How Do Birds Find Their Way?

Every fall thousands and thousands of birds fly south for the winter.  In the spring they return.  Did you ever wonder how they find their way south and back again?  Many scientists have studied the journeys of birds as they complete their annual migration.  If you'd like to find out more about birds, their habitats, body structure, and migration patterns come to our Open House on Thursday, January 28, 2010 and look for the Bird Museum located in grade 6B.  During the afternoon we'll be reading Roma Gans' book, How Do Birds Find Their Way?, at our book journey.  It's a fascinating story.  Our birds, Angel and Gabriel love to listen to it!

A New Clutch

As you can see (below) Angel and Gabriel have been busy. Two new eggs (a clutch) have been laid.  This is their third clutch since October.  If these eggs hatch it should be around February 10th or the 11th, 2010.  

Gabriel 

Angel

Who’s the Male? & Who’s the Female?

    When the doves first arrived at school it was a mystery as to who was the male and who was the female.  Actually, we didn’t even know if one was female and one male or if they were both female or both male. For a while we just didn’t know. Then, two eggs showed up in one nest.  If they were both males, no eggs would have shown up.  If they were both females, four eggs would have shown up around the same time. So then we knew we must have one of each, a male and a female.  Still, who was the male and who was the female?

    Then we thought we figured it out.  The dark colored dove, Angel, did very little if any cooing (usually a sign of a female).  The light colored dove, Gabriel, did most of the cooing (usually a sign of a male).  Since in the dove family males do most of the cooing, we thought Gabriel was the male and Angel was the female.  However, there have been a number of times in the past two weeks where Angel has been seen doing a bow coo (walking around the bottom of the cage with tail feathers spread out like a peacock showing off the beautiful orange/blue/gray striped feathers of the tail).  According to several breeders’ web sites, only a male will do a bow coo (usually).   

    So at this point it appears that Angel is the male and Gabriel is the female.   Hmmmm . . .  Maybe we should change their names to Angelo and Gabrielle.  What do you think?