birds crop – Tjs Garden

Over the past 6 months I have watched mourning doves survive in our unforgiving desert environment. Following the quails, mourning doves have begun to mimic their behavior.

Mourning Dove Arizona Gambel's Quail desert — Mourning Dove with Gambel’s Quail

I’ve witnessed mourning doves out fly and out maneuver various hawks. Always learning, mourning doves are honor roll students of the Sonoran Desert.

Tucson Phoenix birds Mourning Dove — Mourning Dove in Arizona

Tucson mourning dove birds Turtle Dove — mourning doves in a palo verde tree

larger male dove bluish eye bird — male mourning dove, Turtle Dove

Male mourning doves are bigger than females but their color is very similar. The difference between male and female mourning doves:

Males have a bluish-gray crown; along with a rose color on the breast.
Male mourning doves can have an iridescent patch on the neck area.
Females have a grayish brown crown and a brownish tan breast area.

Arizona birds Turtle Doves — Mourning Dove in Arizona Desert

dove birds drinking water — mourning dove after a rain storm

Mourning doves successfully live in arid areas because they have no problem traveling several miles for water. Their diet consists of mostly dry seeds; therefore, they must have water daily. Mourning doves drink faster than other birds which helps them avoid predators who stay by available water.

dove squabs male and female dove — baby mourning doves 8 – 10 days old in nest

Baby mourning doves, SQUABS, have a white patch under the eye which you can see in the photo above.

doves in Tucson Phoenix birds blue eyes — mourning dove photos

doves eating with full crop — mourning dove with his crop

Mourning doves eat enough to fill their crops and then find a comfortable location to digest. What is a crop? A crop is part of the digestive tract that acts as a storage bag to hold food until it can be processed by the body.

When a mourning dove feeds in the open it must be careful of predators; therefore, it will gobble up seeds as fast as it can. The food fills up in the bird’s crop and the mourning dove hurries to safety for digestion.

dove birds in Tucson Phoenix — mourning dove getting ready to preen itself

What is preening? When a bird grooms its feathers it is called preening.

This short video below shows a male and female mourning dove preening each other. It is a lovely dove behavior to witness.

doves with white marks brown color birds — young morning dove squabs juvenile

Young mourning doves are darker than adults and have a white patch under the eye. A mourning dove will reach maturity in approximately 3 months. Mortality rate for young mourning doves is high. On average the life span of a mourning dove is 1-3 years which is mostly due to disease and starvation. Currently we have 70 or so mourning doves we feed daily.