William Wade, age 10, of Saratoga Springs, N. Y., for his question:

What is pigeon’s milk?

Baby pigeons are fed on pigeon's milk   though pigeon's milk is not at all like cows milk. Those of us who live in cities know that grown up pigeons feed on peanuts, crusts of bread and almost any scrap of food they find lying around,. The baby birds are not ready to swallow and digest these morsels. So the pent birds eat and partly digest the food before giving it to the babies.

The partly digested food is a soupy mixture called pigeons milk, It is kept in the crop of the mother or father bird. When Mama or Papa returns to the nest, each baby bird dips his beak down into the parent birds throat. You might think that the parent and baby bird are having a fight. Actually the parent bird is helping to pour the pigeons milk down the baby bird's throat.