Joyce Kok and her husband had a pair of Pink-necked Green Pigeons (Treron griseicauda) nesting in their garden recently. The birds built a simple platform of twigs at the top of their potted Dracaena fragrans plant along their balcony (below left). As the nesting was so accessible, they kept watch on the progress, documenting the stages from eggs to chicks. It was through the efforts of Patricia Thong that we received the details of their observations and the images that are posted here.
The birds laid two white eggs (top right). One egg hatched, but they failed to notice it as the chick was brooded close to the parent and under one of the wings. And the nest was never empty as there was always one parent in it. The male sitting in the nest (below left) is actually brooding a chick that she failed to notice. The other image where the the male is with an old chick, shows the other egg that remained unhatched.
What Joyce did notice was that both parents helped in egg incubation and chick brooding. She especially noticed that the male incubated the eggs and brooded the chick the entire day (below left) while the female took over the night shift (below right).
In the image on the left, notice the distinct upper eyelid of the male bird. The eye of the chick is covered by a translucent membrane, the nictitating membrane, also called the third eyelid. This membrane moves sideways across the eye and helps to clean the surface of the eye as well as keep it moist.
Pink-necked Green Pigeons are now becoming common around our urban areas and it is not unusual to see pairs nesting in trees, bushes and potted plants found in small gardens.
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