6
$\begingroup$

Do they tend to live their lives in one area of the city or do they move around? For example, do pigeons born on London's Trafalgar Square live their whole lives centered around Trafalgar Square or can they move and become Marble Arch based pigeons?

What is the typical range of a city pigeon? Have Trafalgar Square pigeons ever made the trip to Buckingham palace just down the road from them, or do they hang out in the square all the time?

How different are these behaviors from their wild behaviors and how effected by humans actions in the city are they? For example, do pigeons learn that a particular city square will become busy with tourists in the summer and travel there at these times of the year seeking food?

Improve this question
$\endgroup$
3
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Good question! You might want to restrict it to one species only though (such as pigeon for exmaple). There are interesting studies about crows for example and how they learned to predict consequences of human behaviours. $\endgroup$ – Remi.b May 13 '16 at 16:40
  • $\begingroup$ This will differ widely between different species, so you need to specify exactly what species you are asking for (e.g. pigeons). $\endgroup$ – fileunderwater May 13 '16 at 21:32
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks for the feedback! I'll change the question to be just about pigeons. $\endgroup$ – RGWinston May 14 '16 at 9:59
2
$\begingroup$

I'm only aware of two studies that have looked at Rock Pigeon home range size. Note that this isolated research and may not be representative of Rock Pigeons everywhere nor of other pigeon species.

Rose and Nagel (2006) tracked 80 feral pigeons using GPS receivers and found 32% remained within 0.3 km of their roost location. Only 7.5% traveled over 2km from their roost location. Individuals of this species typically have 1-2 primary feeding locations within their home range which ranged from 3 - 151 ha in size (Rose et al. 2006).

Rose, E., D. Haag-Wackernagel, and P. Nagel. 2006. Practical use of GPS-localization of Feral Pigeons Columba livia in the urban environment. Ibis 148(2):231-239.

Rose, E. and P. Nagel. 2006. Spatio-temporal use of the urban habitat by Feral Pigeons (Columba livia) Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 60(2):242-254.

Improve this answer
$\endgroup$

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.