Pigeon Talk

[WVduckchick]

So add 2 more to my loft. Trip and Rocky’s pair hatched yesterday. That’s 6 babies in 14 days. One more pair of eggs to go!
Doesn’t he look proud?

 

[biophiliac]

Anyone know when parents stop brooding the babies :/ Wallace & Soup haven't been sitting on the baby once since I got home at 4 this afternoon, it's now eight. Right now the heat is on at 70 but it'll drop to 60-62 whithin hrs of turning off said heatand the baby only just started getting pin feathers :/ they still act semi protective but don't seem to want to sit on said baby, only stand above it if at all.
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60°F should be fine I think, even if its only one baby. I have 2 nestlings that arenot being brooded at all during the day and its in the 30s and 40s here.

They also have already swapped to seed feeding, at exactly one week? I left my homers to their own devices so I don't know standard milk to seed swap time but swapping to seed only 7 days into a 30 day nest seems kinda fast, or am I just over cautious??

The crop milk is only produced for the first 5-7 days, at least that is my understanding. Just make sure they are getting fed.

 

[tacothechicken]

Alrighty guys so baby spent an hr whither me yesterday evening as I warmed him up before bed since he was distinctly below body temp and then hastled Soup too at least stand over him before I turned out the lights out. Luckily he did fine last night, and his crop is definitely full, although I have yet to see it really descend since they stuffed him full of seed last night so I don't know how often they're feeding but they appear to be doing every 2/3 hrs which is fine by me as long as he's getting fed. Also the tiny opened his eyes last night!

 

[biophiliac]

So add 2 more to my loft. Trip and Rocky’s pair hatched yesterday. That’s 6 babies in 14 days. One more pair of eggs to go!
Doesn’t he look proud?
View attachment 2062767View attachment 2062768

Congrats! He does look so proud with that tail all fanned out! But he has neglected to remove the shells from the nest. Got to do that right away so predators don't see you have live babies.

 

[PioneerChicks]

I'm considering getting pigeons! No guarantees yet, but I'm aiming to get some this year or the next. Complete newbie to the pigeon world. I have a friend who has pigeons, and he lets them out once a day and they fly for about ten minutes then they return to his loft. My guess is those are Homing pigeons? I want mine to do that, though I don't care much about big pigeon races and that kind of stuff.

My number one priority right now is building the coop and researching what they need. I will be building the coop, mostly from scratch. Advice? Also, what supplies do pigeons need? I don't want to get a bunch of stuff that is just for decoration and such, I'm just that kind of person!

About how much does it cost to feed pigeons? I want to get 4-8.

I have read through all the pigeon articles on BYC and learned some, but I still have a lot of questions. I am working on reading through the previous posts on this thread and other BYC posts about pigeons.

Sorry about all the questions, to a little carried away by my questions while writing this. Tell me when you are ready for load to of pigeon questions!

Can't wait to learn more about pigeons and all of you pigeon keepers!

 

[Qwerty3159]

Advice: Build bigger than you think you'll need because pigeons multiply fast and are very addicting! I'm not a very skilled carpenter so I also suggest making your loft out of easy dimensions such as 4x4 or 4x8 to minimize the amount of cutting and waste of plywood and other materials.

Pigeons are not expensive to feed. I buy a pigeon mix from Chewy.com for around $35 that lasted a flock of 5 about six months at a time or more. In the winter you can add more corn to their feed to keep them warm which is also very cheap.

Their loft needs to be clean and DRY to stay healthy. They need clean water and a clean uncontaminated feeder, and they appreciate a bath as well. They also need access to grit which is also pretty cheap, and the hens need oyster shell or some other calcium supplement during egg laying times. You can buy very nice feeders and waterers and other equipment for the birds online but you can also save money and make your own, it doesn't matter either way and is purely up to personal taste. What I do is cut a square hole into the side of a gallon iced tea jug to use as a waterer and instead of cleaning it over and over again I just throw the old one away every week or so and replace it with a new empty jug. Also when pigeons drink they like to stick their whole beak under the water and sip like a horse, therefore it's important that the container for water is deep enough to allow that. They're able to sip drops and stuff like that and I'm sure they could learn to use a nipple waterer but they prefer the big sips

 

[Old_Strain_Lover]

https://www.chewy.com/browns-calcium-grey-grit-bird-food-50/dp/216153
Would this be fine as a regular grit or is this meant to be an oyster shell replacement? I give them this purplish poultry grit at the moment but I finally am about to run out and it would be convenient if this worked. I have oyster shell anyway but I need a regular grit.

This is the grit you would want as an all purpose grit... https://www.chewy.com/browns-national-pigeon-grey-grit-bird/dp/216155
Also just getting caught up as I haven't been on in a while. Sorry to hear about you losing your birds! Did the person you got them from fly them? It makes me wonder if they just bred them as "homers", or were trying to breed to a more showy type... as it's VERY strange to have 5 birds get lost at the same time because of a hawk. When not even a single one returned on it's own makes me question what kind of "homers" the person sold you.

 

[Qwerty3159]

This is the grit you would want as an all purpose grit... https://www.chewy.com/browns-national-pigeon-grey-grit-bird/dp/216155
When not even a single one returned on it's own makes me question what kind of "homers" the person sold you.

I agree it's very strange. The guy I got them from was a racer actually. He had a few different lofts and had all the clocks and race cages and whatnot in his garage, he wasn't the owner of the club but I think his house was the hub for that particular club. I know he flew them. It was frustrating because I made sure to purchase from a racer in the area because I wanted good stock.
I do think though that for whatever reason there is something off with these birds. I got 7 from him originally and I lost one to sickness and the rest to hawks or them just disappearing. By January last year I was down to 4 and satisfied with the routing I was seeing from the cock in my avatar and another bird so I took those two on a quarter mile toss just to see what they would do and they flew in the direction of home but I didn't see them for another day. By March last year I just had that cock bird in my avatar and his mate. I decided to let them breed and build up a small flock again and see how it went. The first pair of babies that pair raised was the one I just retrieved from another state and his sibling. On their very first outing (I was literally just having them sit on the board and have a look around before coming in the trap after a week or two of the settling cage) and they both immediately took off, circled around, and disappeared. This was shocking to me as the birds were born in my loft and less than 8 weeks old. The next day finally one of them (the one I have now) came back but I never saw his sibling again. I let them raise another set but I didn't end up getting them out all summer or fall because the hawk pressure for me is worst from March to December for whatever reason. Come last December I was letting then out again and things were going well. I was having some issues with recall and stuff but they weren't getting lost or anything like that. They were disappearing sometimes for an hour at a time but always coming back so I was confident they knew the area. I had zero hawk attacks from December to March and the very first one was when all the birds split and never came back.
My point in this big long story is that I think there was something wrong with the father (my avatar) of my birds that he passed down to them because his offspring couldn't home worth anything either. That day I tossed them and they were lost I think I got them back purely by luck. They did fine on loft flies but I guess the hawk chased them a bit too far off and they got lost. Very baffling. The parents were flying here for more than a year and a half and the rest were all born here. The hen he bred with also wasn't great quality in my opinion as she was very petite and noticeably smaller than any homer I had ever seen but she survived or evaded probably 50 hawks in the time I had her so I thought she was alright. The racer didn't have any other breeds either so I don't think any were accidental mutts

 

[Old_Strain_Lover]

I agree it's very strange. The guy I got them from was a racer actually. He had a few different lofts and had all the clocks and race cages and whatnot in his garage, he wasn't the owner of the club but I think his house was the hub for that particular club. I know he flew them. It was frustrating because I made sure to purchase from a racer in the area because I wanted good stock.
I do think though that for whatever reason there is something off with these birds. I got 7 from him originally and I lost one to sickness and the rest to hawks or them just disappearing. By January last year I was down to 4 and satisfied with the routing I was seeing from the cock in my avatar and another bird so I took those two on a quarter mile toss just to see what they would do and they flew in the direction of home but I didn't see them for another day. By March last year I just had that cock bird in my avatar and his mate. I decided to let them breed and build up a small flock again and see how it went. The first pair of babies that pair raised was the one I just retrieved from another state and his sibling. On their very first outing (I was literally just having them sit on the board and have a look around before coming in the trap after a week or two of the settling cage) and they both immediately took off, circled around, and disappeared. This was shocking to me as the birds were born in my loft and less than 8 weeks old. The next day finally one of them (the one I have now) came back but I never saw his sibling again. I let them raise another set but I didn't end up getting them out all summer or fall because the hawk pressure for me is worst from March to December for whatever reason. Come last December I was letting then out again and things were going well. I was having some issues with recall and stuff but they weren't getting lost or anything like that. They were disappearing sometimes for an hour at a time but always coming back so I was confident they knew the area. I had zero hawk attacks from December to March and the very first one was when all the birds split and never came back.
My point in this big long story is that I think there was something wrong with the father (my avatar) of my birds that he passed down to them because his offspring couldn't home worth anything either. That day I tossed them and they were lost I think I got them back purely by luck. They did fine on loft flies but I guess the hawk chased them a bit too far off and they got lost. Very baffling. The parents were flying here for more than a year and a half and the rest were all born here. The hen he bred with also wasn't great quality in my opinion as she was very petite and noticeably smaller than any homer I had ever seen but she survived or evaded probably 50 hawks in the time I had her so I thought she was alright. The racer didn't have any other breeds either so I don't think any were accidental mutts

Yeah I think they were missing the homing instinct if it took so long to return from a quarter mile. It's a shame someone gave you birds like that. I have had youngsters return from 40, 50, even 60 miles without ever having flown. I have sold some youngsters after they went out into the aviary and got a look around and even after telling the buyer not to release them, they did anyways and they ended up coming back to me. When I start training, my first toss is from 10 miles... routing takes them out a few miles so I don't even bother with those short tosses. If you lived closer I would set you up with some good birds.

 

[biophiliac]

I'm considering getting pigeons! No guarantees yet, but I'm aiming to get some this year or the next. Complete newbie to the pigeon world. I have a friend who has pigeons, and he lets them out once a day and they fly for about ten minutes then they return to his loft. My guess is those are Homing pigeons? I want mine to do that, though I don't care much about big pigeon races and that kind of stuff.

My number one priority right now is building the coop and researching what they need. I will be building the coop, mostly from scratch. Advice? Also, what supplies do pigeons need? I don't want to get a bunch of stuff that is just for decoration and such, I'm just that kind of person!

About how much does it cost to feed pigeons? I want to get 4-8.

I have read through all the pigeon articles on BYC and learned some, but I still have a lot of questions. I am working on reading through the previous posts on this thread and other BYC posts about pigeons.

Sorry about all the questions, to a little carried away by my questions while writing this. Tell me when you are ready for load to of pigeon questions!

Can't wait to learn more about pigeons and all of you pigeon keepers!

Welcome! You have come to the right place to learn more about pigeons and chat with other pigeon lovers.