Friday 7 September 2018

Disappearing Doves



Farmland birds are in trouble. The 2016 State of nature report found farmland birds have declined by 54% since 1970 and 12% of farmland birds are at high risk of extinction from the UK. Of these, the species which has experienced the fastest decline is the European Turtle Dove. Numbers are down a massive 93% since the 1970s. Sadly this is not a local phenomenon, Turtle Doves are rapidly declining through much of their European range, so much so that the species is now considered at risk of global extinction and is classed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Endangered Species.



Since I began bird watching in the late 1990s, I have found Turtle Doves to be the bird species which has most noticeably disappeared from my local countryside. From the early to late 2000s Turtle Doves could be seen reliably at all three of my main local patches, sometimes in fair numbers such as when adults and juveniles flock together readying for their return migration. Fairly suddenly, at the turn of the decade, the doves vanished from two of my patches. This was mirrored on a national scale, with the birds becoming scarce very quickly, even warranting broadcasts by rare bird news services - unthinkable only a few years ago. Luckily at my third local patch Turtle Doves have remained and have so far returned every summer.

Turtles Doves are a long distance migrant, spending the winter in west Africa and returning to Europe in summer to breed. Each April I wait nervously at my local patch to see if the regular pair have survived the winter and their hazardous migration back to the UK. Usually the first sign of a returning bird is the characteristic soft ‘purring’ of a male. Fortunately this was indeed the case at my patch on April 22nd this year, and from early May onwards one or two birds were to be seen on most visits.



The reasons for the Turtle Dove decline are varied. Operation Turtle Dove has highlighted what are considered to be the four main factors associated with the rapid decline:
Food shortages on their breeding grounds - Research points towards the loss of suitable habitat on the UK breeding grounds and the associated food shortages for turtle doves being the most important factor driving turtle dove declines.
Disease - An emerging potential additive cause of population decline is the disease trichomoniasis. Recent research has highlighted a high prevalence of infection in turtle doves by the parasite that causes this disease.
Unsustainable levels of hunting on migration - Of the estimated population of 3-6 million pairs of turtle dove breeding in Europe and Russia the annual hunting bag total in EU member states alone was estimated at 2-3 million birds, [...] If these figures are accurate estimates, hunting may constitute a significant factor driving population declines. 
Habitat loss on their wintering grounds - Africa’s landscape is changing too. Increasing human population pressure is transforming many of the wooded habitats favoured by our migratory birds into more intensive agricultural landscapes, with livestock causing additional damage through overgrazing.
Clearly Turtle Doves are facing multiple threats and a coordinated response is therefore needed to halt the decline. In the UK the RSPB has teamed up with Conservation Grade, Pensthorpe Conservation Trust and Natural England to form Operation Turtle Dove – a partnership aiming to address the four main factors associated with the decline. In the south-east (the UK stronghold), the project has been raising awareness as well as encouraging farmers and land managers to establish and maintain Turtle Dove habitat. This year an emergency action plan, to provide supplementary food in the crucial early stages of the breeding season, has been implemented at over 100 sites.



Certainly the action being carried out by the Operation Turtle Dove partners is encouraging, but is it too little too late to save this species’ place in the UK countryside? Plans will need to be delivered on a sufficiently large scale if Turtle Doves are to recover, but will farmers and landowners be willing (and adequately funded) to help? Also this conservation work may prove futile unless similar action is carried out along the Turtle Dove’s migratory flyway.

So therefore the Turtle Dove is facing a very uncertain future. However, if the good work being carried out by Operation Turtle Dove is expanded and coordinated well with further land managers, then there is surely hope.

The pair of Doves at my patch have now departed and are likely on their way back to west Africa. Hopefully they make it safely through the winter, for next spring I will be waiting anxiously for their return. 


All photos were taken near Waterbeach, Cambridge in 2018

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