Pigeon Breeding and Loft Design in Ghana

Two eggs a clutch, and why the pair is the unit

A pigeon pair lays two eggs at a time. If one egg fails to hatch, or a squab dies in its first week, the pair has lost half of that clutch before the loft has noticed. Most of the work in pigeon breeding is about making each clutch succeed, not about how many birds crowd into the building.

Think of the pair as the unit. Both birds build the nest, both incubate and both feed the young. When one partner is sick, bullied or simply uninterested, the nest suffers. A loft of twenty single birds breeds less than a loft of ten settled pairs, and it takes much longer to work out why.

Pigeons defend the space around the nest, and they will fight over a bowl that sits too close to another pair. Keep each pair in its own nest space, and watch for birds that keep chasing neighbours off their bowls. Those are often the birds that will not feed their young properly.

For the wider business picture, from buying squabs to selling them, our starter guide to pigeon and squab farming covers the economics. This article stays with the breeding and the building. Halaal Farms is a poultry hatchery, so we do not supply pigeons. Our breeds page and day-old chicks page cover the poultry side of a mixed farm.

Choosing breeders by how they behave, not only how they look

Look for birds that hold themselves upright, eat quickly when the feed goes down and show clean eyes, clean vents and smooth feathers. A bird that sits hunched in a corner while the rest of the loft feeds should be checked before it goes near a breeding pair.

Behaviour counts as much as body. In the first days after two birds are paired, watch whether they preen each other, sit close together and take turns on a bowl. A pair that squabbles for three or four days and then settles is usually fine. A pair in which one bird spends its time on the floor, or in which the female will not stay on the nest, is a problem you will pay for later.

Buy breeders from a source you can visit, and ask to see the parents if you can. Pigeons carry some infections without showing them, so a new bird should be kept apart for a few weeks before it joins the loft. The quarantine pen does not need to be fancy. It needs its own feeder, its own water and its own door. Our biosecurity guide sets out the same habits for poultry, and they apply just as well here.

Pairing, settling in and the first nest

Introduce two birds through mesh in a neutral pen, not inside the nest space of either one. Let them see each other for a day or two. Then put them together with one feeder and one drinker only. When they begin to bill and sit side by side, move them into a nest compartment with a clean, dry bowl.

The bowl should be shallow and wide enough for both birds to sit in. Give a small amount of clean dry grass or a few twigs, and no more. A pile of material around the bowl harbours mites and lice, and it can hide a squab from the parents, who may then struggle to find it when they feed.

A pair that refuses the bowl for a week is telling you something. Check the position first. Bowls set in full light by an open door are often rejected, and a pair that will not nest in one spot may simply want a quieter corner.

The breeding cycle from first egg to first flight

Keep the dates from the first egg. The table gives the usual sequence, with a check to make at each stage. Treat the days as approximate, because a pair in a cool spell or after a hard feed change will run behind.

The timing matters more than the calendar. A pair that lays in the rains may breed back within days of its young leaving the bowl. A pair that has had a hard harmattan, or a stressful change of feed, may stop for several weeks. Keep the dates, and treat a long gap between clutches as a symptom to investigate.

Incubation shifts, and why the night bird matters

In most pigeon pairs the male takes the day shift on the eggs and the female takes the night. The changeover usually happens in the late afternoon and again in the early morning. That split is useful to know, because it tells you when to look.

Check the nest at dawn and at dusk, when the swaps happen. A bird that stays off the bowl for long periods, or that will not sit when you approach, needs watching. Ghanaian dusk comes quickly, and a loft that is dark by six will hide a cold clutch from you until the morning.

Cold eggs and eggs left unattended for hours may not hatch. Do not handle them more than you must. If you need to lift a bird off the bowl, do it slowly, and put it back on the same spot. A bird that gets disturbed too often will abandon the clutch, and the second disturbance usually does more harm than the first.

Loft dimensions for a first ten to twenty pairs

Here is a layout that suits a first loft, drawn for a room about three metres long and two and a half metres wide. Run a walkway of about eighty centimetres down the middle. On each side, a row of compartments roughly eighty centimetres deep and seventy-five centimetres wide gives four compartments a side, so eight pairs on one level. A second tier of shelves can double that, provided the roof is high enough for you to reach the top shelf without stooping.

Put the door at the end of the walkway, not into a compartment, so a stray bird cannot slip into a pair's nest when you enter. Keep the walkway clear. Put the feeders and drinkers at the far end, so you do not have to reach into each pair's space every time you feed. If you are building poultry houses on the same land, our broiler house setup guide covers ventilation and layout for the flock side.

Build the compartments with partitions that stop at about two-thirds of the way up, with mesh above, so the air moves through the whole loft. A solid wall right up to the roof traps heat, and a mesh gap at floor level lets rats in.

Nest bowls, perches and where the light falls

A nest bowl is a shallow dish set in a cool, dim corner of the compartment, away from the perch and the door. Pigeons like a bowl that feels enclosed. A bowl in the full glare of an open door is often rejected, and any eggs left in it cool down quickly.

Set the perch above the bowl, not beside it, so the droppings fall on the tray and not into the nest. A perch that drops straight onto the bowl will foul the eggs within days. Keep a cleanable tray or board below each perch, and scrape it every few days.

Light matters for breeding. Birds that get long, steady daylight tend to come into lay more reliably. Do not fit a lamp to force the cycle without advice. Give the loft natural light through a window or an open upper panel for part of the day, and let the birds' own rhythm do the work.

Ventilation that does not put a draught on the perch

Ventilation is the hardest thing to get right in a Ghanaian loft. The same building has to shed heat in the afternoon and keep out the cold wind during the harmattan. Put the openings high, above the perch line, with wire mesh that stops predators and lets the air through. Air should enter at the top and move across the ceiling, not drop straight onto the birds.

A loft with no air will cook squabs in a week of hot days. A loft with a draught at perch height will chill birds that are sitting on eggs, and the dry season nights can be cold for a bird that has spent months in the heat. Walk the loft in the evening and feel for air at the level of a bird's back. If you can feel it there at night, close the lower gap and open the top.

Rats, cats and snakes: sealing the breeding room

Rats are the loft's worst enemy after neglect. A rat will take eggs and young in a single night, and it carries disease from the granary into the nest. Use wire mesh with openings no bigger than about a centimetre on every vent and every gap. Fit a solid floor, or a raised floor with a mesh gap too small for a rat to squeeze through.

Cats and dogs get in through a door left open for a minute. Snakes come up through floor gaps. Pick up dead birds and spilled feed at once, because both draw the animals that later find the nests. Check the lower wall every week, and look for gnawed feed bags and fresh holes.

The feed store should be a separate building or a sealed bin. A granary next to a loft is a rat highway, and every pair you lose to rats is a pair the granary helped to kill.

Grit, water and a feed that keeps a pair laying

A breeding pair needs more than grain. It needs grit and a calcium source as well, and clean water every day. Give a separate pot of grit, a supply of oyster shell or another calcium source, and water that you change daily. A pair short of calcium lays thin shells, and thin shells crack under the weight of the sitting bird.

Most keepers in Ghana feed a grain mix of maize, sorghum, wheat or peas, depending on what they can buy and what it costs. Watch the bird rather than the scoop. A pair in good shape holds its weight and keeps a clean vent. A pair that is thin and dull needs more protein or more variety, and your vet can tell you which.

Do not feed pigeons from a bag of broiler or layer feed without reading the label first. Some medicated poultry feeds are not suitable for other birds, and additives that are safe for chickens can harm pigeons. Our poultry feed basics guide explains what the label numbers mean, which helps when you compare bags. Ask your vet before you change the feed of a breeding pair. Your vet can also advise on any vaccines for birds on the same farm, and our vaccination guide explains the general poultry schedule that such advice usually sits beside.

Culling and retiring breeders on a rule you set in advance

A pair that has reared young in two seasons out of three is worth keeping. A pair that lays fertile eggs and loses every squab in the first week is telling you something, and you should stop hoping it will change. Set the rule before you need it. For example, retire a pair after two seasons with no young reared, and move the birds to a different pair or sell them as companions.

Be honest about the cause before you blame the birds. A pair that fails in the same nest every season may be sitting in a bowl that is too exposed, too warm or too close to a neighbour. Change the nest first. Only then decide whether the birds should go.

The breeding record that tells you what to fix

Write one line per pair: the ring number or name, the date paired, the date of each clutch, the hatch date, the number of young reared and any sickness. Read the record at the end of each month. A column of empty entries shows you a problem faster than your memory of a good season.

The record also tells you which pairs to keep. When you come to choose the next breeders, pick from pairs whose young grew well, not from the birds you happen to like best. Pigeons are easy to love, and that is exactly why the record has to be kept on paper.

Pair records with the rest of your farm books. If you keep geese or chickens as well, our guide to raising geese sets out a similar approach to records for waterfowl, and the habit carries over. If you want the same discipline on the poultry side, start with the questions we answer most often about ordering and delivery, or send us a message through the order form when your flock is ready.

Checklist before the first pair goes into the loft

1. Build the walls and floor with mesh that stops rats at the lowest opening.
2. Put the vents above the perch line, then test for a draught at perch height on a cool night.
3. Set one bowl per pair in a cool, dim corner, out of the line of sight from the door.
4. Fit a perch above each bowl, with a cleanable tray below it.
5. Set up a separate quarantine pen for every new bird.
6. Stock grit, a calcium source, clean water and a sealed feed bin before any bird arrives.
7. Start the breeding record on the day the first pair is paired, not the day the first egg appears.

Questions farmers ask