Animal Diaries Archive

Touchdown!

30 September 2005

Yay! It's fourth time lucky for our latest parents in the Rainforest Aviary, Warroo and Winita, two of our Wonga Pigeons. These pigeons do not have the greatest grasp on how to construct a durable nest; they usually tend to be a rather flimsy affair, and so the first few nests they attempted ended up on the ground. We helped these guys out be putting up wire platforms, which allowed them to have a stable platform to start with, and it was in these that they were able to lay their eggs.

Unfortunately it was not until a few infertile eggs later that they had a triumph. We are very pleased that this pair has finally had success, because they have been trying very hard. Well that is one reason why we are happy, the second reason is that when the male Wonga is not on a nest he is continually calling for a mate, and when I say continually I mean that it is all day long, "Whooo! Whooo! Whooo! Whooo!" like a broken record. So the added bonus is that at the moment we have a relatively quiet aviary.

Now we are looking forward to seeing in a couple of weeks our new little guy, whom we have named Wallace, walking around on the ground with our other six Wonga Pigeons. It is all very exciting!