Caring for your Garden Fantail Doves

Before you take your Doves out of the dove travelling box

(1) Make sure you have fresh drinking water. It is a good idea to purchase Magic Stock Nutrition or Harkers Omni-Vitamins to add to the doves drinking water for the first 4/5 days to help de-stress the doves while they were travelling to you and getting to know their new home and surroundings.

I would recommend a 3.5 Litre 5 Litre  or 7 Litre Water Dispenser rather than putting their drinking water in a saucer as the fantail doves will foul in this and may cause them to get diseases.

(2) Dove Food I would recommend getting a few different types dove food mixes for your garden fantail doves. We sell a large range of quality dove food mixes on our Dove Central website.

You will also need a food container for your doves to feed out off and to keep the dove food dry. I recommend the small dove food container or large plastic food containers which we sell on the website.

(3) Dove Grit and Minerals. I recommend buying the grit and mineral station as this comes complete with dove grit, black minerals, pink minerals and the plastic or metal mineral and grit station which can be placed on the ground or hung onto the wall near your dovecote.

(4) If you are keeping your doves in a dovecote then use straw from Dove Central for their bedding as this straw has been chemically treated and should be free from dove lice, mites and other fleas that may cause problems to your doves.

(5) If using a dove homing net or need to buy a homing net for your doves we sell them here at Dove Central to home your garden doves you will need to keep your doves in at least 7 to 8 weeks of the homing period and make sure that there are no holes large enough for your garden fantail doves to escape or other unwanted pests and that the homing net is securely fastened all the way round.

(6) Place all water dispensers, food containers, grit and minerals stations inside the dove homing net.

(7) Once all the above has been done then you can place the doves still in there secure travelling boxes into the new homing area making sure you have secured the net down so the doves cannot escape.

Carefully start opening the dove boxes one by one making sure each dove has left the secure travelling box, you can then slowly retreat out of the dove homing net area with the empty dove boxes and secure the net down after leaving.

It’s a good idea to keep a few of the secure dove travelling boxes in case you need to transport you doves elsewhere.

(8) Each garden fantail dove eats approximately 1 x large tablespoon (2 x per day) of dove food and this should be given to your doves once in the morning and again late afternoon. I personally would do this for the first 5 to 6 days just make sure there have food at the ready in their food containers.

You can always give them other treats throughout the day like sunflower hearts, cabbage, lettuce, parsley, apples, and small amounts of wheat germ bread including crushed peanuts.

(9) You should always have dove grit available as doves do not have teeth and need the grit to help grind down their food and also this helps with the dove’s digestion system.

(10) Minerals also should be readily available. I recommend the pink minerals as this can be added to the dove food. I just sprinkle the pink minerals then mix it into the food to put a light coating on the food, I would do this twice a week.

The black minerals should not be mixed with the food but put into a grit and mineral dispenser, a good idea is to buy the grit and minerals station which will keep the grit and minerals dry.

(11) When you buy the doves from Dove Central the doves will have been treated for the following diseases and the doves will need to be treated again in the next 3 months.

I treat my doves 4 times a year against the following but on different schedules as not to over medicate them so I leave a 2 week gap before administrating the next course of medicines.

To find out more about these dove disease Click Here and this will take you to the Dove Health & Hygiene of this website or click on the items below to view before you buy these products below

• (1) Canker(Trichomoniasis)  - Harkers 4 in 1  or  Harker 3 in 1
• (2) Coccidiosis  -Harkers 4 in 1  or  Harker 3 in 1
• (3) Worming  - Harkers Harka-Verm Wormer  or  Harkers 4 in 1  /  Harker 3 in 1
• (4) Fleas, Lice and Mites  - Harkers Harka Mectin Spot On
• (5) The Harker 3 in 1  for Coccidiosis, Canker and Worms
• (5) Harkers 4 in 1 Canker, Coccidiosis, Worms, Parasites, Lice & Mites

(12) A good tip is to always add a clove of Garlic to the water. Just get a garlic clove, peel the skin until you come to the shiny part of the garlic, snap it half open and place the garlic clove into the water dispenser. Again I would recommend in the 3 litre Water Dispenser or 6 litre Water Dispensers.

Also another good tip is to add apple cider vinegar once or twice a month and also what I do is to mix a tub of YAKULT to 3 litres of water and this helps to put the good bacteria back into your dove just remember to replace the water daily as the YAKULT can go off.

Garden doves love to take baths and again I put the dove bath out for my doves 2 or 3 times a week depending on the weather. I add apple cider vinegar to the water and this helps to eliminate any mites and keep their feathers in tip top condition.