WOOD PIGEON. 



RING DOVE CUSHAT QUEEST. 



PLATE CXXXIV. FIGURE I. 

 Columba palumbus, LINNAEUS. 



'"I A HE nest of the Wood Pigeon is wide and shallow, placed 

 1 in almost any kind of tree, and frequently in thick ivy 

 on cliffs or old walls ; it is little more than a rude platform of 

 a few crossed sticks and twigs, the largest as the foundation, 

 so thinly laid together that the eggs or young may often be 

 seen from below. It is often built in woods and plantations, 

 but not unfrequently also in single trees, even those that are 

 close to houses, roads, and lanes the oak and the beech, 

 the fir, or any other suitable one or even in ivy against a 

 wall, rock, or tree, or in a thick bush or shrub in a garden, 

 or an isolated thorn, even in the thick part, so that in flying 

 out in a hurry, if alarmed, many of the loosely - attached 

 feathers are pulled out. One pair built in a spruce fir not 

 ten yards from a garden gate, where they were constantly 

 liable to disturbance by the ringing of the bell, and the 

 passing in and out of the members of the family. Another 

 pair dwelt two years in succession close to a window by a 

 frequented walk, and this though a cat destroyed the young. 

 Many are now built in the trees in the parks and squares 

 of London. 



