A Dovely Day!

What a lovely day I had today.  The sun was shining although I didn't see much of it.  I was inside the hospital at Wing and a Prayer which is one of my most favourite places to be.  It's always great to be surrounded by so many wonderful birds (and three hedgehogs) but today was a red letter day!  Today was the day I was able to feed one of my baby Doves for the first time!  Yes, sorry we are back to Doves again, never fear I am getting chickens soon so I will be boring the world about them in due course.

Anyway, back to my baby Doves.  They are doing really well, their lovely white feathers are coming through already, you can see the feather shaft with tufty bits coming out of it and in places there are largish flight feathers coming through.  It's really interesting, if you find that sort of thing interesting which I do, to see the actual layers of feathers, especially on the wings.  I have always tried hard to learn the names of different types of feather, Primaries, Secondaries etc but sitting gazing at my little ones I can really see the separate areas.  I also found it fascinating how there is a gap at skin level before the actual feather starts.  So you have the quill part and then the feathery bits.  I'm imagining this gives the bird insulation by trapping air close to the skin.  Mind you, what do I know the whole thing could look totally different before they are fully grown.  It's just that where the feathers are coming through you can see the base of each one.  Totally amazing.

So, as I was saying, I was able to feed one of them with a syringe.  They have a special mix made up of powder and water, it's the colour of biscuits and about the consistency of thick custard.  You hold the birds beak between your index and middle finger, with your fingers pointing down and palm towards you.  As you grasp their beak they open their mouth and you squirt a little amount of food in, then they swallow and scream blue murder for more.  Absolutely wonderful!  I fed Perky, the slightly smaller one because Pinky the bigger and just a little more developed one is a loony and jumps all over the place.  After they had been fed I was able to have both of them on my lap for a cuddle.  At one point I had the two White Doves on my lap, Woody the Collared Dove on my shoulder and Twizzle (who was called Wurzel but has now been found to be a girl) was sitting on my handbag in the kitchen.  How cool was that.  Who would have thought I would be doing that a year ago when I was so desperate to get out of London?

Taken on Sunday, they have even more feathers today (Tuesday)  Pinky on the left, Perky on the right

A little update on my older birds (you were wondering weren't you?) I still have two birds out there.  They seem very settled and often go for long fly abouts.  I'm also pleased that they are definitely a pair, they share the same nest hole, so that should encourage them to stay plus gives me the chance they will have babies.  My only worry now is that dratted Sparrowhawk.  I saw him land in my big Sycamore tree tonight and I never thought I would see the day but I opened the back door and scared him off.  I know he is only looking for dinner but I don't want my Doves being the main course!

So, did I mention I am getting chickens?  Hairy Hubby is getting on well building my chicken coop.  It is all out of scrap wood donated by Farmer Dan and son so is taking a bit longer than it would if we had just gone to B&Q but beggars can't be choosers as they say.  It's looking really good and also pretty large.  We think there is room for 12 chooks in there but I want to start with 4-6 ex-battery hens.  Yes, I am very excited!