How did the pigeons in the early days know where to deliver the message? Just curious. Weren’t there times were pigeonsost their way or got caught? How did that not create chaos? Somebody please answer
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Homing pigeons were a one-way service.
The pigeons would be taken to a place by horse/foot/etc.
When released they would fly home.
How did they know where home was?
[Same way animals do now](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-do-birds-find-their-way-home-61927645/)
And yes, sometime something or someone would foul the fowl’s flight.
They just go home, you needed to have a pigeon from the person you wanted to be able to send a message to. It was common for important people to keep a pigeon roost for this reason.
It’s not like it’s shown in movies where the bird somehow knows where the recipient will be.
You house the pigeon in a place it considers home
You take it away with you
You tie the message to its leg and let it go
It finds its way back to its home (we are still not entirely sure how)
Recipient reads the message.
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And yes they do sometimes not make it back because of predators or whatever.
Imagine a phone that you can only send one text from to only one number and you can’t receive any
Pigeons don’t care about messages they are just going home and they happen to have something attached. So you just gift your pigeon to others. Important people had employees to raise pigeons for that purpose.
Add more pigeons to cover for accidents and make sure at least one arrives.
Some pigeon breeds imprint on their birth location by around six weeks. They develop a *strong* instinct to return there for safety/mating and can fly up to 700 miles in a single day, which is pretty amazing. Take some pigeons with you on a journey, tie a note to its leg, and boom: one way telegram with unbeatable speed prior to the actual telegram.
Pigeons, in generally, are a pretty remarkable species that we used to raise for food (taste like a less gamey pheasant), keep as pets (they’re very sweet and snuggly), and in some places/times used as status symbols.
Their current bad reputation (“rats with wings”) is very recent (circa 1960s for the US). The book “A Pocket Guide to Pigeon Watching” is a great primer on these sweet little guys.
I NEVER knew this. Is this the origin of feral pigeons?! I have read that pigeons are feral and descended from pigeons that were kept in captivity. But I’ve never made any connection to homing.
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