Woodpigeons begin courting and nesting very early in the year, and even when the temperature was below zero last week some males could be seen making their first approaches. The male sidles up to the female on a broad branch and bows deeply to her. Then he starts turning his head and brushing one of his shoulders with his beak in a kind of mock preening. The female may copy the male’s action. Then, sitting side by side, the two of them start a kind of kissing. They rub their yellow beaks together, and after a while the male opens his beak and the female puts her beak inside it. This is apparently a form of mock feeding of the female by the male and occasionally some actual food passes. Finally — though not in every case — the male flies up and hangs above the female on flapping wings and mates with her. The pair may have a nest of twigs with two white eggs in it by the beginning of February.