Turtle Dove: Millions Cleared for Shooting

Despite partially dramatic population declines, many EU countries will once again open the hunting season on migratory birds in the coming days.

On the shooting list are the turtle dove — named Bird of the Year 2020 in Germany — skylarks, lapwings, and numerous other species that are endangered in this country. According to theCommittee Against Bird Slaughterapproximately 52 million wild birds are legally killed by recreational hunters in the EU every year.

By far the highest kill figures are reported by France, where a total of 63 bird species are cleared for shooting. In most regions, the hunting season this year begins on 13 or 20 September and runs until the end of January. Analyses of hunting statistics from the national hunting authority ONCFS have revealed that French recreational hunters kill around 17 million wild birds each year, including turtle doves, skylarks, water rails, lapwings, curlews, redshanks, and snipe. All of the species mentioned are endangered throughout their European range and some are threatened with extinction.

In Italy, a total of 34 bird species appear on the official shooting list, including blackbirds, song thrushes, starlings, and species threatened in Germany such as the water rail, skylark, turtle dove, lapwing, and snipe. The hunting season traditionally begins in most regions on the third Sunday in September. The annual kill in Italy stands at around seven million wild birds, including 300,000 turtle doves and more than 4.5 million songbirds. In Malta, a total of 32 migratory bird species have been open to shooting and partial trapping since 1 September. The list of huntable species includes, among others, turtle doves, golden plovers, skylarks, and the ruff, which is critically endangered in Germany.

In Spain, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Romania, and several Austrian federal states, the shooting of turtle doves and many other endangered species is once again permitted from mid-September. In total, between two and three million turtle doves are killed each year across the EU. Most of the animals end up in the cooking pot. According to the umbrella organization Dachverband Deutscher Avifaunisten (DDA), the breeding population of turtle doves in Germany stands at between 12,500 and 22,000 breeding pairs — a figure that continues to decline.

Conservation organizations have been criticizing for years that hunting endangered migratory birds accelerates or contributes to their decline.

«Mass shootings of species with declining populations cannot be sustainable and jeopardize costly conservation projects in the breeding areas».

Alexander Heyd, Executive Director of the Committee Against Bird Slaughter

Because the governments of the countries concerned are unwilling to voluntarily change anything out of fear of the powerful hunting lobby, the Committee Against Bird Slaughter has in recent months filed environmental complaints with the EU Commission against France, Italy, and Spain. The goal of the campaign is a Europe-wide closed season for all migratory bird species threatened with population decline.