Wood Pigeon.

Wood Pigeon. An 8 x 10 Acrylic painting by
Mark Phillips

This is the latest painting in my “Birds of Barbados” collection.

For all my life, I have referred to this bird as a Wood Pigeon. However, its correct name is Columbidae Patagioenas Squamosa, also known as the Scaly-naped Pigeon or in some countries the Red-necked Pigeon.

The Scaly-naped Pigeon is a large, dark pigeon that is common and widespread throughout the Caribbean except for Jamaica and the Bahamas, where it does not occur.  

It is very good to eat.

No, it does not taste like chicken, it tastes much better!  They feed on fruit and seeds and as children, we caught them with “fly sticks” baited it with sunflower or “yellow hawk” seeds. Some of the boys even used downfall traps made from pieces of old chicken wire and wood but I preferred my fly stick. We have even used our "guttaperks", made of a y-shaped stick cut from a branch of a Whitewood tree and strung with a piece of rubber cut from an old bicycle tire.

We would remove the intestines and organs, remove the feathers, skin and all, and roast them over a fire made with cow dung and casuarina sticks. Good Eats!

Many times, our hunting efforts were frustrated by wood doves, my grandfather's pigeons and other smaller birds being caught in out traps. We usually set these free as they were just not worth the effort to cook. However, whenever wood pigeons were present they would push the other birds away to get at the bait and invariably they were caught. 

There is a lesson there somewhere.

I believe that there are other species of "wood pigeon" in Barbados. I would appreciate if anyone has any information to let me know in the comments below.

I'm like Albert Schweitzer and Bertrand Russell and Albert Einstein in that I have a respect for life - in any form. I believe in nature, in the birds, the sea, the sky, in everything I can see or that there is real evidence for. If these things are what you mean by God, then I believe in God. - Frank Sinatra

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Mark Phillips

Artist
Email:- mark@phillipsbajanart.com
Website:-www.phillipsbajanart.com
Online Store:- PhillipsArtStore