Boxing legend Mike Tyson is known for his love of animals and wildlife, but most notably pigeons.
The 56-year-old recently shared a video compiled of several clips with him and the pigeons at his home that he cares for and races.
Tyson was filmed holding and kissing his pigeons before showing a clip of him letting his hundreds of winged friends out of their coop, he captioned the clip: “I love these birds.”.
‘Iron Mike’s’ love for pigeons developed growing up in New York and he started collecting the birds at a very young age.
He told Tony Robbins: “I’ve always had pigeons my whole life, since I was 8, 9 years old. That’s just what we do in Brooklyn, New York, we fly pigeons. I don’t know why, but that’s just what we do.
“Having great birds gave you respect and stuff. And I was a little kid, I wanted to have respect like the big guys had. But I didn’t realise you had to be big to get the respect.”
As anyone who has visited New York will know, there is certainly no shortage of pigeons in the city, but not many residents may have connected with the birds in the same way that Tyson did.
The former heavyweight champions was often pictured kissing the birds throughout his career and would meet up with pigeon fanciers – those who keep pigeons – when he wasn’t at training.
There are some remarkable stories involving Tyson’s love of stories, from dumping girlfriends to actually having his first fight because of a bully harming his pigeons.
However, the most jaw-dropping tale involved a binman being on the receiving end of one of Tyson’s famous knockout blows.
“One morning I woke up and found my favourite pigeon, Julius, had died.
“I was devastated and was going to use his crate as my stickball bat to honour him,” said Tyson – who finished his career with 44 wins by knockout.
“I left the crate on my stoop and went in to get something and I returned to see the sanitation man put the crate into the crusher.
“I rushed him and caught him flush on the temple with a titanic right hand! He was out cold, convulsing on the floor.”