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CHAPTER XXX. 
PIGEONS AS FOOD. 
MUCH has been said of the damage done by pigeons to the crops of the farmer ; and in considering 
them simply as food, in a few final pages, this aspect of the subject ought not to be ignored. For 
it would not be right to conceal our belief, derived both from observation and such information as 
we have been able to obtain, that the question of whether pigeons “ pay ” when kept merely to 
supply the larder depends chiefly upon the neighbourhood where they are kept. In other and 
plain words, they do undoubtedly forage in the fields, and it is only where they can thus obtain a 
good proportion of food from the land adjoining, only costing the actual proprietor a few handfuls of 
grain morning and evening, that they can be said to pay so far as concerns providing a family meal. 
In such circumstances they are profitable stock, even as regards providing so many pounds of meat. 
Even when all the food has to be provided, there is perhaps little or no loss, provided the pigeons 
killed be valued at the ordinary prices per couple ; but this to all intents and purposes is an 
artificial value for mere “food,” and it can hardly be doubted that the parents must live very 
largely upon the neighbourhood — not to say “ the neighbours ” — for the produce to be directly 
remunerative. 
But nevertheless, and though it be granted that the majority of dove-cote pigeons must and 
do find a great part of their food in the farmer’s fields, it by no means follows that they do him a 
tenth of the injury popularly supposed, or even any injury at all. The late Mr. Brent devoted 
particular attention to this question, and his remarks upon it deserve consideration : — 
“Very curious statements,” he says, “have sometimes appeared in print, trying to prove the 
immense quantity of wheat and other cereals destroyed by pigeons; but nothing is ever said of the 
benefit they do on the land, which, I really believe, far exceeds the injury done. I may be deemed 
infatuated, but I hope not so much as not to hear reason and compare facts ; and I trust that my 
readers will for a while put aside the deep-rooted prejudice that condemns the poor pigeon, and 
consider patiently a few facts. I ask, then, has the pigeon the bill of a rook, that it may dig in 
the earth ? or the foot of a fowl, that it can scratch over the surface ? Does it not then follow 
that the pigeon, which can neither dig nor scratch, can only lift such grains as are lying on the 
surface, or imperfectly covered, and would inevitably fall a prey to some other bird ? The pigeon, 
by the aid of its swift wings, can, at seed-time, soon fill its crop. When a bird thus laden is shot, 
and the grains counted, it is a very common practice to multiply the number by 365, to find out 
how much it could eat in a year; then, reckoning the supposed number of pigeons in the United 
Kingdom, an awful amount of depredation is placed to the account of the despised birds. But let 
us inquire if this formidable theory is consistent with practice. Let us suppose that during the 
sowing time of corn pigeons feed entirely on grain, it will at once appear that, as they are not 
armed with hoe or rake, they can only take the waste, and consequently do no harm. Again, the 
enormous cropful that this or that bird was killed with does not prove that such is its daily 
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