Mourning Doves are among the best-known North American birds, nesting in most of the US and Mexico, and during the summer migrating deep into Canada. They even turn up below birdfeeders in small towns and the suburbs. My field guide says they're absent only from extensively forested landscapes.

There's a lot of folksy discussion about Mourning Dove courtship behavior, nesting, eggs, young, plumages, food and more in the online AC Bent electronic book at http://www.birdsbybent.com/ch11-20/mourning.html.

Of the 12 North American pigeon and dove species profiled in the Smithsonian field guide, only the Mourning Dove has such a long, sharply pointed tail.