The Collared Dove in Catalonia

Common resident, closely matching distribution of human settlement.

Best Sites: all

In 1963 a young man in East Lothian, Scotland, was fined for shooting a Collared Dove.  

At this time, having only been a British breeding bird since the first chicks hatched in Norfolk eight years earlier, the Collared Dove was still treated somewhat as an oddity and treasured.  And with good reason.

When the very first record was sighted in Lincolnshire in 1952, it had taken just 24 years to extend its range north-west right across Europe from the Balkans and, incredibly, was well on its way to entrenching itself as one of the continents most numerous bird species.

Quite what lead to this sudden and rapid expansion is still a mystery, especially as, up until about 1928, having been introduced into western Turkey from its native India, it had existed there for generations without any significant population growth.  The claim that a genetic change occured remains unsubstantiated as does that that the spread was initiated from a separate population introduced directly into the Balkans.  Similarly, claims that improved food conditions resulting from the spread of european agriculture were responsible do not seem to justify the eastward sprawl into Kazakhstan, Egypt and the far east.

Whatever the cause, the potential of this bird to take full advantage is not in question (its one of only a few species to occur north of the Arctic Circle in any numbers).  Perhaps key is its amazing ability, shared only with other pigeons, the Greater Flamingo and the Emperor Penguin, to produce milk! 

This substance, actually the consistency of cottage cheese, is ‘regurgitated’ from the crop to provide the complete diet of its nestlings for the first few days of life.   Unlike other vegetarian birds therefore, who have to switch to an invertebrate diet to feed their chicks, collared doves are freed from a dependency upon the seasons and can raise up to five broods per year.

When you also consider that these doves can breed at an early age, for their size need relatively short incubation and fledging periods and that they sometimes lay a second clutch before the first has left the nest, it is perhaps no wonder that they so quickly became regarded as a pest. 

By 1981 their special protection was rescinded and young men across the land, including East Lothian, could take aim without fear of financial penalties.