[Libis]

I've been thinking for a while that it might be fun/interesting to some day start breeding and selling doves among hobbiests/ADA members/etc. (maybe in years and years--this is kind of like my far-off sunroom idea, I don't have the house to put it in) How difficult is it to sell birds within a reasonable amount of time to good people who will probably treat them well?

Where do you guys usually prefer to advertise besides club classifieds?

How did you guys get to the point where you were selling birds?
At what point did you make that decision?

 

[Print Tippler]

Not that I'm selling birds for profit but it's really not that hard. I have sold a couple birds on craigslist and have more I'm selling soon. There is a person I have gotten birds from quite often who you could classify as a feather peddler. He has many breeds of around 7-12 with many lofts. I can't say for certain but I feel all he does is put them on craigslist and it works. My brother put our archangels up and had a call them same night from someone who will mostly likely be come out from LA to Phoenix (6 hour drive one way) to pick them when a little one is weaned. He has tons of breeds and probably wants the archangels to add one more. I think that is probably the key to being successfully is not putting all your eggs in one nest. Keeping more breeds caters to more people. Craigslist is always better in larger cities ofcourse. If you were wanting to sell doves I would list them up for anywhere from 10-20 bucks and people will call.

 

[Libis]

How do you normally weed out people who might mistreat them?

In my area, a lot of people don't even know that there are domesticated types of dove. When I mention that I have them, they think I've got mourning doves. Many of the people who do know what they are act like they aren't good enough a lot of the time and would rather have a $6000 parrot. Would Craigslist still work in this area?

A few hours away there is an exotics and birds swap meet/fair/potluck/big get-together twice a year that looks like a lot of fun. A friend of mine who breeds parrots and reptiles sells a few animals there each year. Do you think people might be interested in a few doves out there, or are they probably not "exotic" enough?
http://www.lovealop.com/events.html

 

[Print Tippler]

You would have to go to find out. Doves are differently more of a humble bird to have. You like doves, and so do a lot of other people so somebody will stumble upon them. As for craigslist you just have to talk to people and get an ideal of there interest for birds. My brother sold a reptile last year and he really wanted to make sure it went to a good home so he typed up a very long thing on craigslist asking things like: Past experiences and with what species, tank size, if other reptiles were going to be in with it. He then made them take a picture of there set up with a piece of paper in front with his name on it or something so they couldn't get it off the internet. So if want a good home follow that and just grill them people to make sure they have all the ends at outs covered. I just gave my doves to a flyer in my area because he had one and wanted another and we decided as much as we loved that we would give it to them because we are trying to cut back. I gave him the coop they were in which was 6x3x4 and talked to him a lot about proper care for them and what to do and not do and i also gave him a large bag of grit and told him the importance of that.

 

[spirit wings]

you may do well to join a society and then on their online web sites they sometimes list breeders.. most go for the color breedings when it comes to RN doves..and the silkies seem to be popular too.. as far as weeding out the bad home.. you would have to ask allot of questions and ask for a picture of their set up.. then use your best judgement.

http://www.doveline.com/

 

[PigeonVilla]

Selling anything these days isnt easy ,you have to have names and certain colors or strains to get into the main stream of it all.

 

[Libis]

you may do well to join a society and then on their online web sites they sometimes list breeders.. most go for the color breedings when it comes to RN doves..and the silkies seem to be popular too.. as far as weeding out the bad home.. you would have to ask allot of questions and ask for a picture of their set up.. then use your best judgement.

http://www.doveline.com/

Yep, I actually already am part of the ADA.

 

[MaryOfExeter]

I sell my extra doves. The money of course goes back into the feed, as with all the birds I sell. I advertise here and Backyardchickens. That way I pretty much know the people I'm selling to.

 

[Libis]

I sell my extra doves. The money of course goes back into the feed, as with all the birds I sell. I advertise here and Backyardchickens. That way I pretty much know the people I'm selling to.

I have noticed that a lot of people sell just a couple of birds at a time here. That might work well because I could let them have 1 or 2 clutches a year eventually (before I even had a loft setup) and sell them. Plus, having fewer babies at a time means that I could work with them and get them very tame and sweet. Probably not for a while yet, though.

 

[MaryOfExeter]

Yeah I just let my doves do what they want. I don't try to force them to breed or try to speed up the process with lights and such. I only have two legit pairs right now so there's only so many babies Actually it's complicated in my loft. One "pair" is actually a trio - two boys and a girl. They all take turns incubating and feeding. It actually seems like the boys take over but I do see the hen on the eggs/babies occasionally. The males often sit together on the nest. The other "pair" I have discovered is actually two pairs....or....two girls and one male. I'm not entirely sure. At first I thought it was another situation like the others. But I have 3 eggs in the nest this time. Not sure who's the other is. I think there was 4 but one of them fell out on the floor. This is a nest that has raised many babies before, so I know it isn't just a pair of females. There's got to be at least one guy (besides, I marked the guys with blue zip ties, and I've seen him on nest duty). So yeah..it's complicated, LOL. Needless to say, I need a few more hens. I would like to get them from someone else rather than waiting to see if my babies are hens...that way I can get some new blood in the loft

 

[Libis]

Yeah I just let my doves do what they want. I don't try to force them to breed or try to speed up the process with lights and such. I only have two legit pairs right now so there's only so many babies Actually it's complicated in my loft. One "pair" is actually a trio - two boys and a girl. They all take turns incubating and feeding. It actually seems like the boys take over but I do see the hen on the eggs/babies occasionally. The males often sit together on the nest. The other "pair" I have discovered is actually two pairs....or....two girls and one male. I'm not entirely sure. At first I thought it was another situation like the others. But I have 3 eggs in the nest this time. Not sure who's the other is. I think there was 4 but one of them fell out on the floor. This is a nest that has raised many babies before, so I know it isn't just a pair of females. There's got to be at least one guy (besides, I marked the guys with blue zip ties, and I've seen him on nest duty). So yeah..it's complicated, LOL. Needless to say, I need a few more hens. I would like to get them from someone else rather than waiting to see if my babies are hens...that way I can get some new blood in the loft

lol. Nice drama you've got going on there. If my birds chose a setup like that I think I'd have to draw out diagrams beside them to figure it all out.

Well, Edmund and Lita are more than willing to provide me with lots of babies. Wish I had more space. I'll have those two for quite a while though (at least, hoping that Edmund is relatively young--he's an unbanded bird a friend got from the pound,) so there's plenty of time to get more babies out of them. I'm currently keeping my birds in twos. For a while I thought about seeing if I could reintroduce Ed and Lita's daughter to the big cage, but if I wound up with a trio like you were talking about, I wouldn't want Ed to mix with his daughter. (He's not got as good of traits as his mate, so I wouldn't want to lock in his messy feathers that aren't tight enough to the wing or anything by inbreeding.) I'll still try to get everyone to get along out of cages, though. The only ones I really don't think that will work out between are Ed and his son. The little male keeps challenging his dad. *facepalm*