Gypsy and Tink get along well. They sleep next to each other on the same branch and they like to preen each other. Recently Gypsy has been going around our house and try to pick up stringy things; he spent a lot of time trying to eat (as we thought then) head phone cords and other wires.
Yesterday he found some hay and carried it up to one of thier favorite spots to sit next to each other where they often preen and coo.
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| They spend a lot of their day here. |
Gypsy put the twine underneath him. Anna gave him some more and he tucked each piece neatly away beneath him. We kept giving him more twine and occasionally a twig or some hay. Tink helped very little. An hour later their nest was finished.
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| Sadly it didn't look like this . . . |
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| Or this . . . |
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| Or even this. |
Their nest looked liked this.
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| This is not Gypsy's and Tink's fault. Apparently all doves make nests that sometimes at a slight breeze will fall straight out of the tree. The mortality rate for a young dove is 67% because of poor craftmanship (and the fact that they drive the squabs out of the nest at 2 weeks old to make way for the next clutch). |
After all this hard work was done Gypsy was kind enough to regurgitate "crop milk" into Tinks mouth. Then he mated with her for 3 seconds.
A male and female pair of doves is called a "true pair". If they have eggs we are going to find a way to stop them from hatching and then replace them with plastic eggs that no matter how long incubated will never hatch.
By Claire.
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