Brussels orders hunting quotas for turtle dove to be cut by 50%

Malta will have to reduce its hunting bag limit on turtle dove by 50% during the autumn, after the European Commission deemed the species needed more protection.

In a statement, BirdLife Malta praised the fact that the turtle dove, hunted in Malta also during the spring under a contentious derogation from the EU ban on hunting in spring, would have more protection. 

The Maltese government is obliged to implement either a full hunting ban on the turtle dove, or a mandatory 50% reduction of the hunting quotas during autumn.

The current maximum quota for turtle doves in Malta is 5,000.

The EC had long been discussing the fate of the turte dove populations with BirdLife International and the European federation of hunters FACE. Larger countries such as France, Spain and Portugal are looking at banning turtle-dove hunting all year round. 

The legal notice will be announced after a discussion during an Ornis committee meeting on Wednesday afternoon, which gathers government experts from the Wild Birds Regulation Unit, BirdLife, and the hunting lobby.

The EU today will say that while it accepts that a full ban is the only way to protect this bird species, which is in sharp decline, a 50% reduction in quotas must still be adopted. “The European Commission is sending a clear message here. This decision to allow Malta only 500 turtle-doves to be hunted during September also means that the chances of a spring hunting season for turtle-doves is definitely out of the question,” BirdLife Malta CEO Mark Sultana said. 

Sultana said that knowing that there is no respect for hunting laws in Malta, this limited bag limit would not actually stop hunters from killing more than the quota. “This puts more pressure on the Maltese Government to strengthen its enforcement efforts, and BirdLife Malta will remain committed to doing its share in monitoring what is happening in our countryside, support the enforcement efforts and report back both locally and at EU level on whatever we witness,” Sultana said. “It is disappointing that the Maltese government continued to ignore scientific data.”