FEATURE
use one of my parakeet aviaries to see what results could be achieved outside. The day came when the two pairs were due, as we live some 150 miles apart I collected them mid-way in the early evening, all four were in one box and generally they were quiet but when I hit a pothole in the road they would crash about and become thoroughly disturbed. Once home I let them out into their outside aviary as it was light until at least 9.30 p.m. in June. Although built in a block there is a large amount of privacy as most of the walls are constructed with 3/4” plywood but to provide them additional seclusion I placed a 3’ container grown Conifer, a Vibernum and six pots of runner beans to climb up the former. To provide nesting sites I screwed four wooden platforms 6” x 6” with a half inch lip around the edge, to the plywood wall. I had read that they seem to like to use fine roots as nesting material and fortunately I had a pile of forest bark next to a large hazel bush the roots of which had permeated the bark pile, it was therefore an easy exercise to pull up a few roots and make nice nests for the Doves. Evidently placing two pairs in one aviary is generally not successful as fighting frequently occurs but only one of my pairs seemed interested in breeding and possibly that was why I had no difficulties in that regard.
My efforts were very quickly rewarded as within two weeks one of the pairs started to show interest in each other and there was a fair amount of mutual preening and sitting close together, then I saw the hen on one of the nests, progress appeared promising! The first egg was laid on 21st July and the second the following day, they were a rich cream colour and I candled them after the hen had sat for 5 days, they both showed that the vein formation was developing so I speedily returned them to the nest. The first egg hatched on 4th August and the second on 5th. I was aware from the excellent book by I.S. Dyer “Breeding the Cape Dove: My Experience” that around eight days of age can be a critical time as the parents can stop feeding the youngsters. On 12th August I was delighted to see that my two precious
BIRD SCENE 35
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