# update, rescued ringneck doves, and pics!



## Fluttershy (Sep 18, 2013)

Hello everyone, its been a while since I posted here, I don't think I even told you about my dove that I got. It was hard for me to find a dove near me because I live in Utah and Ringneck Doves are very rare here, but I ended up finding one back in October 2013, her name is spirit she is a White Ringneck Dove and we have become very close.
this is her sitting with me while I take a bath.


She lives in a large cage when she is not out and about with me, and she looks very lonely in that big cage. she recently laid an egg and then a couple days later she decided to surprise me by laying 3 eggs in one night! poor girl I need to get her some extra calcium.





anyway I was filling bad that she was so lonely and decided to keep an eye out for any ringnecks on my local classifieds. I found a add for 2 ringnecks, I jumped on it and today I went and picked them up. here they are, I have named the female (on the right) Fluttershy but have yet to name the male. ( on the left) you can see the size difference in this pic.


the cage they were in was about a foot deep by a foot wide and 2 feet tall, there was 2 poles in the cage and no matter how they sat their feathers were being messed up and pushed through the bars. the cage was definitely to small for them, then I saw the food they had given us and were feeding them, the food was large ball type seeds, about the size of a small pearl, along with sunflower seeds in it. the person mentioned they would only pick out some seeds out of the food, these poor little guys could barley swallow the seeds, and couldn't eat the sunflower seeds. 
when I got them home I took them out of the cage and sat them on a little sitting area. The female is smaller then the male and smaller then my female Spirit. When I took her out her little feet felt so boney on my fingers, looking close her feathers lacked luster and she looked rather malnourished. as soon as I sat them both down the male started attacking the female, he was getting on her back and then pecking her, then they started to fly and the male kept chasing and pecking the female, I ended up moving them so they were sitting separately, and that calmed them down while I got an old cage of mine out and fixed it up. while I was working on the cage I had given the female some of the food I feed spirit, she started gobbling it down like there was no tomorrow. I don't think she was able to eat much of the food they were feeding her. I ended up moving them to my cage and the male was fine as long as they were in the cage together, so I wonder if he thought she was a different dove or something. but now they are in a bigger cage with a nest, and have pigged out on the new food I gave them. they seem so much happier in there the poor things. 

anyway why do you think the male was attacking the female when they were out side of the cage, but was fine when they were inside the cage together? the person said they had been paired for a long time even before they had them and that they have had eggs together. 

I am planning on making some hard boiled eggs and blending them up along with the egg shells and mixing in some crushed cuttle bone to help give them all a boost of calcium and protein. thoughts on this? are there any treats I could give Fluttershy to help put some fat on her?

Thanks!


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## LouisAnna23 (May 4, 2014)

Hello

the male is chasing his female back to the nest. What you can do if it gets too bad is separate them for a while. Then the male will go back to the first stage of courting and be trying to impress her rather than chasing her.

A balanced diet is important. Do not overload the female with rich food. My doves always recover quickly and actually are a lot stronger and healthier than my pigeons.

Some fresh lettuce chopped up they love, and a good grain mix. Mine eat sunflower seeds though they prefer smaller ones.
Also grit and calcium is important and sunlight. Once a month I give a chopped boiled egg and when I thought a female was a bit low I also gave a bit of cheese chopped fine. Real milk cheese, not fake cheese. One of my males will eat the whole plate of it if i let him


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## Fluttershy (Sep 18, 2013)

Thanks so much for the reply and all the helpful tips!


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

*i found a white ringneck dove too*

I found a male white ringneck dove and he seems lonely. I want to get him a mate but I have nothing to do with the chicks. I live near Byron bay au so iv'e never actually seen a white dove before I found an injured one   I also want to know you do with your chicks?


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## PamperedPigeon (Sep 23, 2014)

Ringneck_redneck_dov - you can purchase some fake eggs for them to sit on. Just replace them with the real one at night when they're sleepy...they will eventually figure out they aren't going to hatch and will abandon them. That way you don't have to worry about babies.


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

i dont want to kill the babies like that. its not fair on them. i would prefer to keep him like this then kill the babies, he is okay but he would prefer a mate


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## PamperedPigeon (Sep 23, 2014)

Getting her a mate and replacing their eggs right after laying isn't killing babies...the eggs laid, even if fertilized, are just like eggs from the store as long as you replace them right after they're laid...they have to be incubated to form chicks - no incubation equals no chicks. Fake eggs are birdie birth control...better this than unwanted babies that you can't take care of or rehome. If you only remove eggs and don't provide fake eggs for her to sit on, she might keep laying every few days, which is bad for her health.


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

PamperedPigeon said:


> Getting her a mate and replacing their eggs right after laying isn't killing babies...the eggs laid, even if fertilized, are just like eggs from the store as long as you replace them right after they're laid...they have to be incubated to form chicks - no incubation equals no chicks. Fake eggs are birdie birth control...better this than unwanted babies that you can't take care of or rehome. If you only remove eggs and don't provide fake eggs for her to sit on, she might keep laying every few days, which is bad for her health.


izzz a guy, anyway how would you dispose them?


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## PamperedPigeon (Sep 23, 2014)

You can just crack them open and toss the egg down the kitchen sink (or feed it to your dog if you have one) and put the eggshell in the compost bin or trash. Alternately, you can feed the shells back to the birds as a calcium source - I offer a mix of crushed oyster shells and crushed chicken eggshells. I bake the eggshells at 200 for 20 minutes or so to sanitize them then put in the blender to crush to a very small size - one would assume you can do the same for dove eggshells.


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

I'm not feeding my bird its own eggs!


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

and anyway he seems to like it alot when i play the keyboard, he coos away happily and flies around a little-he looks very happy.


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## PamperedPigeon (Sep 23, 2014)

You aren't feeding them their egges, just the eggshells.


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## ringneck_redneck_dov (Jan 29, 2015)

its still wrong


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