where are the baby pigeons?

Question

How come I always see flocks of adult pigeons but no young ones? with other birds you can tell the young apart from the adults but I never can tell with pigeons.

Answer 1

The very young don't fly yet. When they molt to get their flying feathers they look the same as older pidgeons. Pidgeons don't go through varied color stages because they don't have much color to them anyhow.

Answer 2

We get this question periodically. Here's the answer:

Pigeons are altricial birds, i.e., they stay in the nest until they can fly. Pigeon young are hatched at 18 days. They stay in the nest till they are about 30-35 days old. When they fly for the first time, you can often see them in flocks among the adults if you know what to look for. Young pigeons have little if any iridescence on the neck. They still often squeal when they chase their parents or other adult trying to con them into feeding them. Their feathers are a bit duller than the adults and their tail feathers often have a slight point to them - where the down was attached.

Pigeon young almost double their weight each day in the nest and pigeon parents feed them well. In fact, for about the first ten days, they actually feed them a "crop milk". It's not really milk as we think of in mammals -- it looks more like a cottage cheese they produce - but it is a high energy food and the youngsters (squeakers) grow fast and well on it. About 7-10 days into the nest period after hatch, the adults begin to add grain, seeds, whatever, to the food that they are giving the youngsters.

There are a lot of young pigeons out there at certain times of year and part of the fun of looking at a flock is to recognize which are young and which are adults.

If you want to find out more, you might want to also check a few sites like:

http://www.angelfire.com/ga3/pigeongenetics
http://www.pigeon.org

BTW - Here's a pics of a young pigeon in the nest. http://www.speedpigeon.com/10-Day_Old_baby_racing_pigeon.jpg

Answer 3

Pigeons are cavity or crevice nesters. It is hard to see babies due to where they nest. Babies are almost full grown when they leave the nest. They are fully feathered and don't molt for another 6 months. The reason why they are not able to fly when they fledge has nothing to do with feathering, it has to do with lack of muscle in the wings and breast. The will spend sometime on the ground, their parents will care for them while they are there, and they will build up their muscles. Pigeons are heavy bodied birds it takes a lot to get them into the air. The difference between and adult and a baby are...A babies cere is the same color as the beak, an adult had a chalky white cere...Babies are missing a small ring of feathers around the eye, and when disturbed make a high pitched WEE WEE noise.

Answer 4

what are you looking for? Bird babies have to be fully feathered to fly.. Pigeon babies tend to fledge or get adult plumage or near adult plumage right away only some colors and breeds of pigeons go through a juvinile phase of colors. Pigeons grow very fast and by the time there ready to fly they are only sightly smaller than there parents. If you are looking for baby pigeons you are only going to maybe find ones that are slightly smaller that the other pidgeons and maybe a duller color. I raised Fan-Tailed Pigeons and there babies always fledged there coloration on the first moult. So snow white parents and snow white offspring and green metalics had green metalics so on and so forth.

Answer 5

the young pigeons look exactly like the adults, although the young are a little skinnier and have thinner beaks, and look a little more fluffy, the feathers have slight down comin out from behind the proper feathers, but u can only notice this up close

Answer 6

Once they are fledged, they are nearly as big as the adults. This is true of most birds. Some birds have special juvenile plumage, but pigeons don't.

Answer 7

the baby pigeons are all in my garden they are hard to tell apart from their parents as they are only a little smaller than them but you can tell by the way they watch and then copy that they a baby pigeons......

Answer 8

All young birds look like the adults , You dont see the chicks because they cant fly till they are adults..

Answer 9

You'll find that most of the baby pigeons around my neck of the woods end up in my cats tummy! :)

Answer 10

i once saw a baby one in york. to be fair tho, it may have just been a midget pigeon!