Wild forest pigeon witten (otherwise a whirlwind) is well known to hunters. It is of interest to both the object of sports and ordinary bird hunting. Caught poultry is large and very tasty meat. Interest in these forest dwellers arose relatively recently: before the Internet era, only ornithologists were interested in them.
Vahir: description
The Latin name for the wild wicket is Columba palumbus.
An average man without clues will not be able to distinguish a wild dove from an ordinary city one. But a vakhir is a pigeon large enough (even for such a large bird), its dimensions are impressive: body length up to forty-five centimeters, weight on average from seven hundred to nine hundred grams, wingspan is almost seventy centimeters. Males and females weigh almost the same, although the male looks much larger.
Like all representatives of this detachment (pigeon-shaped), the swirl is painted in gray-blue (bluish) color.
Its characteristic features are clearly visible in flight: there is a white wide chevron (strip) on the wings, the top of the tail is dark, then there is a white edging. Unlike the city counterpart, the wild pigeon does not have transverse stripes of a dark shade on the wings.
In the photo of the vahir, the chest color is clearly visible - wine-pink, in front with a greenish tint.
On the sides of the neck are two large white (sometimes cream) spots.
Paws are pink-red, yellow beak.
The color of the males is brighter, the spots on the neck are much larger. Females are more elegant than males, which look somewhat heavier and larger.
In favorable conditions, a vahir can live up to sixteen years.
Wahir: distribution
Wituiten lives in the temperate latitudes of Europe and Asia, and is distributed in the northern part of West Africa, where northern individuals fly for wintering, and local people live permanently. In Russia, it was never seen north of the sixty-second parallel both in the European part and beyond the Urals. The habitat is limited to the south by the fifty-second parallel (to the borders with Ukraine).
It settles most often in coniferous or mixed forests, preferring their outskirts. For nesting, it can choose individual groups of conifers and protective forest belts along the routes, sometimes even equips in quiet parks, farm and private gardens.
In the southern regions of the European part of the Russian Federation, a pigeon witten can fly for wintering, sometimes it is delayed there for further migrations. In the Asian southern part of the Russian Federation does not settle.
Time and method of nesting of vahirei
At the end of March, these wild pigeons fly in packs from the south, and already at the end of September (mid-October) fly away for the winter.
Males, half a month after arrival (in mid-April), choose a site for themselves and begin to look for friends. The current look like this: coo during the flight, alternately take off and slow lowering-planning ("hill"). Having made several such alternating flights, the pigeon witten returns to the so-called prisad (hunters lexicon).
A pair of pigeons immediately begins to twist the nest, placing it in the forks of large horizontal branches of spruce or pine, slightly away from the trunk at a height of two to five (less often eight to ten) meters.
The vakhir nest is a loose translucent platform with a height of five to twenty centimeters and a diameter of up to thirty centimeters with a weak tray (depth about five to eight centimeters, diameter up to fourteen). The material for the construction is thin branches of birch, alder, spruce and pine. In some cases, the structures are so fragile that the eggs simply fall through the rods, becoming the prey of all kinds of predators.
The female lays only two eggs (their size is larger than that of ordinary city pigeons), the weight of the egg is nineteen grams, the diameter is up to three centimeters, the length is about four., The color of the shell is pure white with yellow on the lumen.
The first clutch is almost always at the end of April (in the early warm spring), more often - in the middle of May, the second - in July.
Mostly the female sits on the nest, males can replace her for the time of feeding. The time for hatching eggs is from seventeen to nineteen days.
Males during incubation by females of clutches can join in flocks for collective feeding. They fly out to the grain fields, then one by one they return to the nesting places.
In August, females, chicks of the first (hatching) and second broods are combined in flocks (sometimes up to four hundred individuals) for feeding and then migration.
Progeny
Relatively large chicks of a vahir in a nest spend up to thirty-five to forty days.
Both parents are busy feeding the children, bringing in the goiter, first softened grains (“bird milk”), and then other various foods.
The chicks appear almost naked, a gentle fluff - the base of the plumage does not grow quickly, first the pegs of feathers appear on the wings, then the feathers grow, and only after that the rest of the plumage. The color of the chicks becomes gently bluish.
On the eighth day, the ability to see appears.
By the fortieth day, the chicks had already taken to the wing and could provide themselves with food.
Almost half of all females after the first laying were ready for this moment to the second.
Vahirey food
The craw of a wild pigeon is large enough; hunters sometimes, when eviscerated, took out almost a whole dish of cereal seeds.
The basis of the diet upon arrival (early spring) is young buds, coniferous seeds.
In mid-May, a pigeon witten feasts on sprouted grains of spring, sometimes (with a large number) it can cause damage.
By early to mid-summer, ripening berries, seeds of wild herbs, fruits of stone fruit trees become objects of nutrition for vyakhire.
By autumn, wild pigeons begin to peck young nuts, mountain ash, currants, rose hips, bird cherry from bushes, and do not disdain carrion. Very rarely feed on worms and caterpillars.
They love to peck grain. They fly in whole flocks to the place of sorting and transshipment of grain, peck as much as possible - how much can be accommodated in the goiter. Then, one by one, they fly away for an attack.
Behavior features
Pigeon Witten - an extremely cautious bird.
Like all wild representatives of birds, having excellent hearing, does not allow a person closer than fifty, more often - a hundred meters.
When a person approaches the nest, the cooing bird immediately trails off.
It can fly close to a person if he is wearing a camouflage suit, but his face should be completely covered.
You can take a photo of the vyakhir and video if you disguise yourself in the vicinity of the nesting site in advance in his absence or, after following him, find the breeder and sit nearby.
Activity
The behavioral addictions of pigeons are due to the methods and diet.
In the spring, the bird loses weight, so its diet is poor - germinating cereal seeds, buds, last year's carrion. Weight loss - almost three to four percent (up to thirty-five grams).
By the middle-end of summer, the wild pigeon again begins to gain weight, eating fruits, seeds of wild and field grasses (loves clover very much), and then, flying in packs, and cereals and legumes.
Vyakhirei feeds in the morning and in the evening (part of it falls at dusk).
Wild pigeon lives almost on schedule: sleep, morning feeding, watering, return to the nesting place, evening food.
Females behave more actively, their life processes proceed faster than males. They spend less time on feeding, watering, and cleaning of plumage. But in the nest with the chicks they spend almost four times more time.
Ornithologists could not explain the constant morning and evening low cooing of males. To date, the reason for this behavior is associated by scientists with tactics of communication in this way with relatives, who arrived together in a flock from wintering. Birds settle at distances up to fifty meters, although in conditions of high crowding, nests can also grow at a distance of only twenty meters.
The period of sexual activity ends in birds in late summer, this contributes to the maximum weight gain.
Human intervention in the life of birds
A dove is a creature, loving order and silence. It would seem that urbanization leads to a reduction in the size of the rural population, which could bring silence to the forests. But the development of walking and long-distance car tourism makes pigeons leave their usual habitats. The suburban forests visited by mushroom pickers almost all summer (from early spring to late autumn) almost ceased to be habitual habitats of wild pigeons.
The number of vyakhirei beginning to decline since the late forties of the last century, the reason was the huge use of pesticides in agriculture.
Currently, the restriction of the increase in livestock is affected by gambling of wild birds by hunters. The pigeon of a whirlwind easily flies away even after getting into it, the hunter can not always find the dead bird, which makes him hunt further, killing more and more.
