Mother and Baby

I went to Pelee Island for a few days on another birding trip, hence the blip silence. Had a wonderful time and we found some rare birds by ourselves. More on that if I get around to back blipping.

I'm back at work and trying to hang on to the holiday glow.

We've been spending time at work watching our pigeon family. This is the larger of the chicks and the mom. The previous blip was the first pigeon picture if you want to compare their growth. Oh, and this is blurry, but this is the best picture for today.

The chicks are about 2 weeks old now and they are about half grown and getting cute. They can walk around slowly, preen, eat and stretch their wings.

But I think there is an impending tragedy.

Both chicks were getting fed but the smaller of the two chicks didn't look as coordinated or as strong as the other one. They were both sitting on the nest this morning but this afternoon the smaller chick disappeared.

I found it later huddled up against an air outlet on another part of the ledge. It's breathing but I think it's going to die. I don't know whether its stronger sibling forced it out or whether it decided to leave itself. I know that the mother was feeding it.

It's very sad. But I guess that's the way it works.


PS It's great to be back! I'll try to catch up with everyone!