Superdove: How the Pigeon Took Manhattan ... and the World

by Courtney Humphries

Book Overview

In the tradition of Rats and Garbageland, Superdove is the fascinating story of an often reviled yet vastly misunderstood creature--the pigeon. 10 b&w photos and illustrations throughout. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061259160
• ISBN13: 9780061259166
• Release Date: August 2008
• Publisher: Smithsonian Books (DC)
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Essential reading for lovers of pigeons or natural history

SUPERDOVE is a beautifully-written, in-depth history of how the "common" pigeon came to dominate cities the world around. Particularly interesting is the idea of synanthropy, wherein animals become dependent on humans while remaining wild. How the use, abuse, manipulation, adoration,and vilification of pigeons has shaped their evolution is a fascinating story. Author Courtney Humphries is immensely talented.

Bring on the Pigeons!

A fascinating book about the bird that everyone takes for granted. I keep waking up my husband to read him fun pigeon facts. Who knew they mate for life? Navigate with iron in their beaks? A great read for anyone interested in birds, nature or evolution.

Differing Aspects of a Unique Bird

In _Stardust Memories_ of 1980, Woody Allen memorably called pigeons "rats with wings", summarizing how many urban dwellers think of them. Every city has pigeons, and this is just as much because of human nature as pigeon nature. In _Superdove: How the Pigeon Took Manhattan... and the World_ (Smithsonian Books), Courtney Humphries has presented a comprehensive look at this common bird (some would, of course, say common pest), but unlike a typical ornithological evaluation, this has to take in not just the natural history and evolution of the bird, but also the geography, history, and culture of the humans who have invited it to live in cities and indeed have shaped it to be able to do so. It's not the sort of bird you'd expect to see in, for instance, a special on the Nature Channel. "The pigeon is not the smartest bird, Humphries says, "nor the fastest, nor the prettiest, and it is certainly not the rarest. But it is capable of so much. More specialized birds might illustrate the limits of evolution, but pigeons show us its breadth." Pigeons show a widespread competence, rather than exploiting specialized expertise, and their interactions with us show a lot about human nature. Pigeons are also called rock doves (and have recently been officially denominated "rock pigeons"), and indeed there is essentially no species difference between a dove and a pigeon. There are so many forms of pigeon because they were domesticated around five thousand years ago, probably the first domesticated birds. The birds were kept as a food source in dovecotes, and so began their long history of exploiting a niche in between full domestication and life in the wild. Pigeons also were used as messengers, and the capacity of pigeons to return to their homes has been the subject of biological investigation for decades; it seems that they can use sun position, smells, and visual cues, as well as being able to sense magnetic forces. The other way people use pigeons is for show. Careful breeding has developed birds that look vastly different from one another in color, posture, neck or tail feathers, and more. Pigeons were one of the many subjects Darwin pushed himself to find out about. Everyone knows that Darwin's finches from Galapagos are an important illustration of evolution, but not everyone realizes that pigeons played an even more important role. Darwin devoted the first chapter of the _Origin_ to pigeons because he saw that what human pigeon fanciers were doing with relative speed to their generations of pigeons, nature had done slowly with all animals and plants. It was a wonderful metaphor, easy to understand and vivid. Humphries is a gifted writer, documenting with zest and humor her visits with world-wide experts on different aspects of this multifaceted bird, including ornithologists who are inspired by studying a bird that has changed so much through its long association with humans and other ornithologists who say such study is useless beca

answers a lot of questions

I've always thought pigeons were pretty amazing; as the author points out, they are "able to make a natural habitat out of areas that seem hostile to animal life" and thus "bring a bit of nature back into cities." This book answers a variety of questions, including: 1 . Where do pigeons come from, anyway? They are descendants of rock doves that nested in the cliffs of southern Europe and the Middle East. Eventually, pigeons were domesticated by being lured into dovecotes, essentially being given free food and shelter, and being used for message-sending due to their homing instinct (that is, their instinct to come home). Today's urban pigeons are feral rather than wild- that is, they are descendants of these domesticated pigeons. 2. Why are pigeons so comfortable in cities? First, habitat. The windows, porches and ledges of cities are similar (in a pigeon's eyes) to their native cliffs. Second, food. Humans tend to eat (and throw away) a lot of grain-based food- by coincidence the perfect pigeon diet. Third, because urban pigeons are descendants of domesticated ones, they have been bred to be less skittish around humans than some wild birds. 3. Why don't we eat more pigeons? Although pigeons breed rapidly enough to survive (and occasionally be eaten though usually as "squab") they don't breed nearly as rapidly as chickens. A hen can lay 200 eggs a year; pigeons are much less productive and waste valuable egg-laying time nurturing their young, since pigeon young are much more dependent on their parents than chicks. Thus, a farmer simply cannot churn out as many pigeons as chickens. 4. How smart are pigeons? In some ways, not so much. They have small brains, and don't solve puzzles or use tools. On the other hand, a well-trained pigeon can recall hundreds or thousands of images for years, and pigeons can even be trained to do assembly-line pecking due to their high tolerance for boredom. 5. Why might a city rationally want to discourage humans feeding pigeons? The issue (at least in cities where people have thought intelligently about the issue,) is less disease than overpopulation. Some scientists worry that if humans feed pigeons too much, it becomes easier for pigeons to breed, thus causing overpopulation and maybe a mass die-off. (I'm not sure whether this argument really makes sense, and I didn't get the impression that the author was trying to independently evaluate it herself).

The fascinating history, biology, and anthropology of a bird and an eloquent, humorous, thoughtful b

An evolving animal takes whatever it can get and runs with it. For the rock dove, it was us, and our civilization. First kept for food some 3000 years ago, the pigeon has escaped the fate of the chicken or the cow, animals that wouldn't last long without us. The pigeon has made us and our creations its environment--feeding in our fields and at our hands, roosting on our buildings--just as a lion does the savannas of Africa. Courtney Humphries' excellent first book reveals a writer with talent and brains and a very humane touch, able to treat the follies, failings, and successes of humans as deftly as she does the successes of science; the chapters on the BF Skinner, pigeon racers, and "pigeon people" are among the best studies of humans you'll ever read. The pigeon might be so commonplace that they escape our notice, but authors like Humphries and books like _Superdove_ are among the rarest literary treasures, and we ought to cherish them.