of the nest for the first time.
I may have seen each one once, recently. Not sure it was them. Whether it was or not, they’ve definitely gone off into the world to find their fortune. Which is good, because if the squabs all stayed here, the balcony would soon be covered in pigeons.
Sam,
First time poster, long time lurker to your thread. I cannot believe I’ve become so invested in the plight of 6 pigeons and a couple of apartment dwellers… in Thailand!
It’s been a while with no further comment and I can’t help but wonder… what’s the status of the ant problem. When last you posted about them it seemed as though they’d set up camp in the rectangular pot. Given your aversion to them, I’m betting you somehow got rid of them. Or are they still there?
Did they arrive with the hatching of the squabs? I was thinking that they were eating whatever was left in the egg shells.
Thanks for your comment. The ant problem has lessened but not gone away. Inside the box itself, I don’t see them anymore, so the colony must have died out. They never seemed to bother the birds themselves, and I wasn’t about to spray poison in the box. But they’re still out on the balcony, always in the vicinity of any pigeon droppings. We’ve drowned a good number of them with water with our periodic washing downs. I’ll use a little spray in selected areas the pigeons, especially the squabs, can’t get to, such as on the wall past the rail (there were a lot on the wall last week, but I zapped those). Ants are a sad fact of life in Thailand; I’d almost rather have roaches).
A friend is in town from upcountry this weekend, so I was out late in the bars with him last night, but the wife tells me the squabs stayed away again for the second night in a row. We think maybe the squabs found where the parents sleep at night and are staying with them. But it’s almost noon here now, and the entire family is out on the balcony, parents and two squabs. Tammy seems so curious about everything, wandering around constantly pecking at something new, like “What’s this? What’s this? What’ this? What’s this?” Manny acts a little more cool. It’s funny how each bird has its own personality.
And the squabs have taken to having an occasional bath in the water dish. Always fun to watch.
It’s looking more like the parents are preparing to lay fresh eggs. Big Pidgee stays in the box and seems to be tamping the dirt down from time to time. Odd, but he’s the father; Little Pidgee, the mother, stays on the rail over to the side. It’s almost like the father is preparing the dirt. Also, Tammy was carrying a leaf on a stem in her beak, and later we noticed it in the flower box, so one of the parents must have put it in there; that’s the only nest-building we’ve seen so far this round.
I think new eggs are definitely on the way. Big and Little Pidgee still sleep elsewhere at night, but they keep returning by day to spend time in the flower box. Their behavior is consistent with the previous egg-laying. Little Pidgee acts sort of like she’s in labor, and Big Pidgee is all in attendance to her – guarding her, preening her head feathers. It all looks very sweet. Something seems about to happen. Little Pidgee is very nervous now; if we get too close to the window, she freaks and heads for one of the balcony rails. You’d think she’d be more used to us by now.
The squabs have been staying away at night, too. They did stay here on Saturday night – or so the wife tells me, as I was out until daybreak Sunday morning with my friend from upcountry – but three of the past four nights they’ve been gone. Manny is out there now with ther parents, but Tammy is mysteriously absent. She had been sticking close to her brother, and we last saw her yesterday.
Manny was 5 weeks old yesterday (Sunday, Tammy 5 weeks today. Perhaps their venturing out farther is a result of our petting them. We finally stopped, because they clearly just did not like it and would not get used to it; they seemed to think each time that this is it, they’re going to be eaten now.
It’s just instinct that birds fear larger, potentially predatory creatures. I have had numerous domestic-bred pet birds, currently have three, and even those highly-acclimated-to-humans birds freak out when startled by the large bipeds they live with. In the larger scheme of things, most birds are snackfood for something else and they know it - that skittishness is what keeps them safe in the wild and you just can’t undo 100 million years of experience with a few pats on the head. Actually, birds like to be gently rubbed along the lower jaw, just behind the beak. But short of snatching the biddies out of the nest before their eyes open and handfeeding them yourself (which I don’t recommend) you aren’t going to tame them. That was what was done for my parrots, and if it hadn’t been done they wouldn’t be very tolerant of human touch.
Yes, we finally figured they just weren’t going to conquer their evolutionary programming. It seems pigeons have a love/hate relationship with humans. They seem to like to be around us but freak if we notice them.
Well, this IS Thailand. Very possible.
Another pigeonless night last night (Monday night). The parents are back out this morning in the flower box. No sign of the squabs. No eggs yet.
