he Cape Dove (Oena Capensis) was a bird regularly imported from its native Africa and very few breeders considered the need to set up a captive
bred aviary strains whilst imports were available to meet the demand, prices were low and there seemed no real reason to breed these delightful, colourful doves as imports were quite readily available. All that has now changed, unless aviculturalists really work hard to establish birds that were previously imported in large numbers there will be none of them left in aviculture in a few years time. It is now imperative that all those breeders with experience with domesticated or near domesticated birds work hard to establish breeding stocks of birds that previously were readily imported. We all need to select one species and try really hard to establish them. About ten years ago I kept Diamond Doves and bred a few of them so to a small degree I did have some knowledge of this family. I have chosen the Cape Dove because my good friend Jerry Fisher on the south coast introduced them to me and encouraged me to work on this species. In the
