Evening star., 1946-04-26
This and That
By Charles E. TrdceUell.
"TAKOMA PARK

n.
Dear Sir:
Three dove musketeers, we call them
They all fly into our yard eyerv morn
ing together, and leave in the evening.
Perhaps they nest nearby, but we
have never been able to locate them, al
though sometimes we hear their mourn
full cry.
But what is the third one doing with
the pair? Is this a case Of a dove tri-
angle, or what?
Doves always make an appeal to the
real bird lover, just as you have said
several times. This is the first occasion
we have had three OF kind.
"One spring we had three pairs.
Our family loves this species. and
thinks there is no better bird to have
around. Is there any way they can be
attracted to nest?
Very truly, NJ H. j."
The three dove musketeers" NAV he
a father and mother dove and a baby.
The young are as large as the parents,
sometimes even bit heavier.
Young doves are very slow to learn
to fly. 1t has been reported that at
times the mother will be in the nest with
heao SUCKING out from beneath her.
Inc nest is very poor affair, made
simply OF sticks. Often there is no at
tempt at lining, and the one or two eggs
are IN great danger of rolling off.
PROBABLY some of them do, but this
makes no particular difference, since
tnere are three broods a season.
Ihe trouble with the doves is not that
they do not want to make good nests. but
that their feet and bills are not ADAPTED
for the task.
Nests are usually placed low down in
the crotch OF tree, or in shrubbery or
thickets, or sometimes on the ground.
nests have been found at the very
edges of cliff.
II dove house, or cote, is provided
these birds may be lured to a given ward
Usually this is just a sort of Ieanto
with roof, but open at the sides.
The practice of caging doves no longer
Is IN fashion, but at one time most of the
sman town homes in the Middle West
mad their dove cotes and inhabitants.
Ihese careless nesters have been found
TO incubate young in every month except
December and January.
sometimes fresh eggs are found in a
nest with baby doves not yet able to f1v.
III Is possible that our correspondent's
three" may be a mother and two Off
spring.
This bird has several peculiarities
which set it off from other species.
In the first place, when it takes off
from the earth, its wings make pecu-
liar whistling sound, an unmistakable
identification.
secondly, it feeds its young as pigeons
do, by regurgitating a fluid called pig
con milk" which the baby takes BY
sticking its bill into the crop of the
parent.
Thirdly this bird looks so much like
many years persons who saw it reported
that they really had seen passenger
pigeon.
In the fourth place. the low notes of
the species are utterly unlike those of
any other bird. not only as to the low
register, but also because of the pc
culiar intonation.
Some listeners call it sad, others re-
gard 1t as merely the essence of love and
devotion. Certainly to persons brought
up in the Middle West it will speak of
home
This dove should never be harmed. 1t
eats weed seeds and insects, with accent
on the former. 1t does little if any harm
to mans favorite vegetables, although
some have said it takes fresh peas. If
it does, it more than makes up for it
by the other things it eats.
On every account, then, our turtle dove
should never be harmed, but protected
and held as a most desirable resident
of every garden. Where well treated
they remain all winter. but will demand
some food In the cold.