How close do you let the birds nest? Particularly, mourning doves.
They want to nest on the shelf right next to the kitchen door (99.8% entry). Every year I knock it out. This year I'm considering letting them build. This up under carport, between the entry door and the chimney. Am I crazy for even considering it?

We have had doves nest in flower baskets hanging right next to the back doorway, in window flower boxes and in a wooden pergola that is covered by grapevines. They only nest for a short time and then are gone. Kind of fun to see it all happen, so lately we have been letting it go. After a few weeks we just start over if necessary and do a little clean-up. Alway gives us a start when we open the door and the adults fly out of the nest...very noisy. Then the chicks start calling for food.

i would let them nest.
i like critters. as long as they are out of the way, not causing a nuisance. they aren't there year round.
why not.


your house, your rules.



keith

I usually let them be. The only time that I removed their nest building was because they were building it in my window box that I had just bought the plants for. I didn't feel that I could wait a month and a half to put the plants in while they laid their eggs and then hatched them out. If I waited, the box would never have caught up to the 3 others that matched it.

So if they are not in the way, I leave them be.

I have song bird's nesting all over the place.
Front porch garage you name it.
Had one twice come into my house and hang out on the ceiling fan.
It went out on its own without me freaking it out.

I had some mourning doves nest years ago in one of the windowsill boxes I have around my deck, and I just let them stay there. The nest was really strange, as it wasn't much of a nest, just a few twigs and pieces of straw. My stairway was just about 6' from it, and they would fly away, at first, every time I showed up, landing on the rail on the other side of the deck, making their usual noises, but even more so, as if to distract me, but eventually, they got used to me, and didn't mind me walking in and out, and up and down the steps. The only thing I would do close to them is set a small bowl of water about a foot from the nest, on the rail, as that spring was a very dry one. I don't remember how long it took from when the eggs were laid, to when they hatched, to when they flew away, but it was quicker than I thought it would be!