Baby Doves

Last year we had a pair of doves build a nest on our porch. They had 2 babies who grew quickly and left the nest. Then later in the summer the doves returned and had 2 more babies who grew and left the nest. Harrison & I loved to watch them from the front window. They make a beautiful cooing sound! Harrison enjoys watching Curious George every night before bed and there is a pigeon on the show named Compass. He called the doves Compass last summer and would check on them daily.

Well, to our surprise they returned early this spring when the weather was still very cold. They build a new nest where their old nest was last summer. They once again had two babies. Only this time the babies seemed to stay around longer. They got quite big & I was surprised that they had not left the nest yet. Last summer it seemed that they hatched and a week or so were gone (I probably just didn't notice the time passing last summer).

Finally, one of the babies left the nest, but was just on the front porch. It would walk around the porch, but not fly away. I wondered if it was confused, so I helped guide it off the porch. It flew a little & scurried under the holly bushes in our front yard. The mother found it later in the day and cuddled it. (She hadn't cuddled it at all the several days it was out of the nest on the porch.) The second baby flew out of the nest the same day into our driveway and was strutting around. I don't think either of them had the strength to fly all the way back up into the nest. 

The dove in the driveway stayed by the house all day. As night fell he was still just sitting by the house. It was supposed to rain all night, so I asked Ryan to help me guide him under the holly or back onto the porch where he would be out of the rain. We got him back onto the porch and he stayed there all night & the next day. Mommy dove returned to the nest & Daddy dove came and checked on the dove on the porch. We don't know what happened to the one that Mommy had been snuggling under the holly the previous day. We hope one of the neighborhood cats didn't get it!

Now both babies are gone and Mommy dove is back up in her nest day & night. I am guessing she is sitting on some new eggs. I find them beautiful to look at, lovely to listen to, and fascinating!  I didn't realize they returned to the same spot to make a nest each year, and that they had more than one litter each year (if that's what you call it for birds too). The fascination has pretty much worn off for Harrison, being the second summer of the doves, but he still looks at them from time to time.

If you look carefully you can see the dove sitting in our driveway up against the house.

A closer picture of the same dove. This time he is up on his feet.

The other dove after Mommy left him to return to the nest.
He came out of the holly and went into the bushes between our property & the neighbor's.