photo from last May as the saguaros are not yet in bloom. When they are, the doves are there to feed
Watching them for hours sometimes, I've been at times disillusioned by the behavior of doves. If you have watched them, you see some definite bullying behavior. The males can become almost monster-like. They ruffle up their necks and stalk the other birds-- especially the young females. Talk about no understanding of boundaries. Doves are considered birds of peace, but they don’t always feel that way especially some of the older males. I wish I had been able to photograph them when they were doing that but never got the right shot.
This spring, I saw a new side as, because of the missing carport, a pair of doves began to build a nest under the covered porch. Ranch Boss saw that and put some wire mesh up there to make sure their nests wouldn't fall through.
Until now, what I had not known, was they do it as a pair. She stays on the nest, while all day he brings materials to her, which she then forms into the nest. When he brings her too big a stick, it takes her some time to make it comfortable.
I am not one of those who watches birds to count how many I have seen. What I enjoy, probably because of being a writer, is seeing relationships. Living on the desert where nature is outside our doors, I have many opportunities to watch relationships between birds.
Which ones like each other. Which ones chase others away from the food. When there is courting, mutually chosen, not aggressively demanded, it really is beautiful.
So for the next weeks, if this pair stay under the porch overhang, I will hope to have photographs of them and then of their babies. For years, we had seen doves raise their young under the carport. We didn’t see the process as we will with it happening outside our living room window.
Last year, the carport pair had a tragedy when pack rats got to the nest, and the shells ended up on the ground. The carport had more potential for that. These will be safe under the porch if they opt to stay. They do need to be comfortable at being close to humans.
Nature in the raw is not always pretty, and sometimes it is tragic as everyone has to eat. It is always interesting. I might share some predator photos on one of these blogs.
8 comments:
Sometimes it is hard to watch animals "behaving badly", but they don't have morals or ethics like we do. We make value judgments about their behaviour but they're just doing what they do. In my writing group yesterday one of the writers was describing duck sex, how violent and hard to watch it was. And at the dog park one of the regular young dogs has just discovered how much fun it is to bully an old dog who just wants to be left alone. The dog owner doesn't know how to deal with this unfortunate behaviour. Here in the northeast I have cardinals and mourning doves coming to my bird feeder, the doves poke around what has fallen to the ground underneath. I like them better than pigeons ("rats with feathers") but that's just a value judgment.
Animals are in survival mode and do bully for territory and for mating. Hubby say a male mallard try to drown another male mallard over a female the other day. The fight was fierce. This is nature and we have to be realistic. Doves are crazy in that like wrens they sometimes nest anywhere!
Here in Albany we can have as many as 11 or 12 doves at first peacefully eating together picking up sunflower seeds fallen from the feeder above. Then a little while later one of the largest doves goes after any dove under the feeder. The dove is so busy chasing off others that he never actually eats. Then the hawk appears and all the doves go elsewhere.
Yes, it's hard to figure out animals, any of them. The thing that got me with the older male doves is how they could turn from pretty to really intimidating with ruffling those neck feathers. Like monsters. I don't think the younger males do that.
The male that helped build the nest never tried to arrange it but dropped it for her and kept coming until she apparently had enough. I think he was younger based on size.
We have not seen where the doves are nesting for sure. Maybe high in an oak tree. One of the ways males break up a group under the bird feeder. Is to turn his back on the others and walk backwards raming the others with his tail feathers.
Wow on the technique. I haven't seen that one here but the ruffled neck feathers turned them into scary birds. I don't know if it was deliberate though or part of the aggressive emotional behavior in chasing off other birds
She has two eggs, which Ranch Boss saw from a nearby ladder when she had left for her lunch break. We can hope for the best for a happy ending, not that this area needs more doves :).
We learned that the male and female do take turns on the nest, which means they will help feed the young. We hadn't been sure until we had the blind up and watched them. (blind was down to protect them from flying into the window at loud noises. This should be a quiet week-end *s*)
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