Guest Blog Post by Jean Getsi, Creator of Lovey Dovey Birdhouses

Jean has generously donated two Lovey Dovey Birdhouses to MickaCoo Pigeon & Dove Rescue to sell as fundraisers. $45 + shipping for each and all proceeds benefit MickaCoo! Comment below to buy yours.

Lovey Dovey Birdhouses

Birds have always been a joy in my life and it’s great to share this excitement with others.

The first time I noticed pigeons on the roof of our house, I was 7 years old and it was a cool, crisp morning in March. The pigeons were cooing and spinning in circles, flying from the roof of our house to the roof of our garage and back. I was surprised to see the color variation. We had white pigeons, brown, black, gray and a various mix of colors.

I soon realized they were not afraid of us, and as my elder brothers and sisters would throw feed on the ground, the pigeons would fly down and feed within a foot or so of us. I was amazed at how tame these birds were and in awe of how beautiful they were. A year or so later a pigeon breeder came and took all the birds away saying that some of his birds were mixed with ours, and claimed all of our birds.

I missed these birds when they were gone, I missed the sounds the colors and their tame behavior.

Later when I was twelve years old a friend from school acquired a pigeon from someone he knew. He’s parents wanted him to get rid of the bird and it was probably the best thing for the bird. He used to tie a string around one of the bird’s feet and let it fly in circles. I couldn’t believe he didn’t see this as inhumane.

I took the pigeon home and instead of keeping it in a coop for two to three weeks to adjust to its new home. I kept it in a box for 24 hrs. The next day I let it fly outside. The bird flew off for an hour and returned, I decided to name him Boomerang, since he had returned so soon. I’m lucky he came back at all seeing how I’d had him for such a short period of time.

I had Boomerang for many years and was amazed at his tameness. My parents let me keep the pigeon in a small bird cage in our house and when I would let him outside, he would hover in front of the widows of the house until someone would let him in. Boomerang was so tame that I could go outside, stoop down to the ground with my hand out and he would walk to me.

In the years since, I’ve captured and released several pigeons. Some of these were stunned from being hit by cars. These usually took just a few days before releasing. Others had injured wings and took several weeks before they could be released. Today I have two pigeons in a small coop, Ruby & Ralph. Ruby lost part of her wing, possibly due to an encounter with a tree limb, and Ralph had been hit by the windshield of a car. The two are now mates. Neither can fly and they are not releasable.

Ruby & Ralph

Through the years I have enjoyed watching pigeons, doves, and every other bird under the sun. Birds have been such a blessing in my life, I can’t imagine how dull life would be without them.

I’ve made many types of bird houses in the past, and always looked with anticipation to see if the birds would take to the new homes I would build for them.

Doves love their Lovey Dovey Birdhouses

Over the past five years, I’ve been experimenting with an open bird house for doves and have found that doves too, will take to bird houses. I was delighted to see that the doves took to these dove houses so well, and decided to start building these dove houses and selling them online. For more information about the dove houses, please check us out at www.loveydoveybirdhouses.com

Dove Babies at home in their Lovey Dovey Birdhouse

Thank you Elizabeth and MickaCoo for all your efforts in the rescue and rehoming of pigeons and doves.

Sincerely, Jean Getsi

 

Thank you, Jean & Lovey Dovey Birdhouses for your generous support of MickaCoo Pigeon & Dove Rescue!

Guest Post by Linda Press Wulf

Ichiban & Mackenzie, April 2012

I was never very interested in birds. I love dogs, I dream of galloping on my own horse, I bonded with my future husband over rabbits, we have fostered kittens. But birds don’t have names, or personalities, or lovability. So I thought.

When I first signed up with a new rescue association for pigeons that could not be released into the wild, my reasons were hardly persuasive. The rescued rabbits that we kept for years in a huge aviary-style outdoor cage had finally gone to the Big Carrot in the Sky. The aviary was empty, wasting.

We were tired of rabbits, didn’t want chickens, and weren’t prepared to take on any time-consuming pets. Then I heard about Elizabeth Young, who had committed herself to saving king pigeons. Kings are bred for eating in restaurants, called squab on the menu, so their breast meat is disproportionately large. As a result, they are slow fliers and easy targets for hawks. When kind-hearted people see the beautiful huge white pigeons for sale at Vietnamese and Chinese markets and buy and release them with good intentions, the birds’ “freedom” lasts only a few days and their death is horrible. There are other pigeons too that cannot be released into the wild, such as racing pigeons and “wedding-release” homers that have become lost and are no longer wanted by their owners, as well as some feral pigeons with injuries or who have been raised indoors and then abandoned. Elizabeth formed MickaCoo to rescue these birds, trying to find people who would foster them for a while or adopt them permanently. And there I was, with an unused aviary.

I committed to fostering for a few months. I am still fostering three years later, with a changing group of twenty to twenty-seven birds in my care. Some of my friends think I’m crazy, or at least eccentric, but if they will listen, I explain that the pigeons have been, other than dogs, the most interesting pets I’ve ever had, and compared with my other pets, especially dogs, they are the least trouble. Most days, I spend less than three minutes in the cage, simply filling their food and water bowls. I check for eggs, apologizing guiltily as I sneakily remove real eggs and replace them with wooden look-a-likes. (There are too many pigeons in need of rescue, so offspring are a big mistake – called Oops Babies.) The wooden eggs are accepted with grace, and the pigeon couples sit on them patiently for weeks – alternating duties between dad during the day and mom at night – until they decide that location, location, location is the problem, and they move to another hutch and start again. Other days I spend some time hosing off the gravel on the ground or changing the newspaper in their hutches. On the best days, I just sit and watch them, endlessly fascinated by their behavior.

Pigeons mate for life. Their courting, which is recognizable after you’ve seen it once or twice, takes from a few minutes to a few weeks, and then that’s it – they are committed. Unlike humans, the strong and the good looking do not feel entitled to the cream of the crop: their mating choices are inexplicable, but once made, that’s it. The next step is to choose a hutch, win it against any competitors, and build a haphazard nest of straw or twigs. Then the pressure increases. Males spends a huge and hilarious amount of energy chasing their fertile mates back to the nest. No time to eat, or explore, or stretch legs. Round and round the aviary, he chases her, little legs pumping, efforts to “duke” or bob or weave persistently thwarted. With single-minded determination, he chases her to their nest. Finally an egg is laid, followed the next day by a second.

Animal behaviorists have shown that pigeons can recognize faces, can do tricks, can even be taught to play a form of ping pong. I find it more interesting to watch the way they “kiss” for long moments, a movement that is actually a preparation for feeding a baby bird mouth-to-mouth. To watch mates grooming each other. To hear the soft, calming coo-ing that seems generic at first, but eventually reveals the individuality of each pigeon’s voice.

Elizabeth can tell all the birds apart, but most of the big white ones look the same to me, and I usually have to check the colored bands on their legs or observe where they are nesting and who they are nuzzling. Mackenzie is the one I know best, because he was my first bird, along with an unnamed female, whom I called Ichiban, Number One in Japanese. When they suddenly decided many months later that they were going to be a couple, I watched Mackenzie’s self confidence grow until he was lording it over all newcomers, chasing any rude youngsters out of the cubbies next to and above and below his love nest. Two good years later, Ichiban developed a large lump that made her wing stick out crazily. The avian vet diagnosed a cancerous growth, and Mackenzie accompanied Ichiban to a volunteer with more medical knowledge than I have, and a much smaller aviary. He stayed close to his mate as she grew more and more lopsided. When Ichiban died, it took a while before he paid any attention to the three females placed in his little aviary to distract him. Tomorrow he is coming home to me with his second mate. His original cubby has been usurped in his absence but I know Mackenzie better than I ever thought I would know a bird. He will choose a new place, guard it against any trespassers, settle down into being a faithful husband, boss his wife unmercifully, and recognize my face.

The Wulf Foster Aviary

Thank you to Linda and the Wulf Family for their loving and life-saving care of 76 foster pigeons since 2010!

If you’d like to become a much needed foster volunteer, whether for a couple or many, please go here for more information.