Birmingham Roller Pigeons and Mourning Doves.
We live in a rural area in the upper part of Michigan's lower peninsula. We have birds constantly
crashing into the windows. When the bird is unresponsive or disoriented to the point of not being
able to stand, we will pick the bird up and try to get it to grip one of our fingers. One can feel
the strength coming back into their grip as they come around. We will try to talk softly to it from
behind , slightly from one side and then the other paying close attention to the movement of the head.
What we are looking for is movement in both directions from the bird to let us know the neck is not broke.
All the while, softly stroking the bird with a finger along the grain of the feather. Head to tail. It
sometimes just takes a few minutes, but we have had them in hand for over a half hour before they finally flew
off. It's a great feeling to see them leave.
My wife has done this much more than I but it's wonderful to see them fly off. I call her the bird whisperer.
Coo, coo they said.
The sad thing about Mourning Doves is they have a short life span and seem to be on earth to feed the raptors, as Hawks and Eagles love them.
Falling at terminal velocity was mentioned here. Here is a Birmingham Roller that does just that.
Birmingham Roller
This young pigeon showed up one day a couple years ago. We have bird feeders, but this guy would not go to them . We finally started putting out a little food and water for him as he looked like someones pet. There was a band around one of it's legs , and although it would let us get close, he would not let us handle him. After numerous pics enlarged of the band on his leg, and using online media, we tracked him back to his owner who lives about 3 miles away. This bird is used in competition for what is called rolling. 20 birds are released and scored by how many of them "roll in a dead fall". The ones that are falling look like they died mid air and free fall for quite a distance before pulling out of the dead fall. It almost looks like they are going to crash into the ground. At least 5 of the 20 have to do so in unison to be able to score points. I had never heard of it, but the owner was very happy when we finally got him into a live trap and he got to go home.
Lost Pigeon Gets To Go Home
We tracked him back to it's owner after about a week of him hanging out. After numerous close up camera shots of the band on his leg, we were able to piece together all but one number on the leg band. Social media and this number led us to it's owner who was very grateful to get him back. He had flown about 3 miles in a fog bank and storm that followed and ended up at our place.
It would not feed at the bird feeders, even though he watched other birds doing so. I think it would have died of thirst if we had not put out a small bowl of water for him,
even though the pond was 40 feet away and he watched other birds drinking from it. We finally put out a little dish of bird seed and a small bowl of water for him. I had never heard of Roller pigeons and the competitions they have with them, but a quick youtube search explained it for me. He would let us get close to him. Up to a couple feet , but would not let us touch him. The owner brought over a live trap and we finally tricked him into going inside of it with some food. So after a week away from his coop and companions, he finally got to go home. The guy who owns him is a retired State cop, and we had made plans to go fishing some day, but we've yet to do so. He's a very
nice guy and posting this has me thinking about giving him a call for some local lake fishing. Bluegills and Perch.
