Are Turtle Dove numbers increasing in the U.K? (3 Viewers)

[Andy Lakin]

A lot has been said about the really big increase in numbers Europe wide after the moratorium on shooting them in recent years. Are they scrapping the ban altogether or trying to set a quota for a legal total bag in certain countries. IIRC the figure of a 40% increase has occurred, pretty amazing as obviously very many hunters will have continued to shoot them illegally as it is so ingrained in many countries. It baffles me why the ban was lifted, but I would imagine the shooting community has a lot of say in certain areas.

Personally I haven't noticed the increase in reports on the news services. Who would have believed that numbers would get so low that understandably many people are reluctant to report records publicly? All of the places that I can think of where I used to see them regularly have extremely low numbers if any. Is the situation more positive in certain areas of the U.K? It's fantastic that farmers/ landowners are doing some great work to halt the decline, but the future doesn't look very promising

 

[Phil Andrews]

I suspect the RBBP reports are more useful than sightings on the news services but of course there is a notable timelag. The latest report available online (2021) stated 2,092 breeding pairs.

 

[Xenospiza]

Latest data in the Netherlands are from 2023, when the breeding population appeared to show an insignificant increase.
In 1984 there were 35,000-50,000 pairs, but the current number must be below 500.

Only 24 birds were seen migrating past Breskens this year (over 40% of the total number of birds migrating in the entire country...), despite quite a bit of easterly wind. Annual numbers over 1000 were common in the 1990s (when counting was less frequent). Only 2013, 2015 and 2023 had lower numbers.