Sir Bob Jones: The craziness unfolding in my backyard

First there was one ... now 29 doves arrive daily to feed on Sir Bob Jones' lawn.

By Sir Bob Jones

Half a century ago I bought a large block of land on the Western Hutt hills, comprising 50 acres of stream-filled gullies. It overlooks the whole of Wellington harbour including the waterfront, plus the Hutt Valley right up to the Rimutaka range, sometimes snow-covered in winter. I built a winding kilometre long road in to the house I had constructed, which after all these years is now completely roofed by tree foliage.

And despite being only minutes from the Hutt CBD and a quarter hour to Wellington, the property has a wonderful sense of forest-surrounded isolation, compounded by an adjacent Council bush reserve of another 50 acres.

Visitors ooh and ah at the view. You must spend hours gazing at it they say. Yes and no. I spend hours gazing - not at the view but instead the garden which is spectacular.

But much more significant is the extraordinary fauna and bird life, given I'm actually in the middle of extensive suburbia. Crazy things happen. For example, there's at least 100 kowhai trees on the property. They're much favoured by bush pigeons and tui. Every spring as they come into bud, the Tui and wood pigeons declare war on one particular kowhai sited amid a copse of half a dozen identical sized kowhai trees.

As soon as its buds appear they descend on it in large numbers and tear them off. The buds regrow and they do it again. This exercise is repeated until eventually they give up. God only knows why they've got a snitcher about that particular tree.

Ducks come up to breed and waddle about with their usually eight ducklings making a terrible mess. If the cricket is on, they all line a terrace window watching the screen. That doesn't surprise me as in the 1970s we had a cat which, like all cats, turned its back to the television, but, if it was cricket, it would sit for hours staring at the screen.

We lose on average one wood pigeon annually as each autumn, they get drunk on the ripening alcoholic karaka berries and crash into our windows at high speed, breaking their necks. Only two have ever survived. Over the years all sorts of creatures have arrived, even a hare which settled in for a summer, this I remind again, in the middle of suburbia.

But the most surprising event began two years ago.

I looked out of the window and there on the lawn was a white dove. We're all familiar with doves but who's actually ever seen one? It was the logo of the New Zealand Party back in the early 1980s reflecting the Party's anti-military policy and rejection of our participation in the Cold War.

I sought out my head gardener Robert, who's been on the job for nearly four decades and yelled to him, there's a white dove on the lawn. He came up, took a look, then went into a storage area and emerged with a small bucket of mixed wheat and seeds we feed to the sparrows in winter.

As he approached the dove it seemed unconcerned and got stuck into the seed at Robert's feet. That night it made it's home on a ledge in the garage where to her great annoyance it thereafter crapped each day on my partner's car roof.

All day it hung about on the lawn and around midday would fly about until it found Robert. It became a thrice daily spectacle to see him trudging out to the lawn with the seed bucket, the dove walking alongside.

Visitors would startle on arrival. "There's a white dove outside" they'd declare. "Ever actually seen one?" I'd ask and invariably they'd ponder this then say no.

So things moved along for six months, the dove now part of the household and accepted as such by the cat. In the weekend with no gardeners it would fly about until it spotted someone inside then alight on the window box and peck at the window until it was fed.

Then, sadly, one day last September it was gone. "Where's the dove?" visitors asked and so we reluctantly put it down to one of the episodes of unusual events — except — one day we woke and there he was back again, only now with a mate.

Robert arrived and he flew around his head, then cock-a-hoop, pranced beside him to the lawn to be fed.

I can't speak dove but can certainly translate the body language we witnessed as the male showed off while the female hung back. "Look, it's okay", the old hand was saying and he climbed on to Robert's feet as he scattered the seed.

"Yeah right" was the female's clear reaction and, taking no chances she hung back. But after a few more days she too waddled alongside Robert and her mate for the feasting.

And it's from that point that the craziness began.

One morning we found three doves waiting. The new chap went through the same cautionary behaviour for a few days then, a further week passed and suddenly there were four.

Thereafter the numbers have steadily mounted. Currently 29 white doves fly in at precisely 6.55am each day and sit on the eaves looking down the drive for the gardeners' 7am arrival. For variety half a dozen will sit on the nearby window box and stare at me, lying in bed reading.

And there they remain all day. It's costing about $100 a week feeding them. Many are now very tame and will feed out of our hands.

In the weekend, with no gardeners present they march like a small army up to the French doors, staring in until they get some feeding action. Someone must own them. They belt off each evening in a great white flock and head over to the eastern Valley hills. Having lived nearly eight decades without ever seeing a white dove I'm now awash in them. Life is certainly full of never-ending surprises.