Why
do you never see baby pigeons? Do you remember ever seeing a baby
pigeon? The reason is that Mummy and Daddy pigeon keep their nests
and offspring well hidden, on tall buildings or under bridges, so
you don't get to see them till they're ready to leave the nest.
Pigeons are also extraordinarily greedy and the babies, or squabs,
pork out on milk produced in the crop of both their mother and father
(yup, Daddy produces the milk too!) until they are of an equal size
to their parents. The fact that pigeons only lay two eggs at a time
means that they can spoil their little darlings, unlike some other
birds that produce several babies, half of which drop dead leaving
only the strongest. This leads me on to my theory as to why pigeons
are stupid, a lack of natural selection against the really thick
ones just doesn't happen in childhood and the bad genes don't get
weeded out of the gene pool. But that has nothing to do with the
original question. |
