Birds, eggs & other journal notes

Mourning Doves:

• Their brains register the task of parenting
• Together they build a sloppy nest
• The eggs are laid — typically two
• After the eggs hatch, the father and mother alike feed their nestlings with milk
• They eventually offer plant seeds from their beaks (mourning doves eat mostly seeds)
• The hatchlings grow strong and go on to sing more distinctively than most other birds
• Their calls evoke a few simple woodwind notes
• Ancient woodwinds were used to mimic animal calls
• The Northern Paiute word for wind instrument is te-mo’-yaga-ke-no

Misc:

• Rock doves, like drunks, walk precariously close to moving car tires
• Great-tailed grackles — house guests behaving badly
• A Northern mockingbird — inexhaustible in his spry April song
• Darwin acquired various types of pigeons, breeding them to help him build evidence for his theory of natural selection, which he would present in On the Origin of Species
• He became uncharacteristically smitten with his pigeons, science writer Courtney Humphries stated in her book Superdove: How the Pigeon Took Manhattan … and the World