We Have Pigeon Eggs

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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My pleasure. :smiley:

Boxing Day here – never heard of much about Boxing Day until I left the US – and new photos are loaded. The squabs are 32 and 31 days old today and enjoying their new flying abilities. The whole family sleeps here at nght. Like Sammy before them, these squabs enjoy staying on the concrete edge near the flower box, like real cliff birds, Marty especially. The parents are trying not to feed them now, often running away with the squabs chasing after them squealing. I guess to encourage them to go find their own food. They’ll still break down feed them if they get cornered. And I’ve not seen either squab fool with the water, although the wide did see Katie jump in and take a bath once. They’re out pecking around the balcony right now.

Here are the photos:

From left, Katie and Marty, aged 20 and 21 days, Monday, December 15. Still a lot of yellow baby fuzz on the head.

And two days later. You can see how white Katie is underneath, as well as her white “shoulders.” Up in the flower pot in back you can see the remnant of one of the eggshells that one of the squabs popped out of. The other shell got trampled into the nest, but I moved this one up into that pot.

One from the 18th, aged 24 and 23 days. Their yellow baby fuzz is fast disappearing.

Last Friday, aged 25 and 24 days. Another one from the same day shows Katie lying with her wings at an odd angle; they’re getting a bit big by now to be squashed in the nest together.

Then last Saturday, Marty, age 26 days, on an early venture outside the box. There’s that eggshell again.

A nice shot from Sunday, after we’d cleaned the balcony, age 26 and 27 days.

Then here’s a good face-front shot from Tuesday, age 28 and 29 days. Hangin’ out the same day; again, you can see how white Katie is underneath, and she is as soft as she looks. Another shot from the same day, and you can see Marty’s little feathery “stockings”; Tammy had those, as well.

And finally Wednesday, Christmas Eve. Here they are 29 and 30 days old. Here, here and here, they are getting in touch with their inner cliff bird. And later back in the box, with Marty looking quite sleepy.

And again, you can see all of the photos of this batch on one page here. Click on individual ones to enlarge.

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Monday morning in Thailand, and Marty is 35 days old, a full 5 weeks. Katie is 34 days. They’re still spending much of the day away (out there now, though) but sleeping here at night. Last night, Little Pidgee stayed somewhere else, leaving Big Pidgee with the kids. This is the first time since her four-day disappearance that she stayed elsewhere, but I saw her and Big Pidgee together this morning out on the window frames.

Little Pidgee may be tired of being hassled by the kids. The squabs still want to be fed even though they’re out looking for their own food now. They will chase squealing after a parent while the parent looks like it’s running for its life. Yesterday, Katie was so intent on running after Dad that she bonked right into a flower pot. Very comical. After a brief pause she resumed the chase.

We’re flying upcountry for a few days tomorrow evening, so we’ll put out extra water containers. They really seem to appreciate the water, Big Pidgee especially. The first thing he does almost every time he arrives is take a big, long drink from the water dish. He stopped by this morning with the squabs flying in right after him. He ran quickly to the water dish to get some, but he wasn’t quick enough. Marty and Katie were all over him, wings flapping, squealing up a storm. He finally relented when they got him cornered and gave at least Katie a little feeding that I saw before he saw an out and escaped.

The squabs will possibly be gone when we return from our trip. :frowning:

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They’re really growing up fast!

Have a great trip!!

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Tuesday morning, and Katie’s a full 5 weeks old now, 35 days. Marty is 36 days. I finally saw them taking a bath in the water dish this morning. Well, I saw Katie taking a bath; Marty had obviously just gotten out, as he was lying on his side next to the water dish with wing extended up into the air, drying off. Little Pidgee stayed somewhere else again last night, Big Pidgee here. But Little Pidgee was around this morning.

We fly out this evening and don’t know if the squabs will still be here when we return. As I said before, we’ll put out extra water, and possibly there’ll be some new eggs out there when we return. I’m sure the parents will enjoy the peace and quiet while we’re gone.

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Back in Bangkok. We returned home during the lunch hour today (Sunday). No pidgees around and no new eggs :(, but the balcony looked a little dirtier. One water dish empty, the other two still had water; we figure maybe all of the water splashed out of the one during baths.

Then in the afternoon, Little Pidgee and Marty stopped by and seemed surprised to see renewed human activity here. Left before long. Almost 10:30pm now, and only Big Pidgee showed up for the night. He’s out there now. Will see if anyone else shows up tomorrow.

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I hope Little Pidgee is alright! Not so worried about the kids, they have to leave anyway, but the original pair is special.

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She’s around. We saw her and Marty briefly in the afternoon. She stopped staying here a couple of days before we left, but even then we’ve spotted her in the daytime. Dunno why she’s decided to sleep elsewhere. Big Pidgee is out there on his own right now.

Oh, I almost forgot. Before we left Tuesday afternoon, We watched the squabs flying around with Big Pidgee. Or we thought it was with him at first, but no, they were chasing him to be fed. We saw them all land in the parking lot of the Chinese-Thai temple below and chase after Dad to be fed. He ran, then he flew back to the window frames on our building, followed by the squabs, whom we could hear squealing as they all flew past. Poor Big Pidgee, he had quite a chore to shake them once they started flying. :smiley:

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[quote=“chowder, post:11, topic:449131”]

Rats carry disease. Pigeons don’t:

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I have to say that bird flu has become endemic in Thailand, but the risk seems quite small. Almost all of the victims in this country have had something to do with chicken-raising.

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Wednesday morning here. Since we returned from the Northeast on Sunday, we’ve seen Marty and Little Pidgee only the one, brief time on Sunday afternoon. No sign at all of little Katie.

But Big Pidgee still stays here every night, all alone. He’ll show up shortly before nightfall and stay glued to the same spot until daybreak. We’re wondering if Little Pidgee may have laid her eggs somewhere else. :(. It’s a possibility, because while Big Pidgee will leave here at daybreak, he keeps returning for water in the morning, but then we don’t see him again after about 11 or 11:30am. He could be taking his shift somewhere. But we never see Little Pidgee come here for water, and it seems like she would. We’re usually not both here all day, though.

Just after 11:30am here now, and Big Pidgee left a little while ago. He sat on the rail and then in the dining-area window frame looking all around, especially up. Maybe searching for his woman? Then he flew up to the balcony above us. Hmmm, I think, those people also have another home and are often not here, so maybe that’s where a new nest is? But looking out the window, I could see Big Pidgee siting on the edge of that balcony, looking upward in the same searching manner. Then he flew away. So I don’t think that’s where Little Pidgee is.

Well, we did see Little Pidgee on Sunday, so I’m sure she’s okay. Will let you know if anything develops.

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Friday morning, and we had a small scare on Wednesday night. Big Pidgee seemed ill! He would sit on his usual bedtime perch, but instead of sort of hunkering down, he stood up straight – well, straight for a pigeon – and kept sort of convulsively moving his throat, like he had something stuck in it. The wife told me that before I arrived home, he’d stood on the floor and stared in for the longest time, not his usual behavior. She actually wondered if he might be asking for help! His shit looked odd, too; I can’t really explain it, but it looked a different color and texture.

Then the next morning, we looked out at daybreak, and instead of him being on his perch, he was on the floor near the flower box, doing that throat thing again. Funny-looking shit around him. I started to open the balcony door to see what he would do if I started to go out, in case I needed to stick him in a box and take him to a vet, but he jumped up and ran behind a flowerpot, so we left him alone. He left shortly after that, leaving some more funny shit behind him.

Then later that morning I spotted Little Pidgee and both squabs briefly over on the window frames, just before they flew away. Then Big Pidgee returned and seemed all better. He hung around, but he was acting his old self again. Then Little Pidgee appeared, and he went into a eally frantic mating dance, only I didn’t see them do it. She ended up flying away and he after her. But I wonder now if his “illness” had anything to do with a DMS (deadly semen backup, as we called it in high school).

He’s fine now. He was out there most of the morning. Very windy today, as it often is in the “cool” season, and he may have been hanging out until that died down some. I was out in the bars last night, but the wife said he acted fine. Occasionally, people here will poison pigeons in large parks when they get too numerous, and I was a little worried that maybe he’d gotten ahold of something like that, although there are no very large parks nearby. Plus bird flu is endemic here, so a sick bird on our balcony is not a comforting thought, although I don’t believe any cases – locally, at least – have been linked to pigeons.

We’re going to change out the flower box this weekend – Big Pidgee was hanging out a little in the present one this morning, so it’s still in use – and I have a few last photos of the latest batch I took before leaving upcountry for New Year’s that I’ll post soon.

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Not to hijack, but… :dubious: You have a very understanding Mrs. Siam.

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I can’t believe I have just read 8 pages of pigeon family news but I have, in one sitting (I was having a “mental health day” and needed a distraction)!

I don’t know how I ever missed in the first place but I’m kind of glad I did.

Reading it in one ‘fowl swoop’ made the whole thread read like an epic Victorian novel.

Siam Siam thank you for letting these feathered friends become such a part of your life and thank you for sharing it all with us. I sooooooo want a pigeon family now.

The closest I have is my bird feeder where I watch the sparrows chit-chat and queue for food and my current obsession watching caterpillars becoming Monarch butterflies (I’m sure the caterpillars think I’m a creepy stalker").

This honestly is my favourite thread ever. :slight_smile:

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And of course, “deadly semen backup” would be DSB and not DMS. No, I’m not dyslexic; I was just still a bit groggy from having crawled in at 3:30 in the morning. Yes, the wife keeps me on rather a long leash. She lets me out to play, and I try not to abuse the privilege. :smiley:

I am flattered. Thank you. :o

Whatever was wrong with Big Pidgee on Wednesday night, he’s definitely over it. Still sleeps here every night. When the wife returned home yesterday (Friday) while I was out, she saw a bunch of twigs scattered around the flower box. Big Pidgee arrived before dark and started fooling with them but did not put them back in the box. The wife said it was almost like he was thinking of building a nest on the ground. Not sure how the twigs got out there. It would seem odd for the pidgees to do it, and while it’s been windy lately, the box is fairly protected from the wind. But it was so windy last night that we could not leave the windows open like we like when we sleep, but rather had to close them and run the air. It gets like that this time of year, and even now, almost 8:30am, I can hear the wind whistling through the building stairway outside our door. So maybe they did blow out.

Ah ha! And now I look over, and there’s Big Pidgee out there fooling with the twigs now. Yes, he’s just picking them up and putting them back down. I hope he doesn’t go to too much trouble, because we are changing the box this weekend.

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Well, we figured out what’s been happening to the twigs. Big Pidgee is throwing them out! He tosses them out, then fools around with them on the floor. It almost looks like he’s trying to clean the shit off of them, the way he runs his beak across them. We’re wondering if he’s taking them to a new nest somewhere, because he flew off with one. Just to the balcony above us, but he didn’t go into the balcony, just sat on the edge and finally just dropped it out of his beak onto the ground far below, so that’s not where a new nest is, if there is one.

But with Little Pidgee barely coming around to us anymore, we’re thinking they may have scoped out a new nesting site. :frowning: Well, rats! If that’s true. No more squabs? Maybe it was me picking up this last batch that was the final straw for Little Pidgee. :smiley: Anyway, Big Pidgee still seems to want to sleep here at night, so I guess we’ll still have him anyway. And we’ll still change out the flower box today. If Little Pidgee has not yet laid her eggs anywhere, maybe a fresh, clean flower box will entice her back.

Katie stopped by yesterday (Saturday), aged 46 days! First time we’ve seen her in I guess 11 days, except for that briefest of glimpses I had of the squabs with Little Pidgee earlier in the week. She’s getting big. The white “mask” on her face has spread some across her head.

Will have to post those final photos I mentioned before in the next few days.

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I’m gonna miss the pidgee journal if they move away. :frowning:

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Me too, but it’s their choice. They’re as free as a, er, bird. But it looks like Big Pidgee wants to stay here, so we’ll still have him. I suspect a domestic squabble, with Little Pidgee wanting to move and Big Pidgee asking why bother. Let’s see how a fresh flower box affects the equation.

I’ve mentioned before that the wife’s niece keeps a pair of doves. The poor things are well cared for in a large cage her family built, but they had to put a in separator, because the two doves hate each other and would always start fighting. Sad to be yoked for life to a creature you hate. Must be like living in a trailer park in Kansas. I like that our pidgees have free will. They’re welcome here as long as they wish to come around.

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Maybe you could collect a bunch of twigs to help Big Pidgee’s love life.

:smiley:

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Maybe another pair would move in. I vote for a fresh flower box, even though Little Pidgee seems to have, er, flown the coop. It’s obviously a prime site.

Maybe a few bread crumbs strewn about?

Do pigeons mate for life? Maybe Big Pidgee can get another mate. Or keep two households?

I’m still going to keep this thread bookmarked. But I’d miss it if there aren’t regular batches of squabs.

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Yes??