Illegal and legal spring hunting of turtle doves on Mediterranean migration routes causes significant welfare harms and contributes to population collapse.
Turtle doves killed or wounded by hunters on migration routes face acute welfare harms that compound population-level conservation harms. Wounded birds that escape die from haemorrhage, organ damage, or exhaustion over extended periods. The hunting pressure at multiple points on the migration route means that birds surviving one country face further risk in the next. The welfare cost of this hunting falls disproportionately on a species already at the edge of collapse.