# Hand Rearing two baby Wood Pigeons



## Tammy22 (Jun 23, 2010)

Hiya Everyone 

I am glad i have found this forum as it has been very helpful to me 

A friend of ours cuts down trees for a living and on saturday he found a baby wood pigeon in one of the trees he cut down, so bought it to us as we are known as the local 'animal rescue' due to the amount of animals we have here! We told him there was probably another baby in the tree as we keep and breed pigeons here, so know they usually have two in the nest.

A few hours later he came back with the other one, lol 

So since Saturday i have been feeding these two lovely baby pigeons and they do seem to doing ok *touch wood*.

I am not sure exactly how old they are, but they now have a lot more feathers than they did on Saturday and they have got a bit bigger too - they are still lacking feathers underneath their wings and around their crops, and they still have some yellow bits all over them, but they are fairly evenly covered with feathers all over.

They are eating and drinking great, and 'attack' my hand while making cute little squeals everytime i go near them, lol, so i am pleased with their progress at the moment 

I have found a lot of useful information on here and on another site which i have seen mentioned here too, but i still have a couple of questions:

1. The babies get very messy when being fed and i was worried as it was getting difficult to clean off and they were ending up wasting more that they were eating! but have since read that this is normal, so have been trying different techniques and trying to clean them up as best as possible. Over the past couple of days i have noticed them cleaning themselves more and more, so that is a good thing, but i was just wandering if they can have an actual bath with water at this age? i wasnt thinking of submerging them in water, lol, but just thinking of maybe spraying them with a little water to help them clean and then let them preen in the sun (with shade available of course) or are they two young to get wet? Would they bath if i provided a big enough dish with water, or are they likely to drown?

2. I was just wandering at what age they will start to pick up food for themself? they currently have a dish of various seeds in their cage along with a bowl of water - they will drink water themselves but are not the least bit interested in the seeds - is there anything i can do to get them to start feeding themselves, or is it too early at the moment?

Any other info you think i might need, please let me know!

thanks,

Tammy x


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## Feefo (Feb 8, 2002)

Hi Tammy,

Can we see a photo?

One way of weaning them is to defrost peas in warm water and hand feed them while they are warm, popping one at a time into the mouth. When I have done that they get very impatient and start gobbling them down on their own. 

I wash off food with sterile saline, it seems to dissolve it. I also think that it helps the feather development and waterproofing to spray them lightly with water. 

Cynthia


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## Tammy22 (Jun 23, 2010)

Hi Cynthia,

thank you for your quick reply, here are some pics of them:


































Tammy x


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## Feefo (Feb 8, 2002)

You have to smile when you see their little faces! They look so cute!

They are old enough to be fed defrosted peas and to be misted.

Thank you for taking such good care of them. The only thing I would change is the bedding, because the combination of pigeon poop and straw can cause mould and spores. Even wood chip can be problematic (a very young unweaned pigeon at the sanctuary decided to eat all his woodchip bedding overnight...the cost of the resulting surgery earning him the name Sixty Quid ). White kitchen toweling works well.

Cynthia


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## Tammy22 (Jun 23, 2010)

Thank you very much Cynthia, will follow your advice and keep you updated on their progress 

Tammy x


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## cotdt (Apr 26, 2010)

In addition to the previous suggestion, what I do to avoid any mess is get a big syringe and inject the food straight into the crop through the beak and throat. My babies open their beaks wide as soon as they see the syringe, so the whole process only takes seconds for a whole 30cc, with no cleanup!

Anyone know if wood pigeons can be loft flown?


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## spirit wings (Mar 29, 2008)

cotdt said:


> In addition to the previous suggestion, what I do to avoid any mess is get a big syringe and inject the food straight into the crop through the beak and throat. My babies open their beaks wide as soon as they see the syringe, so the whole process only takes seconds for a whole 30cc, with no cleanup!
> 
> Anyone know if wood pigeons can be loft flown?


loft flown?, woodies are wild pigeons, I guess they release them back to the wild.


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