Rock Pigeon or Rock Dove

The Rock Pigeon or Rock Dove is a member of the bird family Columbidae (doves and pigeons). In common usage, this bird is often simply referred to as a "pigeon". 

Pigeons come in many different shades and plumage patterns. There is the typical “blue-bar” form (a bluish-gray bird with two black bands on the wing and a black tip to the tail); a “red bar” version (similarly marked, but with rusty red replacing bluish gray); “checker” (birds that have spots on the wings); “spread” (all black or all gray); “pied” (birds of any color that are splotched with white); and mostly red or mostly white forms. They average 13 oz. in weight and are about 11 inches in length. 

Feral pigeons form the majority of prey for several raptor species (who live in urban areas) like Falcons and Sparrowhawk, who are adept at catching them. 

Although the Rock Pigeon is a relatively strong flier, it also glides frequently, holding its wings in a very pronounced V shape as it does. Though fields are visited for grain and green food, it is often not plentiful enough as to be a viewed as pest. 

Excellent at flying

This bird is distributed throughout Tiruvannamalai District. In its perfectly wild state it lives in open country with rocky hills and cliffs. But mostly seen in a semi-domesticated condition, it lives in an urban environment close to man. The semi-feral stock has become inured to the noise of urban life and is now well established in most Indian towns. Grain warehouses, railway stations and old or disused buildings are their favourite places. 

Their food is comprised of cereals, pulses and groundnuts. Pigeons feed on the ground in flocks or individually. They roost together in buildings or on walls or statues. When drinking, most birds take small sips and tilt their heads backwards to swallow the water. Pigeons are able to dip their bills into the water and drink continuously without having to tilt their heads back. 

There are few visible differences between males and females. The nesting season of this bird is practically all year in semi-feral birds. Its nest is a flimsy collection of a few sticks on a ledge or in fissure of rocks, or on rafters and ceilings of dwelling houses, occupied or deserted. It generally lays two, white elliptical birds. Both sexes share all the domestic duties. 

The call of this bird is a deep gootr-goo, gootr-goo. The species is generally monogamous, with two squeakers (young) per brood. Both parents care for the young for a time. Baby pigeons are called squabs.

Pied Rock Pigeon nesting at Adi Annamalai Temple

Pigeon at Palani Andavar Temple, Girivalam Road

The Pigeon's happy abode

Nesting inside Temple, outside the Sanctum Sanctorum. Good Karma!

Cycle of Pigeon Hatching:  Hatching takes around 18 days. 

The newly hatched squab has pale yellow down and a flesh-coloured bill with a dark band. For the first few days, the baby squab is tended and fed (through regurgitation) exclusively on “crop-milk” (also called "pigeon milk" or "pigeon's milk"). The pigeon milk is produced in the crops of both parents in all species of pigeons and doves. The fledging period is about 30 days. Males guard and care for the female and nest. 

Young birds show little lustre and are duller. Eye colour of the pigeon is generally orange but a few pigeons may have white-grey eyes. The eyelids are orange in colour and are encapsulated in a grey-white eye ring. The feet are red to pink. 

The young mature and leave the nest 4 to 6 weeks after they hatch and more eggs are laid before the first young leave the nest. Breeding occurs during all seasons but mainly in spring and fall. Pigeons commonly live up to 15 years, but in more urban areas they tend to live only 3-4 years 

Cycle of Pigeon Hatching

Elliptical Egg

Usually there are two eggs per batch

1 day old "Squabs"

5 days old "Squab"

Age 10 days old

Age 22 days old

Adult Blue Rock Pigeons

The bird cycle sequence came from this link here.

The below narrative is taken from “Garden and Aviary Birds of India” by Frank Finn (1915) 

The Pigeons 

Pigeons form a family of birds which are found all over the world, and, like Parrots, are very distinct from all others, so that they are given an order to themselves. Their characteristics are easily seen in the common tame Pigeon—the weak bill, soft and swollen over the nostrils, the small head, powerful wings and heavy body clothed in close powdery plumage. The feet are also very noticeable, with three toes before and one smaller one behind, a single row of scales down the front of the shank and none at all at the back, which is covered with soft skin. Most Pigeons have red or purple feet, a few yellow ones. 

Pigeons build very slovenly nests of twigs or dry grass, generally on the bough of a tree, but sometimes, like the tame Pigeon, in holes. They never lay more than two eggs and the young from these are usually cock and hen. The eggs are always white or—very rarely faintly tinted and never show any spots. 

Rock Pigeon Nest Building 

The young are hatched blind and nearly naked and are very ugly helpless little things with swollen soft beaks. They do not gape for food like most young birds, but put their bills into that of the old one, which thereupon throws up the food from its crop and lets them suck it in. The proverbial Pigeons' milk really does exist as a matter of fact, for during the first few days of their lives the young Pigeons are fed on a secretion from the crop of the old birds, which much resembles milk in appearance and chemical composition. Later this is mixed with softened grain, until at length the old Bird gives the young the grain almost at once, merely keeping it in their crops till they have got enough of it. 

Grain of various kinds is, as everyone knows, the favourite food of most Pigeons, but as they cannot always get it they eat a good deal of green food and a few small snails as well. A good many species, however, are fruit-eaters, and never touch grain. These have stouter beaks and shorter shanks than the grain-eating Pigeons. 

Pigeons are strong fliers and use their powerful wings in fighting, their beaks being so weak, although they can do each other a good deal of harm with them if too closely confined. For, in spite of their reputation for gentleness, they are inveterate fighters in a petty nagging way. 

It is, however, in most cases almost impossible to tell the cock from the hen, as their plumage is exactly similar; the young are rather different in many cases. The actions of the cock when courting are very interesting and differ much in the different groups. 

Pigeons are not usually migratory and are most numerous in a hot climate; there are many wild species in India. 

White-browed Wagtail

The White-browed Wagtail (Motacilla Maderaspatensis) is known in Tamil as = Kulatthu Kuruvi. Their specific name is derived from the city Madras (i.e. the former name of Chennai, Tamil Nadu). Another local name for wagtails in India is dhobin (or washerwoman) which corresponds to the bird’s name in French i.e. Lavendiere. It has been suggested that the bird has derived its nickname because of its fondness for water and also comparison with its wagging tale to the battering action by the laundrywoman of clothes on the rocks.

This bird is the size of a Bulbul. It is a large wagtail of black and white plumage and with a prominent white eyebrow. In the female the black portions are duller and browner. It roams in pairs and can be found at streams and tanks. It is resident throughout Indian and can be found in the Tiruvannamalai District. 

This bird prefers rocky smooth-running streams with grass-covered islets but it is also found at village tanks and irrigation reservoirs. It also has adapted well to urban environment and is often found perched on overhead water storages in residential buildings. 

This bird lives almost entirely on the ground, running about instead of hopping like most small birds. When they do fly, they are extremely good fliers and when on the wing, they progress in bounds or curves, alternately closing and opening their wings. Most small birds fly in this way, but it is particularly marked in the Wagtails. They can fly fairly rapidly for long distances and have been recorded to travel at the speed of about 40 km/hr. 

  Video of the male White-Browed Wagtail

This bird is usually tame and confiding. However delicate and as fragile as this bird looks, they are most savage and it is impossible to keep even two of different species together unless they are cock and hen.

Female White-Browed Wagtail

The White-browed Wagtail has a number of loud, pleasant whistle calls. Its usual call is a wheezy "wheech During the breeding season, the male sings sweetly from a rock or house-top. In older times in India, the species was sometimes kept as a cage-bird and was acclaimed for its singing ability. 

Female at nest with chicks

Coppersmith Barbet

Coppersmith Barbet—Megalaima haemacephala (Tamil Name: Kukuravan) The first time I saw this bird was at the Animal Sanctuary on Chengam Road here at Tiruvannamalai. Some local kids had been roughly playing with the little bird and workers at the Animal Sanctuary rescued it and brought it into the shelter.

Coppersmith in cage at Animal Hospital

This pretty little bird is the size of a dumpy sparrow. The heavy-billed grass green Barbet has a crimson breast and forehead, yellow throat and green-streaked yellowish underparts. Its stout beak has a straggly moustache of bristles at the root.

Birding making its tuk-tuk-tuk call

Video of Coppersmith Barbets, female followed by calling male
 

Notice the Flesh-coloured feet

The Coppersmith which is a very well-known garden bird is not easy to discover at first; its green plumage blending with the foliage, while the yellow of its face, and the bright red of its forehead, gorget, and feet are not so noticeable. Sexes look alike. Young birds are still less striking in appearance in a tree, as they have no red on the head or breast, and their feet are merely flesh-colour. 

Feeding on Ficus Benghalensis

This bird has a short tail and appears triangular in its flight silhouette. Its feet has two toes before and two behind; but it does not climb, instead it simply hops from branch to branch, picking fruit on which to feed. When on the ground it also moves with a hopping motion. 

Bird at Nest

The birds’ notes are mellow but of a deadly monotony, being kept up with relentless regularity for a long time. Their call is a familiar loud, ringing tuk, tuk, repeated every second or two in long runs throughout the day, reminiscent of a distant Coppersmith hammering on his metal. 

Pair at Nest

The Coppersmith Barbet is arboreal and frequents Banyan and Peepul trees in fruit whether it is outlying forest or within a noisy city. It sometimes eats winged termites captured by flycatcher-like sallies. This bird nests from January to June; and its nest is generally a hole excavated in a snag of a dead softwood branch such as the Coral or Drumstick Tree at moderate heights. It lays three glossless white eggs with both sexes sharing domestic duties. 

Male and Female at tree-nest

The huge-billed Toucans of America are closely related to the Barbets, but are not found in India. 

Indian Bird Nests—Part Two

The first part of this narrative which covered the main types of bird’s nests found in India, can be found at this link here. 

This second part of this narrative deals with four birds found in India who have a less conventional arrangement with nests and raising their young. This second part is also compiled from the works of the famous Indian ornithologist and naturalist, Salim Ali. 

Whatever its pattern, the nest is always true to the type of the species that builds it, and is primarily the outcome of instinct fixed and inherited through countless generations of builders. Experiments have shown that birds hatched in an incubator who can therefore have no idea of the sort of nest built by their kind, will, at the appointed time, build nests after their own specific pattern. A great deal of other seemingly intelligent behaviour of nesting birds, such as solicitude or love for their offspring, and the ‘broken wing’ trick practised by many different species to draw off an intruder from the nest or young, prove upon analysis to be largely the working of a spontaneous intellect. 

The below are examples of four remarkable nesting habits and behaviour of some common Indian birds. 

The Hornbill 

At mating season, after courtship, the female Hornbill retreats to a natural hollow in some tree-trunk, perhaps even the same that has been used for a numerous number of Hornbills. The bird incarcerates herself within the hollow, singer her droppings as plaster and the flat sides of her enormous bill as trowel to wall up the entrance, merely leaving a narrow slit through which to receive food brought in by the male It is ascertained that besides the female’s own excrement there is a considerable proportion of mud or clay mixed in the cement, thus it seems likely that the male assists his mate in the work of closing up the next by bringing mud to her. 

Hornbill at Nest

The plaster sets so hard that it prevents predatory animals from entering the nest. The female remains in this self-imposed confinement until after the young (two or three in number) hatch and are about a fortnight old. All the time the female is in the nest with her young, the male brings her food. Foraging for his mate wears the male Hornbill down, while the female becomes enormously plump during her chose confinement. 

Female inside nest with Chicks

When the young are about a fortnight old the female breaks down the wall by hammering away at it, and thus releases herself. After her exist the wall is usually built up once more and thenceforth the parents forage to feed the young until they are old enough to be let out to fend for themselves. 

The Baya Weaver

This bird is a polygamist with a unique system. At the beginning of the rainy season, the colourful males start to build their pendant shaped nests, chiefly on Babool trees or date palms and preferably standing in or overhanging water. When the building of the next reaches the crucial ‘bell’ or ‘helmet’ stage, there is a sudden visitation from a party of prospecting hen Bayas. The females inspect the nests, entering to inspect the interiors and seemingly indifferent to the amorous advances of the male. 

Construction of Baya Weaver Nest

If a hen is satisfied with a particular nest she calmly ‘adopts’ it and moves into possession. Thenceforth she and the builder are husband and wife. The male works to complete the nest while the female busies herself with tidying the egg chamber. 

 

Male Weaver completing nest

As soon as the next is completed and the hen settled on the eggs within, the male commences to build himself another nest on a nearby twig. In course of time this too if approved, is similarly appropriated by a second prospecting female who then becomes the second wife. The process may continue until the male simultaneously finds himself husband of up to four wives and father of numerous chicks. 

The Buttonquail 

Normally the male bird is more brightly coloured than the female. However in the case of the Buttonquail, the role of the sexes is reversed. Here it is the female who is the larger and more brightly coloured and who is the aggressor in courtship. She decoys males by a loud drumming call, courts them, displays her charms and engages in battle with rival hens for the ownership of the male. 

 

As soon as a husband is secured and the eggs are laid, the hen leaves the male and wanders off in search of new conquests. The husband is then left with the entire responsibility of incubating the eggs and tending the young. The roving hen may manage to attract three or more cocks as husband. And in this manner each hen may lay several clutches of eggs during a single season. 

The Parasitic Cuckoo 

A large section of the cuckoo family are parasitic on account of building no nests of their own but instead utilising those of other birds for laying in, and foisting their own responsibilities upon the proxy parents. 

Crow's Nest

Examples of parasitic cuckoos are the Brainfever Bird who lays in the nests of Babblers, often removing one of the rightful eggs to make room for its own, and the Asian Koel who habitually parasitizes the House and Jungle Crows. The eggs of parasitic cuckoos usually bear a close resemblance to those of their hosts or foster parents. 

Peacocks at Arunachala

Peacocks are found in abundant numbers all over the Arunachala area. At the back of the Samudram Erie there is a colony of over 60 Peacocks living and nesting in a secure environment at the back of the Reforestation Model Farm. 

Ramana Ashram Peacocks are used to attention from visitors

In many of the reserve areas surrounding and abutting such villages as Sirumbakkam, Meyur and Perumbakkam peacocks roam around in large numbers, wild and undisturbed and friends to the farmers in their relentless pursuit of all manner of insects. 

I have seen unseemly monkey-peacock scraps on several occasions

As well as prevalent in the countryside, Peacocks are also commonplace at several Ashrams and Compounds throughout Arunachala. 

An Ornate fixture to Samadhi Hall

The photographs in this posting were all taken (in just a few minutes) of peacocks outside the Ramana Samadhi Hall. 

They spend a lot of time on buildings, and on the trees

The term "peacock" is commonly used to refer to birds of both sexes. Technically, only males are peacocks. Females are peahens, and together, they are called peafowl. 

Having a good look around his domain

The Indian Peafowl is indigenous to the country and is designated the national bird of India. However the State Bird of Tamil Nadu is the Emerald Dove. 

Visitors ever on the look-out for peacock feathers lying about

To read more about the beautiful peacock go to this link here. And to view amazing photographs showing the structure of this bird go to my earlier posting here. 

Beautiful Arunachala Darshan from Peacock perch

Rufus -- A Working Bird

I have posted a narrative connected with Wimbledon Tennis on my Arunachala Grace Blog at this link here. 

Wearing the Wimbledon Colours, gorgeous Rufus

And now that we are on the subject of Wimbledon, can’t resist posting this photograph of Rufus the American Harris Hawk, who is employed by the Tennis Tournament to keep pesky pigeons under control. 

Rufus on fly-about detail

 

Throughout the year Rufus visits the Tennis grounds once a week for an extended fly-about. And during the two weeks of the Tournament, the Hawk flies about each morning to keep the grounds free of birds and pests.

Different types of Birds’ Nests: Part 1

The information on the below posting of the main types of bird’s nests found in India has been compiled primarily from the works of the famous Indian ornithologist and naturalist, Salim Ali:

1. Simple scrapes in the ground sparsely lined with grass and leaves, e.g. quail, jungle fowl and other game birds, or with no semblance of lining, e.g. tern and lapwing. Protections is secured by the eggs and young of such birds through their remarkable obliterative coloration.

Lapwing Nest

2. Twig nests like platforms with a cup-like depression in the centre usual lined with softer material-grass, tow, feathers, etc. This type, built in trees or on buildings or cliffs, is common to a large number of birds of different families, e.g. crow, kite, dove, vulture, cormorant, stork, etc.

Turtle Dove

3. Nests in tree-holes either excavated in living or decayed wood, or in natural hollows and either with a sparse lining of soft material or unlined, e.g. tits, Yellow-throated Sparrow, woodpeckers, barbets, hornbills, owls, some mynas and most of our resident ducks. The holes are in the first instance cut by woodpeckers, parakeets or barbets and subsequently appropriated in rotation by many other species. Nesting in natural tree hollows is a common habit among our resident ducks, all of whom breed during the SW. monsoon. The situation gives security against sudden rise of water level in the jheels due to cloud-bursts or the swelling of streams flowing into them. The ducklings reach the water by tumbling out of the nest and are not carried down by the parents as has sometimes been asserted.

Woodpecker

4. Nests in excavated tunnels in earth-banks or in clefts or buildings, rock cliffs, etc., e.g. bee-eaters, kingfishers, hoopoe. The tunnels are driven horizontally into the side of an earth-cutting or bank of a stream, the bird using its bill to dig and its fee to kick back the loose earth. The tunnels are from a few inches to several feet in length and usually bent near the extremity where they widen into a bulbous egg chamber.

Adult Kingfisher going to Nest

Adult Kingfisher feeding Chicks

5. Nests built entirely of mud or in which mud predominates, e.g. Whistling-Thrust, blackbirds, swallows, martins. The wet mud is commonly collected a r rain puddles. It is mixed with a certain amount of saliva in the case of swallows. There is a marked increase in the size of the salivary glands of these birds and swifts during the breeding season. Swallows’ nests have perforce to be built very gradually, pellet by pellet, so that not too much of the material is daubed on at one time before the underlying layer is sufficiently dry.

Barn Swallows

Cliff Swallows

6. Cup-shaped nests of grass and fibres in crotches or forks of branches, usually well plastered over with cobwebs, e.g. iora, fantail, and other flycatchers, orioles, white-eye minivets, reed warblers, cuckoo-shrikes, etc. Cobwebs are very extensively employed as cement in bird architecture, for binding the material compactly and neatly together. It is collected by being twisted round and round the bill and is then unwound and attached on the exterior of the nest, or used in securing the nest into position.

Iora Adult Feeding Chick

7. Domed or ball-shaped nests of twigs, grass or rootlets with a lateral entrance hole, e.g. munias, Rufous-bellied Babbler.

Munia Nest

8. Pendant nests, e.g. weaver birds (woven), sunbirds, flowerpeckers. The sunbird’s nest is a vertical oblong pouch suspended from the tip of a thin outhanging twig, usually not high above the ground. It has an entrance hole at the side with a little projecting porch over it. The exterior is draped untidily with pieces of bark, caterpillar droppings, and spiders’ egg-cases which give it an effective camouflage. The flowerpecker’s nest is a hanging pouch of the same general pattern, but made entirely of seed and vegetable down worked into a felt-like fabric.

Weaver Bird Making Nest

Weaver Bird Nest Creation System

Hanging Weaver Nests

9. Woven oblong purse; loofah-like—attached to stems of tall grass or low bushes, e.g. prinias (alternative to the next type).

Plain Prinia

 

10. Nest in leaves stitched together in the form of a funnel, e.g. Tailorbird, Franklin’s Prinia, Ashy Prinia.

Funnel Shaped Tailor Bird Nest

Tailor Bird Feeding Chicks in Nest