



Pigeon cocks are devoted fathers and Walter has been very committed.









Walter









Rocky







But I have been once again surprised by pigeons because Rocky & Walter appear no where near as delighted with their babies as Santino & Charlie were in 2009 when I did have a pair of genuine Oops Babies hatch in my coop.





Santino & Charlie didn't leave their babies alone in the nest for the first couple of weeks while Rocky & Walter have been only visiting intermittently since the babies were only a week old. They've done a wonderful job caring for them but seem much less interested and thrilled than Charlie & Santino were.





Babies out of the nest for a moment while I clean (under Walter's careful supervision)











Babies home alone in their nest box





The family







On the morning of June 26, the day the babies that I call Junior & Sweets were 4 weeks old and would typically be sold and butchered as squab , I woke up to a different kind of horror. (WARNING: Images of an injured baby pigeon to follow.)









That morning, before I came out, Junior had come out on the "porch" of his (gender still TBD) nestbox and either jumped or fallen off. He landed in front of Frances & Country's nestbox (the bottom floor of the tower) and I believe went in mistakenly.









I came out to find him trapped in their box. Unable to find the door, he was stuck trying to get out through the bars and was seriously injured by the adult birds for trespassing. Country pecked his flank (on the inside of the box) while Frances, I believe, attacked his head which was poking out.









Amazingly, he has survived and is healing. For now, I've locked them in their nest box and only open their door when I'm there to supervise.









I've yet again been surprised because Rocky, the injured baby's mother, has to be kept out of the nest box. She attacked Junior as if he was an intruder while his father Walter has continued to parent him. Walter flies in to the nest box to feed the babies every time I open their door.









Rocky, not the pij mother I expected her to be





Sweets







Junior







Walter (with glands swollen from feeding the babies)







Thankfully, Sweets has remained very loving and gentle with her sibling, Junior, despite his disfiguring injuries.





The amazing rate at which baby pigeons grow also gives them tremendous healing abilities. These two pictures were taken less than 24 hours apart.





Junior's behaving n ormally, is continuing to develop and is beginning to self-feed. I'm hopeful that he will make a full recovery from this terrible ordeal. This experience was very different for me than with the Oops Babies in that they never left their nest (whether accidentally or on purpose) until they were much older and they were also much more closely supervised by their parents than Junior & Sweets have been.



