Your skills are evident by this action alone.
I agree with all of your points and would have done the same if conditions were different. I was out walking and just happened to catch this activity out of the corner of my eye. This was strictly a quick capture situation. There was simply no time to make the adjustments that I would have preferred because the male dove was ready to take off. Regarding post-processing, I generally don't play around with photoshop unless I have a real knock-out image that I am going to market or whatever.
But thank you again for taking the time and energy to clean up what was meant to be a cute and humorous on-the-fly shot. It looks much better, Joe, and aptly demonstrates your obvious talents.
And I am positive that you were also a great editor
.
Cheers!