Pigeon Talk

[Qwerty3159]

In my experience hens have stopped feeding the squabs early on (generally only during the 'pigeon milk' stage) and the cocks have pumped until fledging. I always figured it was so her body could recover before laying the next round of eggs.

That makes sense, with most of my pairs the hen still contributes but it would make sense that’s what occurred this time.

Thing is I actually have a cockbird that is really good about feeding random babies, (if you remember a few weeks back I had a cock with babies get sick) and he helped me out, but he wasn’t able to help me with this one this time.

One question: should I limit the squab’s water intake? I made sure the seeds I fed him last night were moistened and let him sip some water out of a spoon. He has been absolutely chugging water this morning. He was very dehydrated yesterday as evidenced by his purple skin but he looks a lot better. I don’t want to give him too much water though…

 

[sourland]

Maybe a good long drink after each feeding? I'm not sure about this. My roller cocks were all good feeders. I would put all fully fledged squabs on the loft floor, and when I would feed there would be a 'feeding frenzy' with cockbirds feeding any and all squabs. No problem with scalping either. I could not have done this with my homers.

 

[Qwerty3159]

Maybe a good long drink after each feeding? I'm not sure about this. My roller cocks were all good feeders. I would put all fully fledged squabs on the loft floor, and when I would feed there would be a 'feeding frenzy' with cockbirds feeding any and all squabs. No problem with scalping either. I could not have done this with my homers.

I think a good drink after feeding is reasonable. I gave him a big drink this morning because his crop wasn’t totally emptied, which I expected since he was practically starved beforehand.

That sounds like a dream. I have one homer cock that I can trust to feed random squabs but his instincts weren’t kicking in this time.

The rest, cocks and hen homers, are all scalpers…

 

[sourland]

I think a good drink after feeding is reasonable.

The rest, cocks and hen homers, are all scalpers…

In my experience homers were far more territorial.

 

[Amer]

Picky pigeons WILL NOT eat wet food
They wait by the door anxiously watching as I scoop out the wet food (it stormed yesterday night) and replace it with dry food

Lovebird has no such qualms. She is the size of a pigeon, so pigeon food seems right to her. (She was sort of malnourished as a chick, that’s why she is so tiny. The previous owners thought vegan kitchen scraps were sufficient to feed bantam chicks)

The guineas are also frequent visitors to the pigeons’ “leavings”

 

[Amer]

I swear the pigeons gave me the same expression as a spoiled child watching for someone cut the crust off their bread.

 

[Qwerty3159]

Very wet droppings today from the squab, not nice lumps as the day before. I think I let him have a little tooo much water yesterday.

Thursday night when I brought the squab in his legs weren’t great, but he could definitely walk and even scurry around on the floor, at least when he was frantic for food and water. Today the squab’s legs seem a lot weaker, he’s sitting on his haunches more and can walk a few steps then sits back down. I’m thinking this obviously has something to do with him going from starvation mode to a heavy filled crop, digestion was slow and it took him basically until this morning to get through all the food from Thursday night. So now that he’s much heavier than he was when he came in his legs haven’t caught up.

My question is if this needs to be corrected or if it can be sorted out on its own? The legs aren’t splayed, one leg has one messed up toe but he was walking fine with that Thursday night. He doesn’t have splayed legs or anything, they face forward and the feet sit flat but he spends most of the time on his haunches. Does he need to be put into a full body sling or something to strengthen his legs? I have things like calcium and vitamin powder for reptiles that I could dust on his food if that would help.

 

[Qwerty3159]

Picky pigeons WILL NOT eat wet food
They wait by the door anxiously watching as I scoop out the wet food (it stormed yesterday night) and replace it with dry foodView attachment 3835445
Lovebird has no such qualms. She is the size of a pigeon, so pigeon food seems right to her. (She was sort of malnourished as a chick, that’s why she is so tiny. The previous owners thought vegan kitchen scraps were sufficient to feed bantam chicks) View attachment 3835446
The guineas are also frequent visitors to the pigeons’ “leavings”

That’s a good clean up crew! The only birds I keep at the moment are pigeons so I had to do away with wire floor coops, the wasted seed was just attracting way too many rodents. I didn’t mind the chipmunks and squirrels that habituated themselves to come running when they heard me feeding the pigeons, but the rats are what put me over the edge.