Greetings, friends of the little flying dinosaurs that populate this planet! Today we will be focusing on a medium-sized dove found throughout Mexico and the United States (though I have never seen it in the latter). The only doves I see back home are the closely related mourning doves. The Eurasian Collared Dove, however, also "mourns" when it flies.
Our dove in question hails from, as the name implies, Europe and Asia. It is now naturalized in North America ever since 50 of them escaped captivity from the Caribbean.
The above picture is the one I will be using as my entry for this week's prompt, birds with human-made things. I took this photo in my back yard. The dove pictured is a juvenile, lacking the telltale 'collar' present in adult males and females. When landing or flying overhead, they make a distinctive "Err-err-err" which to me sounds like an old witch's laugh. These types of doves love to frequent our birdbath along with its smaller cousin, the Inca dove. House sparrows also visit the water source but they seem to prefer the water sitting in the buckets. Ah, that would have been a great photo opportunity but birds are fast moving and difficult to capture, especially with a phone camera.
I hope you enjoyed this small blurb about the Eurasian Collared Dove. Have you ever seen one or any of its cousins?