They have flown away…

One day last week I looked in the nest to see our baby mourning doves and they were GONE! Horrors – did they finally grow up enough to fly or had some nasty predator found the nest?

During lunchtime later that day, Shari grabbed my attention. Lo and behold, there was one of the babies down on the ground under the magnolia. He was bobbing around – not entirely steady on his feet – and both parents were nearby shepherding him carefully. We watched for several minutes as he joined his parents and waddled – really the only term that applies accurately to his motion – out of sight following behind his parents.

It all seemed to happen so quickly -two weeks for incubation and two weeks for maturing enough to fly must have passed, but we all were enjoying watching the little ones in the nest and had hoped to see the first flight.

Now we’ll watch the same tree over the coming months and/or years to find out whether the doves by chance use the same tree, if not the same nest.