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Live for today but work for everyone's tomorrow! Any views expressed here are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of any organisation/institution I am affiliated with.

Friday 27 February 2015

A pigeon called Stumpy

One of the byproducts of trying to grow your own starling flock in a small back garden (by dint of providing water - including bird baths - and lots of suitable food), is that you may of course attract other animals (this does not include the rats described in this blog, they are elsewhere, but it does include the badgers). Hence, we now host a significant flock of feral pigeons. Some thirty come to feed each day.

This is another species that is not universally liked and for some is viewed simply as flying vermin, because pigeons foul buildings and so forth. I quite like them but what always strikes me when I see them (and at one point I used to teach a course on urban ecology that included some consideration of the variety of pigeons) is how many have problems with their feet. Many are lame to varying degrees, many have lost toes or get stuff stuck on their feet that they cannot remove. Most of ours have two good legs but back in the summer one arrived with a very badly damaged leg. 

The leg looked like it had been caught in something sticky and had been broken and pulled backwards. I tried to catch her thinking I might be able to splint the leg but whilst she had only one leg to hop on, she had two good wings and quick reactions, and I had to give up.

Since then she has been a regular visitor to the garden. She compensates for her disability by putting her left wing (it is her left leg that does not work) down to the ground from time to time to help her balance. She got the name of Stumpy - which is silly because the leg is still there, (pointing backwards and useless) - and she behaves slightly differently to the rest of her flock. She is also less inclined to fly off if someone is in the garden |(meaning she often gets some extra food) and when the rest are in a scrum on the lawn she makes for the bird table where there is usually a good concentration of food. This gets her away from the jostling of the others, a compensating behavior that she has surely learnt.

This is Stumpy sitting down -on the lawn  she spends more tine sitting than the rest of her flock

A typical pose - using her wings to help balance

Stumpy- a handsome bird, here with a crop full of food

It is apparent from the attention of the other pigeons that Stumpy is a girl. She has survived the snow and the rain,  the strong winds and many sub zero nights of winter so far. I don't know where she roosts and sometimes her undercarriage looks a little more bedraggled than that of the others but somehow  she is managing.

I saw a starling collecting some dry grass a couple of days ago; Spring is coming! Can a one-legged pigeon possibly raise a brood. My guess is that she will try.

I guess that the reason that so many have foot problems is that they wonder around in all the effluvia that we leave all over the streets and if they get entangled they cannot get the material off. They suffer from the infection bumble-foot also seen in domestic fowl.


There is a lovely story HERE about a flock of crows who show their appreciation for being regularly fed by rewarding the little girls concerned with small gifts.

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