How old are young pigeons when they begin to nest?

[Sweetie]

Hi, I am just wanting to know what age does a pigeon begin to nest. If she is a female, at what age do they start to make nests, and what materials are safe to give pigeons for use for their nests. I do want Sweetie to be able to make her own nest (bed) the way she likes it. She is almost 3 months old. Thank you, Victoria Have a nice day and enjoy your evening!

[maryco]

Hello Victoria and Sweetie,

That's a good question and one commonly asked here at pigeons.com

I would say depending on what type of pigeon you have, I find that ferals grow up really quickly.
A female will begin to lay between 6-9 months of age. Males become full adults a bit later than the females.

A good nesting material and favourite among pigeons and ferals are pine needles, try to pick the golden/yellow dead needles off the pine tree from the dead branches so it can be cleaner than picking up from the ground.
Pigeons love those and will carry them indivitually to the nest for building. Every pigeon is different too when it comes to nest building and their ability to do a good job, some over do it with too many sticks and build what I call a "palace nest" up to 6 inches high and some only lay afew sticks around them without doing much of a weaving job.

Hope that helps!

[John_D]

Hi Victoria -

Some may even start 'courting' as young as 4 months, apparently. I agree with Mary, tho, on average.

Another popular nest material, which we use for the aviary - and I supplied my balcony pair with recently - is tobacco stems, which we get from a pigeon supply store. They have an extra benefit in repelling some of the bugs which can get in nests (when birds are outside, of course).

John

[Izzy]

pigeon supply store

Wow, they have these types of stores? Is there a chain or just something locally? I'm pretty much stuck with Petsmart here and there's not a ton of variety, but just enough to get by.

Any idea where else I might look for pigeon related items? Do you know of any websites?

Thanks,
Izzy

[maryco]

Pigeon supply stores online:

http://www.jedds.com
http://www.globalpigeon.com
http://www.siegelpigeons.com
http://www.foyspigeonsupplies.com

Locally some animal feed supply stores sell pigeon products, feed, and some meds even. Most likely you'll find a pigeon mix and grit there.
You could call up your local pigeon club or pigeon fanciers in your area and ask where they buy their feed/grit from and they should be able to help you out.

[ZigZagMarquis]

Sweetie, Izzy, Et All,

I have ordered from Jedds, Foys and Global and have been happy with all of them... not to knock the others, but Jedds especially because their deliveries are quick, but for me, that is because I live in the same state as they're located... Foys is in PA, near Pittsburgh, so their stuff takes a bit longer to get to me, but maybe it is closer to some of you'all.

Like Maryco says, hit the local feed store. They should be able to set you up with stuff like feeders, waterers, disposable nest bowls and maybe even a bod type trap if you'all need one. Also checkout what they have as far as feed goes... although you may wind-up buying in 50lb bags which may be a bit much if you only have one or two birds, but you can at least start getting an idea of ingredients. Also, one think I found was nest boxes for chickens / pigeons at my local feed store. They're pretty simple and would seem to work, unelss you're hard over on having the fancy type nest fronts on them that you'll see sold on Foys or in pictures of the really high tech lofts.

Anyway... Happy Pigeon Supply Buying!

[Izzy]

Hiya Mary and Zig and thank you for the info! I know there is a local feed store that I used to go to, when I had my button quail chicks, but it has since closed down. I found another one, but it's in west county, I'm in the city, about 45 minutes away, but will give them a call just to see what they carry. Don't want to make that trip and find out they don't have a thing for pigeons.

I'll check out the links also, as I do the majority of my shopping online anyhow. I love the idea of looking for local pigeon clubs, I'm wondering how I even go about searching for that type of information? I'll try Google, as I use that for everything, but do you have any ideas of where specifically I might search? Like maybe in the phone book or something?

Would be super cool to find others that live in my area that have pigeons, wheeee, what fun, we could have a pigeon party!

Izzy

[ZigZagMarquis]

Izzy,

If you go to...

http://www.pigeon.org/

... and start looking around on that site, you should see the "Find A Club" tab at the bottom of the Info or About pages... follow that and any other good info you find there.