Wild animals are not stupid, but they use their intelligence mostly to concentrate on survival skills. When domesticated, they begin to focus on other things.
I had a wild pet pigeon when I was a kid that I acquired by feeding it and it would follow me no matter where I went but it would follow me by flying miles directly above my head. After biking around I'd run into other kids and point up to the little tiny dot in the sky and try and tell them that it was my pet bird, I was roughly 8. They didn't believe me until I'd drive to an open field and within 10 minutes the bird would be there right next to me. My friends thought I was amazing, I knew I was. The funniest part is 20 years later I told me mom about it and she had no idea. I had the bird for awhile, it would sleep on my garage roof at night waiting for me to feed him in the morning.
I had 1 pigeon, around 6 weeks old, male. Today, my dad and I caught a female 3 week old pigeon and they are so cute. The older (male) started to clean the younger (female) and showed her the food! I'm so happy with my pets!
I enjoyed watching this program. I wished more people were made aware of how lovely pigeons are are. I rescued a woodpigeon in August 17 (he was 5 days old), and recently a feral pigeon (about 3 weeks old). It is hard work, but very rewarding to rescue a bird. Pigeons are docile, sweet and very clever.
In September 2021 we rescued an injured pigeon and brought it back to health. We named him Lucky. He visited us everyday, once a day, for two months. We left food and water for him. Sadly, he didn’t return and we’re hoping he flew off to his family.
I feed the pigeons in my garden and make sure they have water, it gets on my neighbours nerves, but then again my neighbour gets on my nerves so we are equal.
I had a racing pigeon live with me for four months he must’ve got lost along the way but he stayed with me for four months and I didn’t want to report him as I heard they would kill them if you sent them back as they were no use as racing pigeons they try to say that they live have them back but generally they will kill as they got lost on the way and won’t make any money. He brought me so much joy brought very much happiness to me. I hope he is free somewhere and is happy.
My pigeons come every day for their breakfast. I have one that has been eating from my hand for over two years now. Sometimes I will be in the house, and he would perch against my patio door and do some loud cooing hopping I will show up with a few snacks. Same for the mourning doves.
I looove pigeons so much! When I lived in Montreal they were everywhere, and I never left the house without a bag of bird food for those I would cross paths with. :)
I do that too now, I started a delivery job feeding people taking food to their homes, now I always take bread with me and feed the swans and pigeons wherever I go when I see them if they look hungry. I see them all as out of work homing messenger pigeons, they have been part of our lives and messengers since the dawn of civilisation living with humans, caring for them helps you to understand the natural world we are part of, we got lost from, we need to remember and connect again too. 😊🕊✌
You are sooo kind, My Friend!😊 Only the pigeons will be even more grateful to you if you give them seeds instead of bread😛 Bread is great for humans but not really for birds😉 They'll be much healthier and have netter lives!😀 But anyway - thank you for supporting them with all your heart, the world would be a much better place if people were like you!🐦💓👍
Absolutely amazing documentary!👍 However unfortunately pigeons DO get hit and run over by cars. I've seen this happen, I've seen pigeons hit or run over by cars and they had looked healthy and energetic before the accidents😞 So even though they have extraordinary perception, this does not always prevent them from being killed. All depends on us - drivers - if we keep our eyes open for birds on the road and if we drive carefully.
Homing pigeons saved thousands of lives during the war. One bird alone, called William of Orange, saved two thousand lives.. There is a brilliant film called "War of the Birds" on the internet. There was a special branch called M14, which was the Secret Pigeon Service in the military.As for this programme it was very interesting, but the experiment of numbing the pigeon's nostrils with an anaesthetic makes no sense. No wonder it took time to re-orientate - because the anaesthetic would affect its brain and consequently its ability to navigate. Thanks for the programme.
To conclude that smell is a contributor to the sense of homing based on a sample of one is a real stretch. Should switch the same 3 birds with the controls, take them in a different direction and repeat the experiment.
Ron Beeckman, totally agree. All i say from the analysis of his experiment on the effect of odours is the flight path of a drugged bird similar to drunken intoxicated man trying to find his way home from a stranger's s house 10 miles away Lidocaine spray for a baby far exceeds the safety dose for that pigeons olfactory area. After absorption, what else would have been affected (partially anesthetized), its frontal lobe, or may be one or both optic nerve or motor input to muscles controlling eye movement and its ability to focus. I was led to do one thing, hit the pause on his image and have a good long look some how hoping that for whatever reason, he would do the same. SMH
A very interesting video .I really like pigeons but am opposed to all this testing etc etc .Pigeons are terrific no matter what .Humans need sorting much more and are so uninformed hence lack of respect ...Long live the pigeon 👍
Excellent upload! Being a lifetime fancier found it very interesting. As regard homing,they still are and will always be one of nature's biggest secret! The sense of smell? navigation by sun position? magnetic field? In the past when I was racing my birds, navigate in all weathers too, no sun,flying in rain no chance of sniffing for home! Obviously in these situations the weather changed on route, they were liberated in ideal conditions at racepoints,but here were I live it can change in matter of few hours. The humble pigeon, still to this day gives me enjoyment!
They're such enjoyable birds. I own 2 turtle doves and with some training i've taught them a few tricks. They're potty trained but they can, on command, land on my arm, they can fly through hoops and they can even fetch things! I keep a spare pencil, eraser, pencil sharpener and even a teaspoon near their nest in case i lose my own. I've done a lot of fun things in my life but nothing's ever put quite the same kind of smile on my face as having a pencil delivered by a pigeon!
Hi, i got 3 queries:- 1) What is the best time to feed the pigeons? 2) What food best to feed pigeons? 3) What time pigeons sleep? I chanced upon 1 pigeon behind my house and thought it is hungry so I fed it with some bread.... Thereafter more and more pigeons will wait behind my house everyday and I started feeding all of them... they were so adorable! Curious to know their habitats, characteristics and more....
😮i AM sorry but after being bullied for 6 years,life threatened to the point that i found it Impossible to continue feeding a group of city piegeons which i fed for those 6 years, finding myself heartbroken worried that the piegeons that were with me Will have a lot of dificulty going back to live off of what they can find i can only say that people are cruel and mean and very stupid. Piegeons are curious an Smart, they do know who is friend and who is not and they are definately not the rats of the sky people say they are. I love them, it is easy to fall in love with such cute creatures. I only wish i knew if they will survive this winter. PS: here in Portugal we frequently find piegeons in the streets Runned Over by automobiles , i had to pick some of my dead piegeons at least half a dozen times.
I don't like they track pigeons with radio equipment. It is unhealthy and they can get stuck. They want to be home with their spouse and babies, not be taken far away.
Been around pigeons all my life .My grandfather and uncles raced them . Seeing a bird drop after a 14 hour flight in a head wind is an amazing sight and feeling.
I feed my wild bird's at least three times a day pigions mainly but all bird's. Best fed bird's in Dublin mostly on porridge it's cheep and cheerfully and they love it. They have a long life that they wouldn't have only I feed them, my way of staying connected. What I also noticed was this I feed them on my window ledge and they don't foul it. I think this is because they feed of the ledge and food mixed with shit is not cool even for pigions ☘️😮
Pigeons actually lay 2 eggs every 10 days of you remove the eggs and I have a 14 year old that hatched 3 babies this year.. #OhYouGoLearnSomethingToday..
"Pigeons can see for 42 kilometers" is a bit confusing. They can see what? Can they distinguish something of what size at that distance? Measuring eyesight by distance alone is not a good metric, in my opinion. For example how far can humans see? 10 km, 50, 1000, a million, 150 million kilometers or more? The sun is about 150 million km away and we can see it, no problem. The Andromeda Galaxy is about 2.5 million light years away from Earth (that's 23 quadrillion km away) and we can see it with the naked eye. I'm sure a lot of eyes in the animal kingdom can see the moon and the sun, even if not in focus or how we humans see them.
7mins in. Those 2 females have different hair and skin colour. That is the reason the pigeons recognise the feeder regardless of what lab coat they are wearing. This simple experiment has no proof that it's anything to do with facial features.
In the time of "CORONAVIRUS WORLD WAR - 3" in 2020 when your own life is at the hands of a invisible pandemic it's cinema and documentaries that breaks all barriers and provides solace and entertainment in the confines of home. As a lifelong sports enthusiast and a silver jubilee pathological gambler on horse racing decided to understand the sport of pigeon racing.Picked the right documentary on understanding pigeons and found this video extremely educating to a novice from Mumbai in India where pigeons are considered sacred.Over 2 decades in the 1980's/90's our tiny gallery in Mumbai had a pair of ordinary wild rock pigeons roosting on the top of a cupboard kept in the gallery.I presume that numerous pigeons in the vicinity of our building in Mumbai can trace their ancestry to the first pair of wild pigeons that roosted and bred in our house gallery.Thanks to this scientific documentary got to understand the pigeon better which is otherwise considered a nuisance in some locales.In India especially in Mumbai there are a few locations in the city called "Kabootar Khana's" where wild rock pigeons are regularly fed. If living in the open countryside in India would have definitely bred fancy pigeons as a hobby. Ahoy !
They look for food where there is none for too many hours a day. When they are properly fed, they eat twice a day and drink after. They starve. It is not OK that they are not taken care of and that lies are spread about them by the pest control comapnies unpunished.
I dont think we can judge a lot by the odor test made in the documentary, he might've overdosed it with xylocaine and bird became confused and it bothered a bird much more than the placement of home (I think)
Not exactly odors! the bird breathes thru its nose.. and it has a super fast heart beat.. yes.. its "something" in there.. but exactly what does not exactly indicate odors as clearly as sniffing glue might mess you up who knows what effect that medicine had on the birds brain, and also physically. its a great experiment.. but how the conclusions were drawn is NOT definitive of a particular thing.
homing pigeon races agreed spray its nose .... Yep they smell home done. It's an all in one deal. They fly and know what they are doing better than we do.
A shame they made so many errors in this video it looked ok at start. here is just a few: pigeons do get hit by cars every day- and they do eat more, when given more- Age 3 years, i have 60 and them i send on pension after racing 5 years is still in fine shape at 10-16 years.
"Pigeons see the world in slow motion. If they were to watch a movie, which is typically 24 frames per second, it would move as slowly to them as a slide presentation. Closer to 75 frames per second." What?
Floriano Papi in 1971 published his research showing it was the pigeon's sense of smell that guided its homing ability. This is an interesting video, but they ought to have explained they were only repeating an experiment, the results of which were already known.
