turtledove

a kind of bird – song bird – related to the doves and belongs to the pigeon family – small with reddish-brown body feather, blue-grey head feather, black and white striped patch on each side of the neck, small head with red-rimmed round eyes, short black beak (bill), pointed wings with dark mottled or streaked feathers above and pale or white below, relatively long tail mixed with a white tip, pink to red slender legs; size: from 8 inches to 1 foot long, and weight: 120-170 grams; feeds on (eats) seeds and flowers; lives for 5-15 years (some individuals live for 20 years); found in Europe and North Africa, and parts of Asia

male ~~ cock

female ~~ hen

baby ~~ chick

group ~~ pitying

voice (call) ~~ coo; purr

home ~~ nest

Some common turtledoves are: oriental turtle-dove, Carolina turtle-dove, red turtle-dove, spotted turtle-dove, Madagascar turtle-dove, Asian dwarf turtle-dove

Special Features:

turtledoves — symbol of love

Turtle doves are migratory birds (i.e., they travel long distances to a warmer place to avoid harsh weather in one place, and fly back to the same place when the weather there gets warmer or better). They stay in North Africa and parts of Asia in winter.

Turtledoves are the symbol of devoted love because a male or female stays truthful to its mate; and if one partner dies, the other one does not take another mate for the rest of its life!

Turtle doves are mentioned in several ancient, medieval and modern literatures, including the Bible, Shakespeare’s poems, etc., and in love poems and songs — the popular poem being: ‘The Days of Christmas’.

Turtle doves are the birds of the second day of ‘The Days of Christmas’, and, according to the Bible, even before Christ, people used to sacrifice ‘two turtledoves’ to show gratitude to the Almighty!

Though they have not been given lead roles in feature films, turtledoves have been mentioned in several box-office hit films!!