IREC leads a European contract for the adaptive hunting management of the European turtle dove

    The contract will be developed by a consortium of French, Portuguese and Spanish entities and will address the sustainability of hunting the European turtle dove at the community level to guarantee its long-term population viability.


    Recent scientific evidence indicates that the hunting pressure that is currently exerted on the European turtle dove (Streptopelia turtur) in Western Europe is unsustainable. This excessive level of hunting adds an additional problem to the progressive deterioration of the feeding and reproduction habitats of the species, the main cause of the significant population decline that the species has suffered over the last decades, and which has led to its cataloging as "Vulnerable Species" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Thus, it is critical to develop adaptive game management strategies that, combined with the management of their breeding habitat, contribute to the recovery of the turtle dove and guarantee its population viability and the sustainability of its hunting in the long term.

    IREC_Sustainability_Hunting_European Turtle Dove_IREC

    Excessive hunting and the deterioration of the feeding and breeding habitats of the European turtle dove have led to the population decline of the species and its cataloging as a "Vulnerable Species" by the IUCN.

    This will be the central axis of the European contract that has just been awarded to a consortium of French, Portuguese and Spanish entities led by researchers from the Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos (IREC – CSIC, UCLM, JCCM), and in which the Office National de la Chasse et la Faune Sauvage (ONCFS), Higher Institute of Agronomy (ISA) full University of Lisbon, the company Environmental Technical Advisors, SL (ATECMA), Artemisan Foundation, Technological and Forestry Center of Catalonia (CTFC) and Universitat de Lleida.

    The contract, which will last 15 months, aims to develop and implement an adaptive management mechanism for turtle dove catches that guarantees the sustainability of their hunting throughout the European Union and that facilitates the decision-making process to achieve this objective in each of the member countries involved.

    The management mechanism will include the approach of proposals that recognize and reward the efforts of hunters in the implementation of habitat management measures that favor the feeding and breeding of the turtle dove

    Among the actions to be carried out within the framework of this European contract, the organization of consultative processes through four workshops relations and a revision of the management actions that hunters from different countries carry out in the habitats of the species to favor its population status. Both actions will serve as a reference to discuss the most appropriate mechanisms to integrate the management of the species' habitats with the management of its catches.

    Likewise, within the framework of this contract, a un modus operandi for an adaptive management of the hunting of the European turtle dove. This will include a technical part, including the development of a population model that allows the calculation of the impact of variations in catches on populations, the elaboration of recommendations on efficient methods to continuously evaluate the information necessary for the model, such as population size or catches, and the evaluation of the best regulation mechanisms to achieve the management objectives (limitation of the number of working days of hunting, of hunters or of daily catches, etc.); and other institutional, which will include the determination of efficient decision-making mechanisms among all the parties involved and the definition of the evaluation criteria for the achievement of the objectives and to establish the possible consequences of their non-achievement.

    This contract means the possibility of addressing the sustainability of hunting the European turtle dove at a community level, which means a unique opportunity for the competent public authorities to make an effort to invest, over the next five years, in the management of the species' habitats to ensure the viability of their populations.