White-bellied green pigeon in the Kyoto Imperial Palace

　Winter, along with spring, is the time when the Kyoto Imperial Palace is at its busiest with small birds. In particular, white-bellied green pigeon is the symbol of the Palace in winter. After raising their young in northern Japan and the mountains, they spend the winter in Kyoto City at the Imperial Palace and the Botanical Gardens.
　The bird is often found in trees and is difficult to spot, but you will notice its presence because of its oohs and aahs, a very eerie call. Different from such a voice, the bird, as its name suggests, has a beautiful olive colour overall. For this reason, in Japan they are called blue pigeons (aobato in Japanese) instead of green pigeons. This is due to the fact that in Japan there used to be only four colours: white, red, blue and black, so green was called blue (ao in Japanese).
　They are known to fly in flocks to the shores of Oiso in Kanagawa Prefecture and drink seawater, gulping it down with their beaks on, as it accumulates in rocky hollows on the shore and in the surf.