Pigeon Milk Is a Nutritious Treat for Chicks
It's also not bad with cereal. (Kidding, kidding.)
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Transcript:
This is BirdNote.
Birds lay eggs. That means they don鈥檛 nurse their young鈥 right? Well, have you ever heard of something called 鈥減igeon milk?鈥
Pigeons, one of the most ancient of domesticated birds, feed their nestlings a peculiar, milky liquid鈥攕traight from the adult鈥檚 beak to the baby鈥檚 throat.
It鈥檚 often called 鈥渃rop milk,鈥 because it comes from special cells in the bird鈥檚 crop. The crop is a section of the lower esophagus in some birds that is used for storing food before digestion.
Unlike milk from mammals, pigeon milk doesn鈥檛 come from a mammary gland. But it does come loaded with antioxidants and immune boosters that help the new hatchlings survive.
A couple of days before their eggs hatch, both pigeon parents start making the milky substance, which they鈥檒l feed their hatchlings over the first ten days of their lives. When the special feeding stops, the special crop milk cells return to normal.
Pigeons and doves aren鈥檛 the only birds that can make this special milk. Flamingos and some species of penguins can, too.
For BirdNote, I鈥檓 Michael Stein.
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Credits:
Written by Bob Sundstrom
Producer: John Kessler
Managing Producer: Jason Saul
Associate Producer: Ellen Blackstone
Editor: Ashley Ahearn
Narrator: Michael Stein
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Recorded by ML 69278 A Priori.
BirdNote鈥檚 theme music was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
漏 2019 Tune In to Nature.org March 2019