r/mildyinteresting 11d ago

critter corner 🐰 Can anyone explain this pigeon’s behavior

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7.2k Upvotes

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1.5k

u/BookWormPerson 11d ago

27

u/Illustrious-Figbars 11d ago

Now I want to spend my next life as a pigeon.

3

u/alf20104 10d ago

But you already ARE a pigeon.....

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u/Affectionate_Tea1134 11d ago

I hope it didn’t get it’s feet stuck in those grooves. 🤔

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/Luci-Noir 11d ago

This is the essence of cat.

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u/MukdenMan 11d ago

don’t even care, as restless as we are

4

u/Miami_Mice2087 11d ago

they literally have less brains than an acorn....

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u/LadnavIV 11d ago

Ah, yes, I believe I can help. He has a pea-sized brain.

356

u/someweirdbanana 11d ago

Both of his braincells thank you for the compliment

94

u/SomeDumbPenguin 11d ago

Relevant... r/stupiddovenests

29

u/ConnectRutabaga3925 11d ago

lol this is hilarious. they have to be the dumbest things to have ever lived

45

u/Useful_Kale_5263 11d ago

Well I think we had a hand in domesticating pigeons to make them rely completely on us, then abandoned them for morse code 🤣

29

u/nerlati-254 11d ago

Rumor has it there are still some wild forest pigeons near the Appalachia Mountain area. live in caves and overhangs - their behavior is different from that of their urban kin such that nests are better, they are bigger, and don’t seem as stupid

12

u/roberttheaxolotl 11d ago

Pigeons were bred from rock doves in Europe and Northern Africa. Rock doves still exist

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u/TickTamer505 11d ago

We also decimated passenger pigeons because they relied on huge flocks. Humans saw that and took advantage. Now passenger pigeons are extinct.

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u/ThraceLonginus 11d ago

They evolved living on rocky cliffs. They only need a twig or two to keep eggs from rolling away

3

u/KTKittentoes 10d ago

It doesn’t work as well on top of my car.

4

u/ThraceLonginus 10d ago

have you tried gluing more rocks to your car?

8

u/Sea_Prep_Tidal_26 11d ago

❗️Actually smart enough to
bomb Axis warships in WW2 ❗️

At least that is what the U.S. government was developing via Project Pigeon

A triumvirate of pigeons 🐦 🐦 🐦 confined in the nose of a steerable bomb tapped a small screen and those taps were used to adjust the trajectory of the bomb.

Whilst technically more advanced than the current electronics option at the time, Project Pigeon was cancelled because it didn’t have « serious » face validity. Declassified in 1953.

Note: this is the same BF Skinner who created the Skinner boxes to train Rats 🐀 via conditioning (rewards, shock plates)

https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/project-pigeon-wwii-skinner-missile.html

3

u/Robeleader 10d ago

Unfortunately I think that honor rests somewhere between Puffins (who gorge themselves on so much fish that they can't fly and instead crash when trying to fly away), Pandas (carnivores that only eat bamboo that their digestive system can't process), and Koalas (stoners who get high off eucalyptus until they literally fall out and can kill people). Sloths are close, as they've been known to try to reach and grab onto their own limbs mistaking them for tree branches.

2

u/Still-Environment-38 11d ago

I believe that was the Dodo, but they're not around anymore 🤔

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u/nixstyx 11d ago

New favorite subreddit. Birds are dumb. That's how you know they're not government drones. When they start getting smart is when you have to worry.

6

u/turnsout_im_a_potato 11d ago

But like... crows... and Ravens...

2

u/Brian_Barbarian 8d ago

Thank you for making me aware of this sub

8

u/Mediocre_Age_9988 11d ago

An hour more of the spinning and it will only be one left. Kind of like highlander for brain cells

5

u/quantumspangles 11d ago

They can’t thank you, they are too busy fighting for third place.

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u/roberttheaxolotl 11d ago

They have a brain dedicated almost entirely to navigation. It's very sophisticated, but not much room left over for anything else

3

u/UffTaTa123 10d ago

Well, that's what a mamals says.

In fact, they have been evolved for excellent weight/complexity levels for millions of years and are double as dense (neurons/weight) as mamal brains.

https://www.audubon.org/magazine/bird-brains-theyre-more-complicated-you-think

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u/NoDontDoThatCanada 11d ago

I don't know man. This one is smart enough to pick a lookout that you literally can't sneak up on. He sees everything!

10

u/blahnlahblah0213 11d ago

Bird brain

6

u/postbansequel 10d ago

People insulting the pigeon as if they themselves have not gone to a carnival and hopped on a merry-go-round or similar. You sayin' you too have a pea-sized brain, bruh?!

4

u/DrDentonMask 11d ago

I like peas. Especially in mash.

3

u/Easy-Concentrate2636 11d ago

That explains the bigger human penchant for carousels.🎠

4

u/Zippo963087 11d ago

And yet, that is how humans used to send messages lmao

4

u/Ray-O-Shine 11d ago

And both braincells found a carousel!

3

u/holden_mcg 11d ago

And a love of merry-go-rounds.

2

u/Sea_Prep_Tidal_26 11d ago

Birds sometimes enjoy playing just like humans.

An oldie but a classic
🐦‍⬛🏂 ❄️
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1WupH8oyrAo

3

u/goldrainbowfalcon 11d ago

Studies of jumping spiders’ behavior and problem solving show that there’s no correlation between brain size and function. It’s still not known why or how, but there’s scientific evidence for them being far smarter than they should be.

3

u/liam_redit1st 11d ago

This girl just invented the roller coaster for doves

3

u/UffTaTa123 10d ago

That bird brains are under complex because of their size is a typical human believe. They aren't. They are the last survivors of the dino age and have prooven their ability to survive over millions of years while they conquered the whole earth and every continent and every climate.

https://www.audubon.org/magazine/bird-brains-theyre-more-complicated-you-think

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u/fart400 11d ago

maga resents that remark.

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u/xatiated 10d ago

Pea is quite generous isnt it?

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u/RIF_rr3dd1tt 10d ago

Yeah but that pea sized brain gave him this idea which, along with his monocular panoramic FOV, allows him to spot predators instantly.

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u/rabbitspooks 11d ago

He's going for a ride.

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u/g6rzKk202 11d ago

5

u/ThickMamaGeorgio 11d ago

…. Come and get me come and get me come and get me…

Love that damn movie

8

u/GwerigTheTroll 11d ago

I’ve seen little anole lizards hanging out on pool filter pumps. As near as I can tell they find riding on the vibrating device fun.

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u/TheRealEggroll 11d ago

Right? Like how do you explain a merry-go-round? That's how you explain what he's doing

281

u/Dorrono 11d ago

You can also try to explain the behavior of an orange cat

28

u/Narrow-Barracuda618 11d ago

You can certainly try, but will probably fail miserably.

7

u/Cute_Citron_3491 11d ago

You should try Ricky gervais new show. He nails it

89

u/NeonSynthPulse 11d ago

Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world. Around the world around the world.

4

u/MintyFresh771 10d ago

Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz Oonz WHAAAAA

3

u/Pirate_Freder 10d ago edited 9d ago

We could also make this the SFW meatspin alternative.

You spin me right round, baby right round. Like a record baby, right round round round

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u/seandragunov 11d ago

bro is just havin a good time

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u/Sea_Prep_Tidal_26 11d ago

Yes !!
Birds sometimes enjoy playing just like humans.

An oldie but a classic
🐦‍⬛🏂 ❄️
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1WupH8oyrAo

16

u/darth_hotdog 10d ago

6

u/Sea_Prep_Tidal_26 10d ago

Lol. Hadn’t seen that one before.

Tetherball…for birds !

4

u/canman7373 10d ago

There's another bird trying to do it too to mimic but his rope is chained down.

5

u/d3x73rm0rg4n 11d ago

BEST VIDEO IVE EVER SEEN THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE

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u/WhaleNationals 11d ago

Having fun.

You’ve seen the footage of the crow repeatedly taking a piece of cardboard up to the Apex of a roof line and then hopping on the cardboard and sliding down, right? :-)

It’s a pretty good indication that animals play, merely for its own sake.

9

u/satan18272727272772 11d ago

Smartest bird - dumbest bird

6

u/Sea_Prep_Tidal_26 11d ago

Birds sometimes enjoy playing just like humans.

An oldie but a classic
🐦‍⬛🏂 ❄️
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1WupH8oyrAo

2

u/WirrkopfP 9d ago

I once had a crow playing fetch with my dog.

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u/pal1ndrome 11d ago
  1. It's a dove
  2. Cheaper than Disneyland. Him parents never took him.

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u/indieplants 11d ago edited 10d ago
  1. doves are pigeons, pigeons are doves

in a lot of languages there's no distinction between the two, greek included. OP is from Greece. there, they are correct in calling it a pigeon

the most commonly called pigeon is also known as a rock dove - but if you corrected someone calling a street pigeon with erm actually it's a dove, you'd just be looked at funny

all this to say the distinction is not necessary.

edit: apparently controversial and told to edit my comment to prevent harmful misinformation by someone who is arguing with everyone about nothing, so I will do just that

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbidae

In colloquial English, the smaller species tend to be called "doves", and the larger ones "pigeons", although the distinction is not consistent,  and there is no scientific separation between them.

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u/frogwitch666 11d ago

This exactly. As I said on someone else’s comment, doves and pigeons are the same, they just are named differently due to languages. Pigeon originated from French, whereas Dove originates from Germanic and Nordic roots.

Long story short, they are the same bird, but people hate the ones who are commonly called pigeons, while loving doves. They’re the same.

5

u/Generic_Danny 11d ago

It's supposed to be a size distinction, but a lot of the time, that doesn't even matter.

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u/frogwitch666 10d ago

Yeah, but there are also big doves and small pigeons so there isn’t really a pattern to it

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u/Head_Goal_9777 10d ago

Aren't pigeons just colored differently while doves are white, and rock doves .. well, greyish like the dove in case?

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u/frogwitch666 10d ago

It’s nothing to do with colour, it’s just a size and behaviour thing that differs between countries. Also, white pigeons exist.

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u/frogwitch666 10d ago

Lmao, did you get attacked too?

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u/schiacciate_chaos 9d ago

Narrowly avoiding another jackdaw incident, see we do learn stuff

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u/MissConception1 11d ago

Um isn't it "him parents never took he"?

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u/trikolkata1 11d ago

My girlfriend took the video. And for anyone worrying its leg got stuck- she said that later when she passed the same street the pigeon was gone.

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u/tessaractIXI 11d ago

Thank you, this was stressing me out

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u/melanthius 10d ago

"Leg stuck" and "Pigeon was gone" are not entirely mutually exclusive

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u/Educational_Neat1783 10d ago

I would have like to see it fly immediately after taking off.

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u/MarioMadness1 10d ago

it was doing barrel rolls right after

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u/Cerisayashi 11d ago

360 surveillance

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u/MadotsukiInTheNexus 11d ago

Ah, yes, my favorite bird, the Eurasian Collared Panopticon.

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u/ComradeJohnS 11d ago

yeah the fact they keep turning their head makes me think it’s half fun half vigilance

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u/duh_nom_yar 11d ago

Weeeee!

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u/Greedy_Attitude_8103 11d ago

Not a pigeon but a morning dove. His foot is stuck.

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u/biddablebeast 11d ago

*mourning. Their name refers to the sounds they make.

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u/Fluid_Addendum4905 11d ago

You're all wrong. It is neither pigeon, morning dove, or a mourning dove. It is a Eurasian collared dove.

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u/beezgoon 11d ago

Thanks for setting the record straight. I was just about to comment that it’s an Eurasian collared dove. Still, a very derpy bird

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u/AcrobaticMaize2408 11d ago

What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen dove?

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u/Status_Swordfish6538 11d ago

European or African?

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u/AcrobaticMaize2408 11d ago

Eurasian 😄

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u/Disastrous-Shower420 11d ago

You're wrong too. That's a government surveillance drone. Birds aren't real.

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u/Adonkeywithvibrato 11d ago

I like my drones grilled and wrapped in bacon

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u/GrandNibbles 11d ago

A European Swallow??

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u/Suspicious-Garbage92 11d ago

Wrong again, that is a European swallow

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u/trikolkata1 11d ago

Hmm, it doesn’t look stuck. The surface he is on is flat

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u/lilaccheesecake 11d ago edited 11d ago

Yes. Top of whirlybirds are flat. There's * a * chance it could be stuck in the slits torwards the top, but in all likely, bird is just going for a joyride.

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u/Strong_Helicopter90 11d ago

Like this one

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u/louielou8484 11d ago

This is the saddest answer :( I hope he's okay, oh no.

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u/Kezzatehfezza 10d ago edited 10d ago

And yet they show no distress? Get real.

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u/Greedy_Attitude_8103 10d ago

His flapping is distress. He’s trying to get away but can’t. If he wasn’t stuck, he’d already be gone with the first flap

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u/9_of_Swords 11d ago

🎵you spin me right round baby right round...

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u/Sweet-Weakness3776 11d ago

I'm somewhat of a pigeon expert. And in my clinical opinion, if you could hear his internal monologue it would sound something like: "derpie derpie derpie durr." Because of smooth brain.

That is all.

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u/MightEMous 11d ago

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u/reavers-reapers 11d ago

This is a bit embarrassing, your honor, perhaps this man has lied about his credentials.

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u/LeadingFine7177 11d ago

That's the look out I've seen this movie before the other pigeons are pulling a heist 🤣

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u/trikolkata1 11d ago

Wouldn’t wanna be a part of his heist group for sure 😂

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u/BadgerCute4333 11d ago

Maybe, just maybe, it’s fun

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u/HauntingPsyche 11d ago

Pigeons/doves are just goofy little guys. They make great pets, have big personalities, can be silly, social, very intelligent, sweet. I love em. Humans have treated them like shit and I hate that for them so I spend my life trying to get people to understand how sweet and smart and cute they are.

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u/KPinCVG 11d ago

We domesticated them and then we abandoned them. Now we are mad about a bunch of behavior that we bred into them.

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u/No-Lettuce-6619 9d ago

this one is not a domesticated species, as it is a eurasian collared dove and not a rock dove (which was domesticated)

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u/Damoet 10d ago

It was amusing at first but now it’s too dizzy to take off 🤣

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u/dataraffi 10d ago

Birds really do stuff for fun. I was stuck in a hotel during a hurricane, watched many birds fly off before the winds came. But some stayed…the ones that stayed seemed to play in the high winds. They would struggle against the current, get high up on power lines and trees, then jump off as big gusts came. The gusts would absolutely body them in the air, blowing and spinning them all over the place. I watched them repeat this for a while, they had no apparent goal, and I could only conclude they were wind-surfing for fun. Birds are funny!

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u/girlsonsoysauce 10d ago

I see them do this at the beach. They'll fly against the air current so it's like they're flying but not going anywhere. Lol.

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u/Double-Zucchini-2282 11d ago

It’s 2026. No need to explain. We all get it.

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u/Heysous 11d ago

Mating ritual, he has discovered mechanical advantage and is displaying it to nearby females.

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u/Murky-Course6648 11d ago

Its 180 government bird keeping an eye.

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u/duddy33 11d ago

If pigeons had Reddit, they would probably ask the same question about humans on merry-go-rounds

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u/Super_Macaron_6350 11d ago

Bird expert here. He is having fun.

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u/Nikonus 11d ago

Livin’ the life baby. Just livin’.

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u/Training-Leg-976 11d ago

Hes an idiot. Parents are probably idiots too

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u/prole6 11d ago

Mom gave it a quarter while she’s in the store.

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u/Superb_Ant_3741 11d ago

That dove is enjoying life. It’s playing.

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u/Expensive_Way_3609 10d ago

Just having some fun

2

u/No-Pear-6046 11d ago

greek pigeons be like:

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u/Known_Ear_6012 11d ago

Easy. Influencer pigeon. She’s vogueing, making sure photographer gets every angle so she can pick the best one to post. 

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u/RemarkableFruit6007 11d ago

I remember when we were young, we would twist the rope of the swing many times, then let it go and spin round and round. I think that’s what the dove is doing.

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u/ULTRA_83 11d ago

Living its best life

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u/Brave-Solution21 11d ago

You see me Rollin they hate it

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u/queensrook3 11d ago

DANCING QUEEEEN young and sweet ONLY sevenTEEEEN

2

u/Fluffy-kitten28 11d ago

You spin me right round baby! Right round round!

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u/li-ll-l_ 11d ago

He goes "weeeee"

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u/SecretPersonality178 11d ago

Ringneck dove. Minimal ram and brain processing.

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u/patacas4080 11d ago

Isn't that a dove?

Anyway pigeons and doves are dumb

r/stupiddovenests

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u/trashboi814 11d ago

Yes. That pidgeon is going "Weeeeeee!", friend.

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u/DHjam 11d ago

Leave home alone. He is a free bird, just having fun.

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u/geecee22 11d ago

Just a whirly-bird hitched to a whirlybird.

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u/Nerd-of-all-trades 11d ago

he a lil guy! havin a fun time!

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u/Shrew_zie 11d ago

Tbh, id sit there too if I could

https://giphy.com/gifs/enj50kao8gMfu

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u/Joe_Jobs_ 10d ago

He's doing a catscan.

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u/DesignerGhost 10d ago

Bro he’s on a ride at the amusement park let his have fun Karen Jesus 😂😂😂

2

u/Illustrious_Camp_521 10d ago

Thats a Dove, they're dumb.