The Birds

In fourteen years in Gullane I've only seen one pigeon in our garden, and it was a homing pigeon; it was there because, well, it had been unable to find its way home. We do, however, have an ever-increasing population of wood pigeons. As these birds are famously wary, I feel rather pleased that, in the last couple of weeks, I've managed to train one to eat peanuts out of my hand. Despite my Birds of Britain and Europe, I can't tell the male from the female. All I know is that the slightly bigger bird of the pair now stuffs itself as its mate looks on, warily, from a distance.

When I lived in Stockbridge (Edinburgh) two plain old pigeons used to visit our windowsill every day.
One was called The Captain (he had a bit of a peg leg) and the other was known as The Purple Girl. One warm day I left the window open wide and found The Purple Girl circling the room. Here's a photograph of the The Purple Girl, taken in 1994. She's outside the house.

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