#there was a large flock on wild turkeys foraging in the leaves

[neofelis----nebulosa]

Saw a yellow-bellied sapsucker and a pileated woodpecker for the first time today

[downtoearthmarkets]

Imagine the giddy surprise of the first European settlers arriving on the shores of the Eastern United States only to be greeted by flocks of gobbling wild turkeys roaming the forests. No doubt these immigrants to the new land were feeling rather “peckish” after spending long weeks at sea and were only too eager to indulge in the abundant plump poultry that awaited them. Of course, this is the tradition we continue today with turkey being the centerpiece of American Thanksgiving celebrations.   The wild turkey is native to the North American continent having evolved here over 20 million years ago. Native Americans consumed the eggs and meat and used their feathers to stabilize arrows and adorn ceremonial dress. These birds have six distinct subspecies of which the Eastern Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), found in these parts, is the most populous. Having been brought back from the brink of extinction caused by overhunting and habitat loss, wild turkeys are now a common sight in many areas, with unruly flocks earning the “wild” part of their name by making headlines for nuisance behavior in Staten Island and other urban enclaves. The type of bird that we bake and feast on at Thanksgiving is a direct descendent of these “wild” wild turkeys. However, not all domesticated breeds are the same and there are some helpful distinctions to know about when choosing a turkey for the holidays: Conventional/commercial turkey Conventional turkey can be categorized as the kind of poultry selection you’ll find at stores and supermarket chains. These birds are usually mass-farmed in large-scale facilities and have been selectively bred specifically for their ability to produce meat at the lowest possible cost. They are raised indoors and fed a steady diet of soy and corn-based grain feed which is easily synthesized and quickly converted to breast meat.   The Broad Breasted White and Broad Breasted Bronze are the most popular breeds used in commercial turkey farming. However, the Broad Breasted White is widely favored due to its shorter breast bones yielding greater breast meat and an all-white plumage which leaves cleaner looking skin for dressing. In fact, the growing process for Broad Breasted Whites has been so well refined that birds often grow larger than 40 lbs. Conventionally raised turkey meat generally has a more subtle taste than that of heritage turkey which gives it wide appeal. Heritage turkey Heritage means to turkey what heirloom means to tomato, with the two words often being used interchangeably. Heritage turkeys are more closely related to their wild counterparts than the commercial varieties and are the types of birds you’ll find sold in farmers markets this time of year. These turkeys have lived most of their lives outdoors on the farm property with space to roam freely. They have enjoyed a natural diet of foraged food such as acorns, insects and berries sometimes supplemented by feed.   There are other stringent criteria that these types of turkeys must be raised within in order to qualify as heritage breed birds: 1. Naturally mating: Heritage Turkey must be reproduced and genetically maintained through natural mating versus artificial insemination. 2. Long productive outdoor lifespan: Heritage Turkey must live a long productive lifespan while possessing the genetic ability to withstand the environmental rigors of outdoor rearing. 3. Slow growth rate: Heritage Turkey must have a slow to moderate rate of growth.   Heritage turkeys yield less breast meat and grow smaller in size than the commercial, broad-breasted breeds despite having longer production lives. Their meat has a richer, gamier flavor and their well-exercised thighs and wings will benefit from longer, slower cooking times. If you are hoping to enjoy a delicious tasting heritage turkey this Thanksgiving, some of our vendors are still taking orders in time for delivery next week, but may have a more limited selection than earlier in the season. However, if turkey for Christmas is on the table, now is the time to jump in with your order to make sure you get exactly the type of bird you want. Gobble gobble to that!

[theramseyloft]

Pigeon domestication: Feral Pigeons are not wildlife.

There were some inaccuracies in the first post on this topic, so I’m making a new one. A second edition, if you will.

One of my followers once asked me why it was that pigeons in wildlife rehab should be held when other animals should be handled as little as possible.

I misunderstood the crap out of her question! And it took three posts to realize I had!

Injured or orphaned Wildlife in a rehab center need to be handled as little as possible to avoid imprinting onto humans. They need to be able to survive on their own, and developing the habit of asking humans for hand outs will lead it to becoming malnourished at best and get it killed for being a nuisance at worst.

Mammals in particular may be killed on approach as fearless approach of humans by a wild animal is one of the warning signs that it might have rabies, which requires brain tissue to test for.

Pigeons are not wild animals. On principal, imprinting avoidance should not apply to them.

Furthermore, it causes them a lot of harm.

Pigeons are intensely social birds! Nestlings suffer from touch starvation as intensely as a human infant and can be mentally stunted or even out right stress to death from lack of interaction.

More urgently: We are simply not capable of teaching a domestic pigeon peep to survive in the wild.

Pigeons are social and observational learners, with cognition equivalent to a human 5 year old. Like human children, pigeon squeakers are TAUGHT how to be pigeons. 

Their social structure is VERY human like! Their father takes them out on foraging trips (because mom either has or is getting ready to lay the next clutch) and teaches them where to find food, water, and nest materials, what to eat, where to shelter, and how to interact with other pigeons. How and when to defer to the status of older established flock mates to avoid a fight and how and when to stick up for themselves to make sure they get their fair share of resources.

Songbirds and nearly all other columbids kick their kids out as soon as they are self feeding and they either make it or they don’t. Their parents will chase them out if they come back.

Feral Pigeons only leave their families if the flock has grown too large for local resources to support. 

Truthfully, orphaned feral pigeons do not belong in wildlife rehab at all. Pet shelters should be set up for them. 

Feral Pigeons are not wild animals. Imprinting avoidance should not apply to them any more than it should apply to an orphaned puppy.

Feral puppies don’t get raised among fox kits or coyote or wolf pups at a wildlife rehab and sent out for release “into the wild”.

Seriously. Take a moment to consider the following scenario:

A shelter gets an orphaned or injured puppy. They bottle feed it until it can reliably feed itself, heal it’s injuries, and clean out its parasites.

And then they return that just weaned, newly healthy puppy to the alley from whence it came.

How many of you, of you actually saw this happen, or heard the plan for the puppy’s release, would not be INSTANTLY concerned for its well being?

How many of your guts just clenched at the thoughts that flooded your minds of it getting hit by a car? Going hungry enough to have to eat garbage? Getting into something poisonous or sharp? Dying because it was left alone with no shelter or resources in a hostile environment?

How many of you, upon hearing that that puppy was going back into the street, would protest that it needs a home? That it’s a pet? That it’s helpless? That it’s most likely to die if it’s released?

What would your reaction be if that rehab brushed all of those aside by pointing out that there are adult strays eating garbage and dodging cars, and they’re fine?

How many of you would get upset? How many would protest that those strays aren’t healthy? That they are skinny, full of parasites, visibly sick, and limping from old wounds?

How would you react if that rehabber looked you dead in the eye and said “Those are wolves and they should be free.”

What if, at all shelters, only purebred puppies, or puppies with obvious fancy traits were put up for open adoption, and all mutts were “released” back onto the street, with all offers to adopt them turned down because they were born outside? What if you could only request to take home a mutt puppy if it lost the use of a limb and was deemed unreleasable?

This happens to pigeons every day, and they are no less domesticated than dogs are.

Dogs have been traveling with humans since the time when there were several species of human!

But pigeons have been with us since our settlements became permanent, and that relationship is nothing to sneeze at!

Do you know why doves have the religeous significance they do?

Because of the Wild Rock Dove, which is to domestic pigeons what the wolf is to domestic dogs.

Rock Doves are cliff nesters native to Turkey, India, the northernmost coast of Africa and southern Europe, who live only in very specific locations: Seaside cliffs on the edge of deserts.

They are grain eaters that need to drink a certain amount of fresh water every day.

If you were lost in the desert, finding a Rock Dove would save your life, if you could keep it in sight. 

During the day, it would lead you to water because it can’t go a day with out. 

At night, it would lead you back to safe, habitable shelter. After all, if there are predators or noxious gas in abundance, the Rock Doves couldn’t live there either.

It’s true that pigeons were initially domesticated for meat, but the Rock Dove’s bond to a specific home site and the unerring navigation that returned them reliably to it every night lead them to being domesticated more like dogs than any other livestock.

Pigeon holes are really easy to make. It’s just an even opening in a mud or stone wall deep enough for a fully grown bird to be completely sheltered and wide enough for two pigeons to build their nest and raise two peeps in.

Babies could be collected from the wild at around two weeks of age, feathered enough to thermoregulate and just starting to wean from pigeon milk to seed. At this age, they could be moved into the man made pigeon holes and hand fed until they could feed themselves.

It would be three to four weeks before they began to be really capable of flight, so the man made dovecote became the Home site onto which the babies imprinted to just as much as their handler.

If the keepers were smart, they brought home a group of babies, because rock doves are social with a cooperative family structure.

If taken at the right ages, that group formed a mini flock, just big enough to watch each others backs and their surroundings on foraging trips farther and farther afield. 

When pigeons take mates from another flock, the pair decides which family to join based on the security of the nest site and availability of resources, so pigeons from a man made dovecote always had the advantage of superior security. New mates came home with the tamed peeps and learned by observation that the human care takers were harmless protectors.

If the farmer was smart, they’d only harvest meat or eggs sparingly and at night so that the pigeons would not associate the human with being preyed upon.

Because pigeons could go out and forage for themselves and be trusted to return, the farmer didn’t have to feed them, and a person could not be too poor to own pigeons.

Not only were they live stock that fed themselves and brought more birds back with them, the guano of a well fed pigeon is one of the most nutritious fertilizers on earth!

If you want crops to grow in a desert landscape, moist pigeon guano worked into the ground will work wonders!

Pigeon guano eventually became so highly prized that people who could afford to hired armed guards to protect their cote!

We kinda ALWAYS knew about pigeon navigation, but the Greeks and Romans wrote a LOT about their use as messengers.

Messengers were not just any domestic pigeon! Speed and navigational accuracy were the traits their lines were selected for exclusively, so these were expensive specialty birds, especially beloved by the well-to-do and the military.

Every fort and palace had a cote for messenger pigeons so that they could recieve the most urgent of messages in situations where a human runner was just not fast enough.

Royal emissaries and platoons of soldiers out on a mission were sent with a supply of birds from that palace or fort so that if they needed to get a message out, they could send it by the fastest carrier over the straightest path.

Pigeons continued to be used in the messenger capacity until only about 50 years ago. 

During this time when every one depended on them for swift communication, EVERY ONE loved and revered pigeons!

Their diversity so inspired Charles Darwin that he did a TON of his genetics research using them as models! And pigeons were so beloved by Victorian England that his editors tried to twist his arm to write a book entirely about pigeons instead of what became the Origin of Species!

When Eugenics began to fascinate the European well to do and dog shows came to be, pigeon varieties also blossomed! 

There were pigeons all over the world at this point, and different regions had so many different ideas of what shape and color and pattern made a beautiful Pigeon! While some valued the appearance, others valued a unique areal performance or a more musical singing voice.

There are at least as many distinct breeds of pigeon now as there are of dog! I have heard that there are more, possibly even considerably more, but I don’t know enough about dog breed diversity to say for certain whether or not those assessments are accurate.

We have taken pigeons EVERYWHERE with us! And when we loved and took care of them, everybody benefited.

But about 50 years ago was when technology caught up with and surpassed the speed of pigeon borne messages, and pigeons were slower with more expensive upkeep.

As previously stated, the military were not the only people who loved pigeons.

But a LOT of the people who kept them after the military phased them out in the US were immigrants and people of color. 

It was a status symbol not to need gardens or farms or livestock, so pigeon coops became associated largely with poor neighboorhoods and immigrants. 

As pigeons fell out of favor, and more and more ferals started living on the closest thing to a comfortable environment: Buildings. 

As they were fed by fewer and fewer people and had access to less and less grain, it became more common to see the white streaked splatters of the pure uric acid that pigeons excrete on an empty stomach.

Uric acid eats stone, concrete, asphalt, and especially metal.

Feral Pigeons thus became linked to property damage, and the smear campaign that coined the description “Rats with wings” ( http://www.audubon.org/news/the-origins-our-misguided-hatred-pigeons ) and linked them with filth and disease was the final blow to the public’s esteem for this animal that has been our partner and companion through THOUSANDS of years of history.

That description of pigeons was all it took to turn thousands of years of adoration and respect into knee jerk revulsion. 

Add the fact that domestication favors year round reproduction, and 50 years later, the feral population of pigeons is staggering. 

Millions are spent to kill them off and drive them out using everything from poison to spikes to nets, tar, traps, and fines levied on the kind souls that recognize their hunger and feed them.

The Street Pigeon Project spearheaded in Germany has found that the most effective way to decrease the feral population and minimize the damage they cause to buildings is to, get this: Take FUCKING CARE OF THEM!!!

They built a big, comfortable rooftop loft with lots of nesting spaces, provided a good mix or grain, seed, legumes, and calcuim, and swapped out the eggs with fakes.

The unrestrained, non-coerced feral pigeons spent 80% of their time in that loft, only leaving to stretch their wings.

It was more comfortable than the awnings, eves, attics, and signs that had been the best nesting grounds available, so they left! 

With no need to range out to look for food, they didn’t go very far.

On full bellies, with good food, their poo wasn’t just pure uric acid anymore!

With eggs swapped out as they were found, reproduction decreased by 95%!

And the best part? It cost SO much less to house and feed the ferals than it did to try to exterminate them!

That’s not even scratching the surface of the OTHER benefits that could be extended from that project!

Pigeon eggs are edible! Even if the thought squicks out people and they can’t be regulated, animals can eat pigeon eggs too. They could be donated to wild life rehabs and animal shelters.

A street pigeon project could partner with community gardens to clean the lofts and keep the fertilizer they gather. THEY could also use the eggs to compost!

Cleaning the loft could also count as community service!

Pigeons did not invade cities. We abandoned them there, after they helped us coordinate building and connecting them.

They are, in every sense of the words, abandoned, forgotten sky puppies.

And they deserve to be treated with the same concern and compassion as every other lost pet.

Adult ferals would be more hurt than helped by capture, but they should have the option of a safe place to go to be fed and cared for, and weaned babies deserve to go to loving homes.

I know there are too many to home right now and that isn’t feasible for rehabs that get hundreds of them, but where rehoming isn’t an option, they should at LEAST be acclimated in a group with supplemental feeding until they find their way in the world.

Pigeons were made what they are by us. They were abandoned by us. 

Everything we complain about regarding pigeons are traits WE intentionally bred into them! And we inexplicably treat *them* like the invaders after abandoning them the second they were no longer deemed useful. 

We even forgot that the pidge we see every day on the street are domesticated birds! 

They are literally stray dogs with wings!

It’s time we remember that relationship and remind other people.

And please, please… be kind to the Sky Puppies. 

They deserve to be loved again.

[josephkitchen0]

Bigger Lambs, Moving Sheep North to Alaska, and Much More from sheep! Magazine

Our January/February 2019 issue of sheep! is NOW AVAILABLE, featuring stories on bigger lambs, moving sheep North to Alaska, and much more! Learn why this magazine is the leading source for sheep information for the modern flockmaster seeking to raise sheep for profit or personal use.

Some of our readers have two or three wool sheep that they shear so they can spin the wool and use it themselves. Others own large commercial flocks whose meat and milk they sell all over the world. And still others are somewhere in between. The one thing they have in common is that they all need help solving the inevitable problems that arise when sheep farming. And so we give it to them critical sheep information every issue! You’ll quickly discover that sheep! makes your life better no matter what your interests are, no matter how many sheep you own, and no matter how long you’ve been raising them.

In this issue of sheep!:

Bigger Lambs, Without Drugs & Drudgery By Patrice Lewis Wool from Norway is justifiably famous for its fineness and beauty. But for sheep to produce wool, they must start as lambs. And lambs, as every farmer knows, often have a rough start in life. Those entrusted with raising sheep must be attentive and proactive about the issues they face. As with any baby mammal, lambs require colostrum — and this can be a problem with sheep if the mother rejects the lamb or the lamb has difficulty nursing.

Bladesmen Afoot, A Fine Day Shearing the Leyden Glen Flock By Kristen Nicholas “Shearing day was in mid-November at my brother-in-law’s dairy farm, where we have our shearing and lambing shed for our sheep operation. Our shearer, Kevin Ford, usually has Gwen Hinman come from New Hampshire to our Massachusetts farm to help with the shearing of our 200 head white faced flock. But this year’s shearing day saw Jeff Burchstead from Wiscasset, Maine and Doug Rathke from Hutchinson, Minnesota drop in to join Kevin for a day and a half of blade shearing.

Sheep are stupendous! sheep! is the leading source for the sheep information you need to keep your flock healthy and profitable. Subscribe Now!

Dual Coat Dynamics, Part Two: A Harvest’s Uses By Jacqueline Harp The differences in characteristics and uses of the outer and inner coats can be extreme. Comparing an outer coat to an inner coat can be like comparing a tailored vest to a fluffy sweater; a horse blanket to a baby blanket; ship sails to a wedding shawl. Non-woven uses of these fibers (i.e., outside their use as yarn), can be explored to better understand their potential markets.

North to Alaska! By Yates Colby & Bill Marion St. Croix sheep tend to conjure images of warm Caribbean islands and sandy beaches. Recently, a group of St. Croix sheep made the long journey north to the 49th state to establish the very first breeding flock of St. Croix sheep in Alaska. Blood Sweat & Food Farms (BSF) is based in Homer, Alaska and is dedicated to growing naturally raised, healthful livestock and produce to share with the local community. The farm raises heritage breed Tamworth hogs, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, and rabbits, as well as growing vegetable crops year-round.

Frontier Island Polypays, A Small, Unlikely Start-Up Growing Fast By Alan Harman The Polypay sheep of Sugar Island on America’s remote northern frontier are thriving, along with a Cleveland couple who six years ago jumped into farming at the deep end. Jeff and Rebecca Franks never expected to be farmers.

More Sheep Farming Information in the January/February 2019 issue of sheep!:

• Scribblings: Our Daily Harvest, Whispered Profits • sheep! Photo Contest • Meeting of Minds ~ Are There Really Hundreds of Sheep Breeds? ~ Fewer Hired Ag Laborers in 2018; Hourly Earnings Grew ~ Gain Sheep Skills Fast: Indianhead Small Ruminant Clinic ~ Replying to a “Cry Wolf” Story ~ Ten Years of Big Advances with U.S. Scottish Blackface Breed ~ Michigan Shepherds Weekend: Your Sheep Can Earn More Pay ~ Hair Sheep Advancement in South Central Region of the U.S ~ Political Actions Affecting World Sheep Prices and Movement ~ Dry Times Leave Only Hardiest Hair Breed Ewes for Brood Stock ~ Cheaply Lengthening Pasture’s Green Reserve — New Developments • Hair Sheep Reports • Sheep May Safely Graze: Wolves Show Up, Now What? • Wool Gatherings • Price Reports • sheep! Bookstore • Poor Will’s sheep! Almanack • News Bleat ~ St. Croix Stomach Juices that Fight Worms ~ Millennials Raising Demand for Sheep Meat & Wool ~ Offshore Sheep Meat Slowly Taking Over U.S. Market Share ~ Rising U.S. Rug Buying Lifts Corriedale Demand ~ Congressmen Signal Contempt for Disaster Livestock Aid Recipients ~ PETA Stands Idly By Cruelty to Gin Up Anti-Wool Donors ~ Finewool Jammies Induce Deeper, Quicker, Better Sleep ~ “Extinct” Wild Red Wolves Still Breeding ‘Yotes in Texas? ~ New Forage Cultivar To Keep Up Gains On Summer-Parched Land ~ Wool Pillows Offer Better Sleep • sheep! Breeders & Classifieds

ON THE COVER:

“A Tender, Snowy Welcome,” by Dean and Kari Hyden, at their Shepherd’s Bounty sheep outfit in Chewelah, Washington.

  sheep! magazine delivers thoughtful feature articles and the latest sheep information to make every shepherd more knowledgeable and better able to raise healthy, productive flocks for profit and satisfaction.

Never miss another great issue filled with actionable sheep information for today’s flockmaster. With just a few issues of sheep!, you’ll be well on your way to mastering how to raise sheep.

Subscribe to sheep! magazine today.

Bigger Lambs, Moving Sheep North to Alaska, and Much More from sheep! Magazine was originally posted by All About Chickens

[theramseyloft]

The domestication, rise, and fall of pigeons.

A few corrections have been made, some things have been streamlined, and a bit on the process of genuine domestication has been added. One of my followers on Tumblr once asked me why it was that pigeons in wildlife rehab should be held when other animals should be handled as little as possible. I misunderstood the crap out of her question! And it took three posts to realize I had! Injured or orphaned Wildlife in a rehab center need to be handled as little as possible to avoid imprinting onto humans. They need to be able to survive on their own, and developing the habit of asking humans for hand outs will lead it to becoming malnourished at best and get it killed for being a nuisance at worst. Mammals in particular may be killed on approach as fearless approach of humans by a wild animal is one of the warning signs that it might have rabies, which requires brain tissue to test for. Pigeons are not wild animals. On principal, imprinting avoidance should not apply to them. It actually causes them a lot of harm. Pigeons are intensely social birds! Nestlings suffer from touch starvation as intensely as a human infant and can be mentally stunted or even out right stress to death from lack of interaction. More urgently: We are simply not capable of teaching a domestic pigeon peep to survive in the wild. Pigeons are social and observational learners, with cognition equivalent to a human 5 year old. Like human children, pigeon squeakers are TAUGHT how to be pigeons. Their social structure is VERY human like! Their father takes them out on foraging trips (because mom either has or is getting ready to lay the next clutch) and teaches them where to find food, water, and nest materials. What to eat, where to shelter, and how to interact with other pigeons. How and when to defer to the status of older established flock mates to avoid a fight and how and when to stick up for themselves to make sure they get their fair share of resources. Songbirds and nearly all other columbids (Including domestic Ringneck Doves) kick their kids out as soon as they are self feeding and they either make it or they don’t. Their parents will chase them out if they come back. Feral Pigeons only leave their families if the flock has grown too large for local resources to support. Truthfully, orphaned feral pigeons do not belong in wildlife rehab at all. Pet shelters should be set up for them. A Feral Pigeon is no more wild than a stray puppy. Feral puppies don’t get raised among wolf pups at a wildlife rehab and sent out for release “into the wild”. Seriously. Take a moment to consider the following scenario: A wildlife rehab gets an orphaned or injured puppy. They bottle feed it until it can reliably feed itself, heal it’s injuries, and clean out its parasites... And then they return that just weaned, newly healthy puppy to the alley from whence it came. How many of you wondered what in the hell a *puppy*, a clearly domesticated animal, was doing at a *wild life* rehab? How many of you, upon hearing the plan for the puppy’s release, would not be INSTANTLY concerned for its well being? How many of your guts just clenched at the thoughts that flooded your minds of it getting hit by a car? Going hungry enough to have to eat garbage? Getting into something poisonous or sharp? Being attacked by another animal or dying of disease because it was left alone with no food, water, shelter, or resources in a hostile environment where medical care was not available to it? What would you say to the rehabber planning to put that weaned puppy or healed stray dog back in the street? What would your reaction be if that rehabber brushed all of those aside by pointing out that there are adult strays eating garbage and dodging cars, and they’re fine? How many of you would get upset? How many would protest that those strays aren’t healthy? That they are skinny, full of parasites, visibly sick, and limping from old wounds? Then how would you react if that rehabber looked you dead in the eye and said “Those are wolves and they should NOT be caged.” What if puppies went to wildlife rehab instead of pet shelters, because there *were* no shelters set up for dogs? What if only purebred puppies, or puppies with obvious fancy traits were put up for adoption, and all mutts were “released” back onto the street, with all offers to adopt them turned down because they were born outside? What if you could only request to take home a "special needs" mutt puppy: one that had to be bottle fed, got handled too much, or lost the use of a limb and was deemed unreleasable? This happens to pigeons every day, and they are no less domesticated than dogs are. Dogs have been traveling with humans since the time when there were several species of homanin. But pigeons have been with us since our settlements became permanent, and that relationship is nothing to sneeze at! Do you know why doves have the religious significance they do? Because of the Wild Rock Dove, which is to domestic pigeons what the wolf is to domestic dogs. Rock Doves are cliff and cave nesters native to Turkey, India, Afghanistan, Iraq, the northernmost coast of Africa and southern Europe, who live only in very specific locations: Seaside cliffs on the edge of deserts. They are grain eaters that need to drink a certain amount of fresh water every day. If you were lost in the desert, finding a Rock Dove would save your life, if you could keep it in sight. During the day, it would lead you to water because it can’t go a day with out. At night, it would lead you back to safe, habitable shelter. After all, not all caves are habitable, and if there are predators or noxious gas in abundance, the Rock Doves couldn’t live there either. They thus became known as messengers of God. Pigeons as we know them today are not Rock Doves any more. Genuine Domestication is a process of altering the genetic make up of a species through selective breeding to encourage physical changes in the brain and physiology of that species. It is more than cosmetic changes to the color or even shape of the animal. Selection favoring Neotany (preservation of infant features into adult hood) is the first step in the process of domestication, and those aren't just facial features. They are mostly brain development! The first thing a species loses as it is domesticated is the instinctual fear of humans. Baby animals are curious and adventurous, but as their brain develops, they become more cautious and wary. So we selectively breed individuals who are slow to develop that wariness until they lose it all together, and remain openly curious, fearless, and friendly into adulthood. If you scan the brains of a wolf and a dog, they are physically different, beyond just needing to fit into a different skull shape. The other thing that all domesticated animals eventually lose is reliance on and genetic ties to a breeding season. Wolves, wildcats, Wild Cotton tail rabbits, Jungle Fowl, Rock Doves, and African Collared Doves all have specific breeding seasons that they physically cannot reproduce outside of. But domestic Dogs, cats, rabbits, chickens, pigeons, and ringneck doves can bear young regardless of the time of year. Physical dependence on a breeding season keeps those wild animals from carrying, bearing, and having to feed young during a time of year when food is scarce. A wild mutant that *can* bear young outside of season is likely to die of malnutrition or lose her young to it. Domestic animals have year round access to food and shelter, so there is no environmental pressure that makes bearing and raising young out of season dangerous or detrimental. Mammalian litters get bigger, and heat cycles grow more frequent as less time is needed to recover inbetween than their wild counterparts. For example, wolves whelp an average of three to five pups. Wild rabbits, rats and mice tend to max out around five kits per litter, with three litters a year on average in the case of the wild cotton tail. Domestic dogs and rabbits of average size whelp/kindle 5-8 puppies/kits on average, with litters over ten commonly recorded! I used to breed show rats and my biggest litter by a single doe was 22!!! 18 was my biggest single mouse litter! Litters of 8-10 were average with the wild max of 5 being unusually small. Galliformes (chickens) who naturally lay big clutches laid bigger and bigger clutches, and the columbidae, who can only make two eggs at a time, lay more frequently with less recovery time in between. Domestic animals are physically NOT their wild ancestors any more. We have directly, physiologically changed them, and it cannot be undone with out breeding wild stock back into them. No matter how big a population mixed with how many breeds, NO pack of stray dogs will EVER whelp a wolf puppy, unless wolves are introduced to that dog pack. Like wise, no flock of feral pigeons will ever produce a rock dove. There are NO rock dove populations in North America, South America, Australia, Greenland, or Iceland, so in those parts of the world, it is impossible for any Pigeons to have any hint of wild blood in them. It’s true that pigeons were initially domesticated for meat, but the Rock Dove’s bond to a specific home site and the unerring navigation that returned them reliably to it every night lead them to being domesticated more like dogs than any other livestock. Pigeon holes are really easy to make. It’s just an even opening in a mud or stone wall deep enough for a fully grown bird to be completely sheltered and wide enough for two pigeons to build their nest and raise two peeps in. Babies could be collected from the wild at around two weeks of age, feathered enough to thermoregulate and just starting to wean from pigeon milk to seed. At this age, they could be moved into the man made pigeon holes and hand fed until they could feed themselves. It would be three to four weeks before they began to be really capable of flight, so the man made dovecote became the Home site onto which the babies imprinted to just as much as they did with their handler. If the keepers were smart, they brought home a group of babies, because rock doves are social with a cooperative family structure. If taken at the right ages, that group formed a mini flock, just big enough to watch each others backs and their surroundings on foraging trips farther and farther afield. When pigeons take mates from another flock, the pair decides which family to join based on the security of the nest site and availability of resources, so pigeons from a man made dovecote always had the advantage of superior security. New mates came home with the tamed peeps and learned by observation that the human care takers were harmless protectors. If the farmer was smart, they’d only harvest meat or eggs sparingly and at night so that the pigeons would not associate the human with being preyed upon. Because early pigeons could go out and forage for themselves and be trusted to return, the farmer didn’t have spend or trade to feed them, and a person could not be too poor to own pigeons. Not only were they live stock that fed themselves and brought more birds back with them, the guano of a well fed pigeon is one of the most nutritious fertilizers on earth! If you want crops to grow in a desert landscape, moist pigeon guano worked into the ground will work wonders! Pigeon guano eventually became so highly prized that people who could afford to hired armed guards to protect their cote! We kinda ALWAYS knew about pigeon navigation, but the Greeks and Romans wrote a LOT about their use as messengers. Messengers were not just any domestic pigeon! Speed and navigational accuracy were the traits their lines were selected for exclusively, so these were expensive specialty birds, especially beloved by the well-to-do and the military. Every fort and palace had a cote for messenger pigeons so that they could receive the most urgent of messages in situations where a human runner was just not fast enough. Royal emissaries and platoons of soldiers out on a mission were sent with a supply of birds from that palace or fort so that if they needed to get a message out, they could send it by the fastest carrier over the straightest path. Pigeons continued to be used in the messenger capacity until only about 50 years ago. During this time when every one depended on them for swift communication, EVERY ONE loved and revered pigeons! Their diversity so inspired Charles Darwin that he did a TON of his genetics research using them as models! And pigeons were so beloved by Victorian England that his editors tried to twist his arm to write a book entirely about pigeons instead of what became the Origin of Species! When Eugenics began to fascinate the European well to do and conformation dog shows came to be, pigeon varieties also blossomed! There were pigeons all over the world at this point, and different regions had so many different ideas of what shape and color and pattern made a beautiful Pigeon! While some valued the appearance, others valued a unique areal performance, fancy feather embellishments, or a more musical singing voice. There are at least as many distinct breeds of pigeon now as there are of dog! I have heard that there are more, possibly even considerably more, but I don’t know enough about dog breed diversity to say for certain whether or not those assessments are accurate. We have taken pigeons EVERYWHERE with us! And when we loved and took care of them, everybody benefited. But about 50 years ago was when technology caught up with and surpassed the speed of pigeon borne messages, and pigeons were slower with more expensive upkeep. As previously stated, the military were not the only people who loved pigeons. But a LOT of the people who kept them after the military phased them out in the US were immigrants and people of color. It was a status symbol not to need gardens or farms or livestock, so pigeon coops became associated largely with poor neighborhoods and immigrants. As pigeons fell out of favor, more and more of the growing population of ferals started living on the closest thing to a comfortable environment: Buildings. As they were fed by fewer and fewer people and had access to less and less grain, it became more common to see the white streaked splatters of the pure uric acid that pigeons excrete on an empty stomach. Uric acid eats stone, concrete, asphalt, and especially metal. Feral Pigeons thus became linked to property damage, and the smear campaign that coined the description “Rats with wings” ( http://www.audubon.org/news/the-origins-our-misguided-hatred-pigeons ) and linked them with filth and disease was the final blow to the public’s esteem for this animal that has been our partner and companion through THOUSANDS of years of history. That description of pigeons was all it took to turn thousands of years of adoration and respect into knee jerk revulsion. Add the fact that domestication favors and in fact forces year round reproduction, and 50 years later, the feral population of pigeons is staggering. Millions are spent to kill them off and drive them out using everything from poison to spikes to nets, tar, traps, and fines levied on the kind souls that recognize their hunger and feed them. The Street Pigeon Project spearheaded in Germany has found that the most effective way to decrease the feral population and minimize the damage they cause to buildings is to, get this: TAKE CARE OF THEM!!! They built a big, comfortable rooftop loft with lots of nesting spaces, provided a good mix or grain, seed, legumes, and calcium, and swapped out the eggs with fakes. It was more comfortable than the awnings, eves, attics, bridges, and signs that had been the best nesting grounds available, so they left all the places they were not wanted in! With no need to range out to look for food, they didn’t go very far. The unrestrained, non-coerced feral pigeons spent 80% of their time in that loft, only leaving to stretch their wings. On full bellies, with good food, their poo wasn’t just pure uric acid anymore! With eggs swapped out as they were found, reproduction decreased by 95%! And the best part? It cost SO much less to house and feed the ferals than it did to try to exterminate them! That’s not even scratching the surface of the OTHER benefits that could be extended from that project! Pigeon eggs are edible! Even if the thought squicks out people and they can’t be regulated, animals can eat pigeon eggs too. They could be donated to wild life rehabs and animal shelters. A street pigeon project could partner with community gardens to clean the lofts and keep the fertilizer they gather. THEY could also use the eggs to compost! Cleaning the loft could also count as community service! Adult ferals would be more hurt than helped by capture, but they should have the option of a safe place to go to be fed and cared for, and weaned babies deserve to go to loving homes. I know there are too many to home right now and that isn’t feasible for rehabs that get hundreds of them, but where rehoming isn’t an option, they should at LEAST be acclimated in a group with supplemental feeding until they find their way in the world. We need to take a page from society's stray dog booklet and make pet shelters specific to domestic pigeons. Imagine how much more actual *wildlife* rehabbers could help with the funds and space currently being tied up by the hoards of domesticated strays that should not be there! Pigeons were made what they are by us. Everything we complain about regarding pigeons are traits WE intentionally bred into them! Pigeons did not invade cities. We abandoned them there, after they helped us coordinate building and connecting them. And we inexplicably treat *them* like the invaders after abandoning them the second they were no longer deemed useful. We even forgot that the pidge we see every day on the street are domesticated birds! They are, in every sense of the words, literally stray dogs with wings! And they deserve to be treated with the same concern and compassion as every other lost pet.

[theramseyloft]

Why rescued pigeons and doves  should not be released into the wild. And why baby pigeons in rehab need to be cuddled.

Edited to be more accurate and less confusing

Why should rescued pigeons and doves not be released back into the wild? And why do they need to be handled in the rescues and humans should imprint on them unlike other birds? I'm writing a paper on rescued pigeons and doves if you're wondering XD

ramseyringnecks answered: First and foremost because they are not wild animals.

They are the children of lost and abandoned domestic pets. Mostly performance breeds like homers, rollers, tumblers, tipplers and sky cutters, with the occasional escaped or abandoned fancy mixed in.

What would your reaction be to a person taking a young dog they found in an alley or parking lot, worming it, bringing it back from emaciation or disease, maybe treating a broken bone or car injury, and then taking it right back and releasing it into the wild once they got it healthy?

Would you object?

Why?

Really. List all the reasons. Because I guarantee that all of them except rabies apply to pigeons.

Never seen a healthy stray dog? I can guarantee you that you’ve never seen a healthy stray pigeon either. The streaked white poo you always see on buildings or sidewalks under pigeon roosts? Its an indicator of starvation. Healthy poo is brown, round, and solid with a small white urate. White poo is pure uric acid, with little to no food matter, whick is why it does the structural damage it does.

The cute poofball pose? They are cold, and most are hunched up in the universal posture of “I don’t feel so good…” Being malnourished and usually heavily parisitized makes it hard to keep enough muscle mass to thermoregulate.

On mobile, I can’t see the question anymore once I start to answer it, so if I missed anything, I’ll reblog with more detail.

Ok. Looks like I have missed a few things.

Rescues and imprinting.

So, alluding to dogs again because pigeons have been domesticated AT LEAST as long and as completely as Dogs.

Imagine if, after all of the time Humanity has spent with Dogs, training them to work with us as partners, companions, therapy, and service animals; Society suddenly fell out of love with dogs and abandoned them completely, except for races and shows, where any non feral puppies born that could not be expected to win or produce winners were immediately killed.

That is exactly what happened to pigeons.

50 years ago.

Really. Just fifty years.

And dogs, who are still VERY much societally beloved as companions and in rolls of service, need rescues.

Because people refuse to spay and neuter their house pets, and more puppies are born than there are homes for, there is a stray population of unwanted dogs that breed uncontrolled.

And the reason feral dogs don't have NEARLY the population of feral pigeons? SO many people respond SO fast to the sight of a lost, sick puppy or dog!

It's just an automatic knee-jerk reaction for most people to at least network on behalf of a stray dog to get it somewhere safe and either reunite it with its owner, or find it a permanent home.

After all, we KNOW dogs are pets! If a dog is wandering unattended, something must be wrong, and it is automatically assumed to need help, no matter how healthy it looks at first glance.

Now, imagine if NO one EVER did that for ANY stray dog, over a period of 50 years, and now you know why there is such an overwhelming number of feral pigeons.

You may find the occasional purebred in a shelter, but I can pretty much guarantee that was a pet 9 times out of 10, whose owner either died or suffered some misfortune and had no other option. (Mill busts aside.)

Like I said in a previous ask, when animals are bred on purpose, there has to *be* a purpose. There must be a goal AND a plan for EVERY single litter.

If you boil it down, THAT is what separates an Ethical breeder from a Mill.

Ethical breeders have a SPECIFIC goal for a litter and have preparations set up for the rest of the pups. Space to house them long term, resources set aside for food and medical care, time set aside to train and socialize them, and a fee and screening process set up to make the best possible match between a pup and a family, and a return policy in case things don't work out, in order to ensure that there is the least possible likelihood of any of those puppies winding up abandoned.

Pigeons, because of the smear campaign against them 50 years ago (http://www.audubon.org/…/the-origins-our-misguided-hatred-p…) no longer have the overwhelming public support with which Dogs are almost universally blessed.

Pigeons are either purebred show birds, purebred performers, or feral.

There are SO few pigeons blessed to be house companions.

Humanity has largely forgotten that they ARE domesticated.

There are SO few places even willing to look at them.

Wildlife rehabs are up to their eyes in DOMESTICATED birds that really should be in pet shelters. If pigeons were not constantly mistaken for wild animals, imagine how much funding and resources could be freed up for genuinely native wildlife!

While ADULT feral pigeons can survive release back “into the wild”, babies ALL almost immediately die upon release.

Pigeons are very human like in just HOW socially complex they are. Babies have to be TAUGHT how to pigeon!

Not just where and how to forage, but how to respect the spaces of older flock mates so that they can make and defend their own space with in the flock.

With out that knowledge, which humans are just not equipped to teach, baby pigeons will never be accepted into a flock.

Pigeon flocks are extended families. Strangers are competitors for limited resources and can only join a flock by marrying in.

Alone, they can’t survive. Feral flocks depend on cooperation to eat, drink, gather nest materials, and avoid predation. With no one to watch their back, a single pidge is under constant stress trying to feed itself and keep watch for predators at the same time. It steadily weakens, and dies of disease if it manages not to get eaten first.

Because of this, I make absolutely NO attempt to release any baby pigeons I get through wildlife rehab.

It would literally be dumping a stray puppy back into the alley or on the road side.

They ARE domestic pets. It is a fact.

And they deserve to be treated like it.

So the few shelters there are that accept them make it their life's mission to remind humanity that PIGEONS ARE ABANDONED SKY PUPPIES!

OF COURSE THEY CAN BE GREAT COMPANIONS!

THAT IS WHAT THEY HAVE *ALWAYS* BEEN!

Now, let’s touch on imprinting.

The difference between pigeons and exotic birds isn’t that it’s ok to imprint pigeons, but not exotics.

It’s that pigeons do not NEED to be imprinted in order to be safely tractable.

Parrots are not domesticated. The tame ones are imprinted. They *have* to think of humans as parents and potential mates, or they will see us as predators and can inflict potentially crippling injuries in self defense.

Pigeons are genuinely domesticated, and have been since the dawn of written history. They are *hatched* already tame and do not have to be stolen and bottle fed to be safe to handle or capable of bonding as a companion to a person. Like puppies, pigeon babies only need to be socialized as they grow up in order to bond easily to people.

Oh!

Sorry.

I missed what you were actually asking in regards to imprinting!

You asked why baby pigeons in shelters NEED to be handled!

It's because pigeons are intensely social. Babies and hens are VERY touch oriented, to the extent that they suffer touch starvation the way human toddlers do.

Baby Pigeons grow up in a cuddle puddle, constantly snuggled and verbally soothed by both parents until they wean.

They usually don't even leave the flock after weaning. They become part of it, like a village made up of a huge, extended family; Nesting next door to or across the way from their parents and siblings, rather than going off on their own to claim an entirely separate territory.

Mater of fact, young birds ONLY have to leave and start a new flock when the one they hatched in grows too large for local resources to support.

Wild animals in rehab need to be handled as little as possible to avoid imprinting, so that they are not hindered in their survival upon release.

Pigeons are NOT wild animals. They are not even native to anywhere but Turkey and neighboring parts of the middle east. They are domesticated pets. Imprinting avoidance should not apply to them.