Around one year ago, I did a piece on the increased number of crows in my neighborhood. Today, I have some thoughts about pigeons¬yes, pigeons!

As my wife and I took our usual walk, we noticed large numbers of pigeons on front lawns and even in the streets. In groups of five to 10 they seemed to be everywhere¬much like the crows of a year ago. It took us several walks and curiosity about roof work going on at one of our elementary schools to figure it out. And it turned out that the roofing work was going on at more than one school in our town.

That led us to the conclusion as to why the pigeons are so plentiful. As the roof work started, I imagine that the smell of tar and the construction people frightened them out of their usual habitat. In reflection, we can remember seeing a pigeon or so every once in a while around the school, but not in such large numbers.

Never having reflected on the pigeon as a neighbor, I decided to look up "pigeon" on the Internet. There were over 32,000 hits for the word pigeon. Much of the information related to clubs for pigeon racing¬a subject about which I was totally unfamiliar. And there were even sites for different types of pigeons and the history of the bird.

As a youngster, I can remember one neighbor who had a hobby of raising homing pigeons. Taking the pigeons some distance from home, he would release them and see who would get back to the roost first¬the pigeons or the homeowners.

In addition to homing pigeons as a hobby, they were actually used in the military service right up to the end of World War II. Some pigeons were even considered heroes and were decorated and buried with military honors. During the war it took over 3,000 soldiers to take care of some 54,000 military pigeons. Flying missions from submarines to landing with paratroopers, the pigeons carried messages and film back to headquarters. Some pigeons were even killed in the line of duty.

Shifting gears, as I write this piece, I cannot help but remember one of the finest meals of my life. It was in Hong Kong and beyond the shark fin soup, I will never forget the delight of "exploded pigeon." While I do not know the entire recipe, it went something like this. First, finely chopped pigeon meat was slightly sautéed with light seasoning. Spread on a six-inch by six-inch lettuce leaf, a light raspberry sauce was thinly applied on top. The leaf was then rolled. The first bite was absolutely delicious and clearly changed my mind set about pigeons. Up until that point, they had only been the messy bird on the sills of skyscrapers in New York City.