bi slut pigeon
A gay pigeon story: my grandfather kept pigeons, and though he maybe didn't know the proper vernacular, he was always an ally to the gay rights movement. When his nephew's boyfriend died of AIDS in the '80s, my grandfather was the only one at the family reunion to actually console him and talk with him about it. Not even his own father gave him the dignity of acknowledging his grief.
The reason I want to make it so clear that he was a friend to the community is because it makes this story funny instead of mean. He kept meticulous records of his pigeons, noting where each one was and who they were with and whose chicks were whose. It was not always the case that the chicks in a certain nestbox were the offspring of the parents in there. Sometimes, a mother hen would push a chick out because it was overburdened, or maybe a cock would push a chick out because wanted it dead (pigeons, like humans, can be monstrous assholes for seemingly no reason).
It is for this reason that it is very advantageous to have something rare like a gay couple in the loft. Pigeons are unique in that they make "milk" for their chicks, and cocks can do this as well as hens. So, because a gay couple can feed their young but never actually bear young, they are often the recipient of orphaned chicks.
All of that is to say this - when my grandfather passed away, my mom took over the pigeon business, as she had been helping him for years. And looking through his records, it was all very standard, very plain, well-documented minutiae about the birds and their pedigrees, save for one spot that looked something like this:
BOX 15
RED CHECK HEN
YELLOW COCK
BOX 16
BLUE SLATE HEN
DUNN BAR COCK
BOX 17
RED GIMPEL COCK
BLUE CHECK COCK
(QUEERS - WOW!)
