… EVENING GROSBEAK! - NIGHT HAWK!
BIRDS OF NANTUCKET
by Kenneth Turner Blackshaw
Birders have a rather desperate sense of humor. Some would even say we're humor-starved. So anything remotely resembling a joke gets a hearty response. The exchange in the title normally starts out when someone spots a bird and calls, "Mourning dove!" Then some resident wit responds, "Evening grosbeak!" and another "Night hawk!" or even, "Night heron!" This is followed by the rolling of eyes and, perhaps, groans.

Mourning dove

This is part two of the "Lawn Dart Birds" column from a few weeks ago. You may remember that I commented that when pointy-tailed mourning doves sit on a wire they remind me of those dangerous Lawn Dart toys from the '70s that we are no longer allowed to play with.

Now it is later in Nantucket's winter, and mourning dove behavior is changing. No longer are they arriving on the ground under my feeders in 10s and 20s. No, now they are coming by ones and twos. Any day now I'll hear the sad whistled call for which they are named. You can write it, "Coooooooo - cooo - cooo - cooo," and the first note is two syllables with the second rising. Apparently this requires a lot of effort. Birds don't have lips and can't just pucker and blow as we do. The males stop everything, inflate their throats and necks, tense their whole bodies and coo. Occasionally a female will answer, but it is only a faint echo.

Males also do flight displays to try to demonstrate what competent creatures they are. The beginning part of the display is an energetic and noisy stroking pattern that carries them 30 or 40 feet in the air. From this majestic height, they set their wings and glide round and round, finally landing near their lady fair.

This last part of the flight is confusing for birders since doves look a lot like hawks at this point. It makes me think of some of our politicians who seem to be doves at one moment and then hawks the next. Too bad there is no field guide for politicians!

Once it is time to mate, mourning dove behavior quickly becomes X-rated! Male mourning doves are extremely focused. Once Mrs. Right has been located he simply pursues her and attempts to jump on top. You see these little races around the yard, sometimes afoot, sometimes in the air. Subtle is not in the vocabulary of a male mourning dove.

These doves nest all over the United States and southern Canada, even on Nantucket. Once, while in Florida, my wife commented that there was a bird nesting on our windowsill. It seemed unlikely but there the dove was, sitting within a pathetic little cluster of woven sticks. Its two white eggs were actually resting on the concrete. This choice of a nesting site was not rewarded by nature since within a few days there was a downpour of rain that deposited the nest with broken eggs on the ground.

Male doves bring nesting materials to the females who actually put the nest together. But they dither about trying to get the perfect twig and often drop it on the way back. Doves don't score very high on the bird intelligence scale. The male doesn't recognize it's no longer carrying anything but arrives at the nest site empty-beaked. At this rate, nest construction proceeds very slowly.

Mourning doves don't always even build their own nests. There is a report of a mourning dove sitting with a black-billed cuckoo on a robin's nest. The observer found two dove eggs, two cuckoo eggs and a robin's egg therein but gave no report on which chicks survived or which foster parents claimed them.

Members of the dove family feed their youngsters an incredibly nutritious food known as "pigeon milk." This is a semi-solid substance generated in the parent's crop that is regurgitated for the chicks. Only one other bird family does anything like this and it would be hard to think of a more different one - flamingos! Sounds like a good way to win a bet when sitting at a bar with a bunch of bird watchers.

Actually, one other species does something quite similar and that is the emperor penguin. The males sit for weeks during the Antarctic winter with their single egg resting on their feet. If Mom hasn't returned when hatching occurs, Dad tries to fill the gap with milk from his esophagus.

If you watch mourning doves on your birdbath you'll note that they don't bob up and down to drink as most birds do. No, they act like they have little drinking straws and just pump the liquid right down their throats.

So that ends our mourning dove story. You now know our timid doves are both hawk-like and horny. These "Lawn Dart" birds are very common on our island year-round. They are low key and unassuming creatures but quite charming and interesting in their own right. Their calls and display flights give us continued

reassurance that spring is on the way. I

Illustration by George C. West. If you enjoy "social" birding, join the Nantucket Bird Club at 8 a.m. Sundays in front of Nantucket High School for a two to three-hour birding trip. Call 228-1693 for more information. To hear about rare birds, or to leave a bird report, call the Massachusetts Audubon hot line at 781-259-8805. Ask Ken a question at: kenandcindy1@comcast.net.