The Rock Pigeon (Columba livia), formerly known as the Rock Dove, is an unusual breeding bird in Kentucky.
It’s an exotic species, introduced to North America from Europe in the early 1600s, that has apparently has lived in Kentucky in the wild since settlement times.
A member of Family Columbidae (doves and pigeons), the Rock Pigeon was first described in the scientific literature by German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin, in 1789.
Few birds have been associated with humans so closely as the Rock Pigeon.
It has been domesticated and taken around the world, raised for food, trained for homing, racing, and carrying messages between units during wartime.
The domestic pigeon (Columba livia domestica), which includes about 1,000 different breeds is descended from the Rock Pigeon. Escaped domestic pigeons have dramatically increased populations of feral pigeons.
Originally native from Europe to North Africa and India, the Rock Pigeon is now present all over the world, including most of North America, and is common across Kentucky, found in a wide variety of habitats in rural, suburban and urban areas.
The Rock Pigeon is not a migratory species. It’s a year-round resident.
Size and coloration
Rock Pigeons stand about 13 1/2 inches, are pale grey with two black bars on each wing, white rump, small orange and black eyes, a short gray beak with a white band above, and pink feet.
In flight, the underwings are white. There are few differences in size and coloration between males and females.
Domestic and feral pigeons vary widely in their color and pattern of their plumage.
Feeding behavior and diet
The Rock Pigeon forages mostly by walking on the ground, but sometimes in trees or shrubs, climbing about awkwardly, in search of fruits or berries.
In farm lands, flocks are often seen flying over grain fields, feeding along roadsides where grain has been hauled, or feeding on waste gains on the ground where grains have been processed or stored.
Its diet is mostly seeds. Away from cities, they may also feed on the seeds of grasses, even acorns, and occasionally earthworms or insects.
In cities, they scavenge for bread crumbs, popcorn, and scraps of fast food discarded by humans.
Pigeons are a favorite prey of the Peregrine Falcon, one of the most desirable species of raptors. An abundance of this prey, in both urban and rural areas, has in part helped this raptor recover from low population levels observed in the mid-to-late 1900s.
Courtship and breeding
Rock Pigeons usually mate for life.
In courtship, male spreads his tail, puffs up his chest, and struts about, often strutting in circles around female, repeatedly bowing and cooing.
In the wild, a preferred nest site is a sheltered cliff ledge.
In cities and around human dwellings, they use window ledges, rooftops, barn lofts, grain towers, and highway overpasses or bridges.
The nest is built by the female, with material supplied by the male. It’s a platform of twigs and grass. A pair may use the same nest site repeatedly, adding to nest each time.
The females typically lays two eggs, sometimes just one.
Incubation is by both parents and lasts 16 to 19 days.
Both parents feed the young pigeon milk, a regurgitated secretion from the pigeon’s crop.
Young leave nest in about 25 to 32 days, usually later in cold weather. A pair may raise up to five or more broods per year.
Risks to humans
Large pigeon populations and handling pigeons can pose a risk to humans.
Contact with pigeon droppings poses a risk of contracting histoplasmosis, a lung disease, which can be serious in humans if left untreated.
Pigeons are also known to host avian mites, which can infest dwellings and bite humans, causing a condition known as gamasoidosis, a form of dermatitis.
Pigeons may also carry and spread avian influenza, a.k.a. bird flu, which can affect humans.
Flocks of Rock Pigeons are sometimes considered a nuisance in cities, but they “have not proven to have a negative impact on native bird species in Kentucky,” said Kate Slankard, avian biologist for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources.
