46 



COLUMBID.E. 



Avill require to be fed at first by cramming. The food of the 

 Stock Dove in a state of nature consists of grain of all descrip- 

 tions, seeds of vegetables as well as of trees, and also wild 

 berries ; but wheat, buck-wheat, rape and hemp seeds are its 

 favourite food, and the quantity consumed at a meal is very 

 considerable. 



The Stock Dove resorts in the spring of the year to those 

 forests or orchards wherein old trees are found with decayed 

 trunks or branches, or where woodpeckers have excavated 

 many large holes, for it is only in a hole in a tree that this 

 bird deposits her eggs : it appears to be of no consequence 

 at what elevation the hole is found, whether four or five feet 

 from the ground, or forty or fifty ; and if a pair of Stock 

 Doves have made choice of a hole for the current season, 

 or have had possession of it in the preceding year, and intend 

 again to occupy it, they will make their claim to it good, 

 and defend it resolutely by snapping at any intruders, or 

 beating them off with their wings. Having made choice of an 

 excavation, the birds lay a foundation within it of dry 

 sticks of any kind, or even of dead leaves for want of 

 other materials, the size and shape of the nest depending 

 upon the size of the hole, but it is generally constructed 

 very carelessly. The number of eggs de>posited does not 

 vary from the usual quantity, namely two of the size and 

 colour represented in our plate. When the birds have sat 

 on their eggs for seventeen days, they begin to look for the ap- 

 pearance of the young pair. These, after both parents have 

 attentively supplied them with food for four weeks, are ready to 

 come out of their nest, and in a few days more are taught to 

 shift for themselves, about which time the parents are making 

 preparation for a second brood, but never in the same hole. 

 The birds of a year old have generally two broods, and the 

 older birds three broods, during the summer. It is well 

 known that pigeons do not appear much to regret the loss 



