Blue Crowned Pigeons in Jurong Bird Park Singapore
Anything that is not traditional is exciting, isn’t it?
That is precisely what I felt when I saw the Blue Crowned Pigeon roaming around me freely without any fear in Jurong Bird Park, Singapore. These non-aggressive birds looked so attractive with their brightly colored crest feathers, I was on my knees.
Meet World’s Largest Pigeons in Jurong Bird Park
The Turkey sized birds moved around me so gracefully, it was hard to believe they belonged to the pigeon family. Also called the western crowned-pigeon, it is the largest pigeon in the world.
The arrangement at this particular enclosure of the Blue Crowned Pigeons was good. A huge cage, visitors could enter and exit through two gates, and the birds seemed so used to the curious visitors. They seemed so tamed and trusting birds. I found so many of them close to my feet.
Victoria Crowned Pigeon as Pets
The ease with which they interact with humans I felt it should be easy to have them as pets like any other pigeon. But it can be an expensive affair I learned later. Each bird sells at 2000 to 2500$.
Their diet usually consists of of grains that are usually fed to the domestic pigeons, small dog food bits, and chopped fruit so maintaining is not costly.
Check out the contrasting scary Cassowary at Jurong Bird Park Singapore.
Also see: Trained Egyptian Vulture
Blue Crowned Pigeons in Jurong
Mating Ritual
There I witnessed the mating ritual of Blue Crowned Pigeons. The male bird was making a boom-boom kind of sound, spreading its tail feathers and continuously bowing to the female one. It was showing off its beautiful crest. I was so carried away by the beautiful sight, that I forgot to click.
Hatching and Incubation
In one of the low branches, there was a mother pigeon hatching its eggs. Usually they lay only one egg at a time, 30 days for incubation, After hatching the chick is looked after in the nest by both parent birds for another 30 days and finally when it flies out it is still looked after for another 30 days by the parent birds.
Threatened Survival of Blue Crowned Pigeons
Hunted for food and its plumes, it remains common only in remote areas. Due to ongoing habitat loss, limited range and over hunting in some areas, the Western Crowned Pigeon is evaluated as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
Other specifications
Also known as: Blue crowned-pigeon, common crowned pigeon, Victoria Crowned Pigeon, Great Goura and Masked Pigeon
Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Chordata
Class Aves
Order Columbiformes
Family Columbidae
Genus Goura (1)
Size Length: up to 70 cm (2)
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Indrani Ghose is an Indian Travel Writer and Blogger based in Bangalore, India. She has written for numerous publications across the globe – including Lonely Planet, The National UAE, Whetstone Asia, Deccan Herald. You can follow her on her social media handles Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook to see the wonderful destinations, beautiful offbeat places and get instant updates about them.
what a pretty creature!
oh! I missed this post!
Really an enjoying post! the pics are so lovely!
Indrani, wish you keep on travelling and post more exciting posts like this 🙂
Thanks for sharing!
Thank you for this lovely post and pictures of the blue crowned pigeon.
That's an amazing head-dress the pigeon is donning! Beautiful photographs.
Wow! This is an amazing bird!!
WOW you have photographed the bird of paradise!
🙂
A wonderful series and the last picture is a masterpiece.
Thanks!
So beautiful a bird …
Wow, that sure is an interesting bird.
She's so beautiful!!
My Travelogue, Savoir-Faire
Beautiful.. waiting to see more beautiful shots of Singapore..
It somehow looks like peacock. I never hear about this type of pigeon, but indeed beautiful bird.
Beautiful bird….
Wow, never seen anything like it! Does that mean turkeys and pigeons are related?
I've seen some lovely pigeons with time at the Eden field station, so I'm not surprised there is another amazing species at the other end of the world. Love this one!
The last pic is my favourite – all of them are good.
Missed you!
What a stunning bird….
Hi Indrani, Good to hear from you after a long time, hope you had a good vacation and you have loads of pictures to share 🙂 Those are nice shots and it is a beautiful bird… love the second photo, it show's some nice details of the crown.
nice shots… but…wasnt that fashion victim rock star "peigeon" frightening?
That's a pigeon? Wow, I've never seen them like that before.
wow very interesting bird, thanks for sharing all information!
Happy camera critters
purrs and love
Luna
Once again, excellent pictures and superb narration.
beautiful bird, I could not shoot it to eat because it's beautiful crown
They are pretty birds! Never even heard of them before!
They look like peacocks! There was a documentary shown in some channel where one guy went to Antartica and sat in the line where the penguins were moving. The penguins where hopping from rock to rock and when they saw him in the way, they just hopped over his head and to the next rock!!! The innocence displayed by the penguins over there (which might have not seen an human at all) was so awesome to watch! This post of yours some how reminded me of that incident…
Destination Infinity
What a glorious crown!!! Like a royal crown.
It is a cool looking bird, and so unlike any pigeon here. Thanks for sharing your beautiful critter.
I love the young one!!
looks like a rock star
Amazing photos of a very exotic looking bird who has a mundane name!
Wow.. what a cool looking bird.. you always get the most amazing shots.
Never seen anything like this before -thanks for sharing.
The birdy looked like a fashion victim after a bad hair cut session, but as it was natural I can only say that nature works in mysterious ways!
Wow!!
Beautiful!
How lucky you are to have seen all of this 🙂
best wishes
Ribbon
Rather a majestic looking bird for a pigeon! The Central Park Zoo in New York has a similar-looking bird, called the Victoria Crowned Pigeon, which has an more elaborate plume!
Hope you had a wonderful vacation.
Welcome back! In Singapore, both at the zoo and the Bird Park, the animals/birds are treated so well by their trainers, that they really feel no need to fear humans.
So loverly plumage on the crown! How nice to be up close and the birds do not feel threatened.
Hi Indrani,
As soon as I saw the first picture, I thought to myself "HEY…I saw this in Singapore. I wonder where she saw it" and then proceeded to read the text.
It is indeed a very striking bird. The Jurong bird park was great, right! I loved the show-birds cage the most.