Pigeon

When we bought our property in Provence, it was already inhabited.  The house itself was empty.  But the farm building across the courtyard from it--consisting of a sheep barn, loft, stables, and pigeonnier (dovecote)--were full of comings and goings, flirtings, courtships, burbled conversations, and multiple families occupying different parts of the building.  Pigeon families.  During the years we were working on the house, I was too caught up to pay any attention to the pigeons.  But now that we're entering our third year of occupation (I'm sure that's how the pigeons perceive it), they have have increasingly absorbed me.

Perhaps it's because our upstairs bedroom has a balcony facing the pigeonnier part of the building, plus a window facing north, toward the kitchen porch aka fledgling nursery.  So I can't help but overhear private pigeon conversations and, from the balcony, observe endless courting and sparking rituals.  Having breakfast on the terrace, we watch them take off toward the village and are forced to marvel at the power and speed of their flight.  Then, in the late afternoon, when we are on the terrace facing the lavoir (former clothes-washing fountain), we hear a rush of wings as the pigeons come home from their foraging abroad to drink.  They perch on the bars designed to support a bucket under the flowing water, dip their beaks then tilt them skyward to let the cool water run down their throats.  All that flying is undoubtedly thirsty work.  Then, it's back to the pigeonnier and other parts of 'their' habitation, to do whatever pigeons do at night.  I don't think it's making love, as most of that seems to be a morning activity.

Pigeons are an inimitable part of Provence.  Sipping an icy pastis under the shade of a plane tree while you wait for lunch at a village restaurant wouldn't be the same without pigeons.  Their sleepy cooing--or roucoulements to use the deliciously onomotopeic French--floating down from their shady perches under the eaves of the ancient stone houses around you is a necessary part of the ambiance of the Provençal village.  Without the pigeons, you'd have the sudden impression of being in a silent movie.

But pigeons in Provence traditionally have been a lot more than part of the scenery.  For centuries, they've  been a particularly delectable part of the local diet.  And that's why so many pigeonniers dot the Provençal landscape.  Resembling round or square turrets or towers and always recognizable by their 'pigeon doors'--a lattice of little arched port-holes through which the pigeons access the nesting boxes within and then escape to forage--the pigeonnier bears testament to a time when pigeons were a prized source of meat for the table in a region too austere to support cattle.  Well-populated pigeonniers once figured as articles of dowries.

Pigeonniers were once common throughout France, but were eventually outlawed in many regions due to the ongoing disputes between wheat farmers and pigeon owners.  The tradition of the pigeonnier of course assumed that the pigeons were free to take off and forage during the day, a potentially lucrative situation for the pigeon owners and a supposed disaster for the wheat farmer.  The latter was perpetually enraged by flocks of pigeons gorging on newly planted seed, and then again on the ripe heads of grain. French agrarian history is full of such disputes, and various laws intending to mitigate them. 

In Provence, pigeonniers were allowed to continue to exist, perhaps because of the poverty of the region.  Especially in Haute Provence, they are the very emblem of the landscape.  Their volières; the above-mentioned pigeon doors, are often framed with multicolored ceramic tiles whose shiny surfaces are said to attract the pigeons and entice them to come back home.  These entries can be blocked off by wire grills, which could be opened and closed by a complicated system of ropes and pulleys at fancier pigeon establishments.  The wire kept out predators at night, and also kept the pigeons prisoner during periods of planting and harvest when in some regions they were forbidden by local decree to fly free.

The inside walls of the pigeonnier are lined with hundreds or even thousands (in the case of châteaux) of nesting boxes.  In fact, standing inside and looking up, it's a dizzying sight.  Why so many nests?  Well, to answer this question we must return to the fascinating subject of the private life of pigeons.  A pigeon reaches reproductive maturity at 5 or 6 months of age, and may live as long as 16 years.  And most of this lifespan is dedicated to amorous activity.  In the early morning, from my bedroom balcony I can observe the mating ritual of the male.  On the roof of the pigeonnier opposite, he executes a complicated and undoubtedly very sexy dance in front of his intended, including what appear to be figure-eights, dips, and tail-fanning.  If he succeeds in seducing her, he then proceeds to nuzzle her beak-to-beak.  Didn't you ever stop to think where the expression "billing and cooing" came from?  This heavy necking continues until at last he is allowed to "cover" her, as the French so delicately put it.  No one can accuse him of not being an attentive lover.

But his troubles have only begun.  Now, he must entice/coerce his beloved to occupy his chosen nest to which she, not yet in the hormonal throes of--do we call it pregnancy?--is not yet inclined to confine herself.  The male begins by gently herding her to the intended destination, but if she is recalcitrant, he doesn't hesitate to beat her into submission, not too figuratively speaking.

Once the eggs arrive (usually two, sometimes only one, rarely three), the household duties are neatly shared in the couple.  The male sits on the eggs usually from late morning to sometime in the afternoon, allowing his mate to get out of the house and most important, get something to eat!  The brooding period lasts 3 weeks, during which time the pigeon couple become more and more amorous with each other and...you guessed it...before the eggs are even hatched, more are on the way!  Meanwhile, Mr. Pigeon has not been a model of fidelity, either.  Now are you beginning to understand why the rule of thumb in a pigeonnier is three nests for every two couples?  It can get so complicated--and this has been documented--that grandparents have to move in to help feed the nestlings while mom and pop are off brooding some more, separately or together--who knows?

The intensity of the pigeon's reproductive activity is simply astounding.  I know I was astounded by the couple (or couples?) who nest on top of one of the pillars supporting the roof of my kitchen porch.  I've come to understand that pigeons really need those fancy nesting boxes, because, without them, they must be the world's worst nest builders.  The artfully woven, cute and tidy nest of the songbird is not for them.  No sirree--they're too busy getting ready for that next batch of eggs to spend any time at all on housekeeping.  A loose assemblage of coarse twigs has to do.  And with the incessant comings and goings of the couple, these twigs--along with bits of down, feathers, and, yes, lots of pigeon poop--come raining down onto my porch at all hours.  Once a day, I have to hose it down, and by the next morning, it's as if I'd never lifted a finger. 


How can I love such slovenly birds, you ask? I'm not sure myself.  I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that their complex social life fascinates me, and also with the idea that they really are such an integral part of the regional landscape and tradition.  As I behold yet another array of debris beneath the porch pillar, I remark that the character of this debris changes with the season.  Now, in early autumn, it includes the dry "beans" from the nearby locust and redwood trees.  In a certain kind of disgusting way, I can trace the progression of the seasons through the pigeon mess on my porch. 

The pigeons do take a break from procreation in the dead of winter, but only after having produced (drumroll...) 10 to 18 clutches of squabs per season!  Okay, at this point, I'm sure you're thinking that now you know why there are so many disgusting pigeons available to eat dog poop in the city.  Well, I'm forced to admit you're right.  But look at it from another angle.  Say you're a hardscrabble farmer in Provence, and you have a pigeonnier.  For around 7 months of the year and at 3-week intervals, every one of those nesting boxes is going to produce a couple of plump, tender, succulent innocents, as the French cold-bloodedly call them--which have been lovingly nourished by their parents mostly by grain that you didn't even have to buy (no dog poop diet here).  If you've never eaten well-nourished domestic pigeon, alll I can tell you is you'd better taste some--cooked rare--before you pooh-pooh the procreation of the pigeon.  For me, pigeon is simply the sine qua non of the poultry world--exquisitely rich in flavor without being fatty, meltingly tender, just so much tastier than any other bird!

We're a long way off from finishing the remodeling of our pigeonnier, which boasts a mezzanine on the interior where the nesting boxes were.  This room is destined to become a library, with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves.  But, whereas originally we had planned just to restore an outward appearance of a pigeonnier, I have firmly decided I'm not about to evict our pigeons from what was undoubtedly their ancestral home.  I've bullied a reluctant Denis into acquiescing to a real live functioning pigeonnier, on top of the mezzanine (which we will be occupying as a cozy reading nook).  I look forward to hearing those soft, romantic roucoulements while I'm lost in the pages of my novel.  And also, incidentally, to collecting the precious columbine (as pigeon guano is euphemistically known in French) which, I've discovered in my research, is the most exquisite fertilizer known to man.  Wagonloads of columbine were historically an article of trade in France!  In a few years, when visitors to my potager ask what my secret is to growing those gorgeous vegetables, I'll smile mysteriously.  Then I'll answer innocently enough:  "Why, columbine!"

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