One of our pigeons is missing

Pidgie Pigeon, RIP

Oh, I know it's small in the scheme of things. A wood pigeon, shuffled off to the great nest in the sky. A late pigeon;  a pigeon who has ceased to be.

Regular readers to this blog will know that for the past five years a pair of wood pigeons has been visiting the garden several times a day, and I've been throwing down seed for them.

The male, a very plump and gregarious bird, would run towards me as fast as his little legs would carry him.  I named him "Pidgie." Well, I haven't seen Pidgie for more than a week now. So I'm assuming that he has Passed.

Meanwhile his mate, Leg, is spending more time in the garden and has a winsome new habit of perching on the garden gate so that she can fix a beady eye on me when I come down for breakfast.

Leg was named thus because she limps.

An intruder pigeon has started hanging around, and Leg is defending her patch.  J maintains this is probably a new male moving in on Pidgie's turf. Or on Pidgie's bird, in fact.

I wonder if Leg knows that Pidgie is dead, or, as in the case of swans, has to see the body to acknowledge it.

I draw your attention to this wonderful, heart breaking poem by Gillian Clarke.

Swans

She was brave in the bitter river,
the Mary Rose, doomed,
ice-chalice, lily in bloom.

Thaw, her feathers and bones dissolve in the flow
and she's gone, flower that floated
so light under death's undertow.

In lengthening light he patrols alone
ferocious on his watery shore
where the nest from last year and the year before

has drowned to a dredge of sticks and sludge.
In full sail, his body ablaze, bridge
over unfenced water, he waits for her.

The voice on the phone said,
"He doesn't know she's dead.
There is nothing to be done."

Now love rides the river
like a king's ship, all wake and quiver,
and I can't tell him, it's over.

Good news for Pigeon Fanciers

A few weeks ago I wrote about Lieutenant Pigeon, the lone pigeon who has been a daily visitor to our garden for the last two years.

He's not so lonely.

Lt Pigeon now has a pigeon fancy who has accompanied him for the last couple of weeks. Their visits have been less frequent:  I can no longer set my watch by them.  So J believes they are building a nest. Our garden, he rightly points out, is a bit low on nest materials.

Here they are, looking for dropped seeds from our bird feeders. Lieutenant is on the left, but I may be mistaken.

Lieutenant Pigeon

Introducing the sad, lonely pigeon who lives in our garden.

I'm afraid he's a bit camera shy, so he doesn't pose very well for photos.
There is he, enjoying the rare flash of sunshine that we had on New Year's Day.

This plump wood pigeon has lived in our garden for the last couple of years. We didn't realise it until we got rid of the previous owner's leylandii trees and started to notice the pigeon roosting on the fence. He came back day after day. When spring came, a year later, he was still on the fence but occasionally joined by his mate.

Now he is solitary again.

He turns up every day at 8.30 and spends the hours pecking hopefully beneath the bird feeders, picking up the seeds that smaller birds have dropped. I imagine he must have several gardens he visits because I doubt if he would be so plump on the strength of our dropped seeds.

When the sun comes out, he perches on the garage roof and his head droops to his chest as he enjoys the warmth on his feathers.
When it's windy and wet, he sits gloomily on the fence and his plumage gets ruffled.

I've grown attached to "the pidge" and look out for him during the day when I'm working, with my view of the garden. He could be around for quite a while. I'm told they live between 3 - 5 years, occasionally up to 15.