Book Review: Pigeons
by Andrew D. Blechman
Reviewed by Carolyn Rozier
	This book gives details of the pigeon's relationship with humans and enlightens us about how people can be obsessed with this bird.  It is also written in almost an expose style as the author reports on people and events related to pigeons. (He did not come to Texas to participate in dove season however.)  Also included are many pigeon facts as well, so that after reading I realized that I had learned a great deal about this bird. The pigeons we see in cities are of the family Columbidae and are known as rock doves because they don't live in trees but on rocky ledges and hence are adapted well to live on our city buildings. Doves are in the same family.
Passenger pigeons are now extinct and were wild cousins of the rock doves. The passenger pigeons were once the most populous birds in North America but the last one died in 1914. City pigeons are feral versions of originally domesticated rock doves.

Mourning Dove	Rock Dove
Pigeons are social and like the company of other pigeons.  They mate for life and lay two eggs which are incubated by both parents.  They can reproduce multiple times a year. They only breed when food is available and the more food that they have the more they breed. They don't abandon their nest and hence the term 'homing' is often used for these birds. They are easily domesticated and breed in captivity.  When held in the hand they won't struggle or bite.  They live on the streets three to four years. They are designed for fast and long flights.  How they find their way back to their nests is still not well understood but they navigate by the sun, magnetic fields, and sound. The characteristic of the bird to return to its home from a great distance away has been exploited by humans to carry messages.  They have been used in war and the author reviews some of the historical uses of pigeons.  He relates some heroic exploits of pigeons and I was surprised to learn that a wounded pigeon hero of WWI is on display at the Smithsonian.  To find out the story you should read the book.  There is also a pigeon Hall of Fame in Fort Monmouth, NJ  so if you are ever in the area you should stop there.
This bird has its enthusiasts mainly for the hobby potential.  The author brings us up close and personal with a pigeon racer and his birds.  If you want to know how they determine the winner of a race when the starting line is at one place but the finish lines are in multiple places then the chapter on racing will enlighten you.  This chapter also delves slightly into the personal dynamics of racing clubs. The author mentions that if you find an injured bird with a racing band; the owner usually doesn't want it back and even if returned it will most likely be killed.  Racing enthusiasts need birds that are healthy and can win races.
Another section of the book is devoted to a look into the world of champion pigeon breeders.  There is a description of a Grand National Show in Lancaster, PA.  These birds are all bred for their looks and are not able to survive in the wild.  In this section the author recounts some of the work of Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel.  He mentioned some breeds that I thought were strange.  One breed was named Rollers.  When put on the ground they somersault backwards and can roll hundreds of feet.  A competition is described in a soccer field where these birds were raced backwards.  There is also a breed of tumblers who do backward spirals when in flight.
The author interviewed several persons who loved pigeons obsessively.  He spent an entire chapter relating how he tried to interview Mike Tyson who is a pigeon breeder.  Other people obsessively feed the pigeons and aggressively defend their rights to do so while others want to use humane ways to coexist with these birds.
The book does not portray only the positive aspects of the pigeon.  The author describes a live pigeon shoot and the history of pigeon shooting here and in England.  Did you know that in 1900 pigeon shooting was a sport in the Olympics?  He also goes to a squab breeding and processing plant and describes the process of killing and processing these month old pigeons that have never spread their wings.  A recipe is included.
Some chapters are devoted to ways used to eradicate pigeons from cities and why pigeons are so maligned.   The author traveled to see the Arizona jail which had a pigeon problem.  The city wanted to use poison but the founder of the Urban Wildlife Society began a successful campaign to educate officials against the use of poison. He pointed out that raptors eat the poisoned pigeons and then die too.  They used netting and took away the roosting spots at the jail. Basel Switzerland has come up with a method that doesn't involve poison or shooting the birds.  They set up dovecotes for nests away from human traffic and fed the pigeons there so the pigeons moved in. Volunteers then feed and clean the dovecotes and remove the eggs in the nest, leaving plastic ones instead.  In four years the city of Basel reduced the population of pigeons by 50%.   Killing birds only increases the size of the flock.  There is less competition for food and this causes the birds to breed and the new birds are more likely to survive.  Pigeons decrease breeding only when the food decreases and time is spent foraging for food rather than mating.  Some people even believe that feeding pigeons is animal cruelty.
The author indicates that the pest control industry has an interest in maligning pigeons. People do associate pigeons with dirt because pigeons poop everywhere even in their own nests.  This doesn't seem right to us and we think they are dirty birds.  However their potential to cause disease is no worse than other animals. Their dung does not have disease organisms and they are not carriers of disease; but the fungi and bacteria that grow on the dung that they leave all over walls etc is a problem.  There are two diseases that are associated with pigeon dung: histoplasmosis which attacks the lungs and cryptococcosis which causes meningitis and encephalitis.  However these microorganisms are around in many places and just grow well when in contact with pigeon poop. One interesting thing about pigeons is that eating bread made from processed white flour makes the poop very hard and almost impossible to remove.
Our culture views the pigeon in a negative manner as shown by terms such as stool pigeon, pigeonholed and Woody Allen popularized the notion that pigeons are rats with wings. This book will help to give a more unbiased view of these birds.