I have a lot more respect for pigeons after learning more about the role they played throughout history, and especially in europe, as a farm animal. People think it's gross to eat a pigeon based on their diet and living conditions in big urban centers, but their ability to fly around and forage for their own feed (for free) during the day while coming home to the roost at night was a huge benefit for thousands of years. People would build tall dovecotes to house them and keep them safe at night. They'd put doors on the first floor so they could go in and scrape up the pigeon poop to use as fertilizer. Obviously people would eat the birds and sometimes the eggs, but that poop was valuable too. I was curious about the feasibility of keeping pigeons as a farm animal today but it seems like nobody really uses them that way. The people who breed them seem to be the type who raise them as pets, as show pigeons, or as racing pigeons. They mate for life so if you wanted to get pigeons you'd have to buy a breeding pair that had already chosen each other - well over a hundred bucks. In comparison, with chickens you could get a couple dozen live chicks shipped to you for less than a hundred bucks.