Abstract
The European turtle dove Streptopelia turtur breeds in both farmlands and woodlands, and it is important to explore the difference in breeding ecology of this threatened game in these two ecosystem types. This study, carried out during four years (2015–2018), compares nesting features of this species and its breeding success between apple orchards and riparian vegetation in Midelt Province, Morocco. The main result revealed that the nest placement, including nesting-tree height and nest height, is similar between orchards and riparian trees. However, the nest dimensions (big and small diameters) were larger in orchards. Correlations were variable among nest placement parameters and dimensions. On the contrary, in four breeding seasons, where 566 nests were monitored (467 in orchards and 99 in riparian sites), the average breeding success was different (57% of chicks in apple farms and 53% in riparian vegetation). Moreover, in apple orchards, clutches’ failure is due to both predation (18.89% of eggs and 10.54% of chicks) and temperature lowering (5.03% of unhatched eggs and 5.49% of dead chicks), while in riparian vegetation, the loss is due to nest desertion (21.33% of clutches) and mostly predation (33.16% of clutches).
Highlights
Introduction e European turtle doveStreptopelia turtur is among birds that have dramatically declined in Europe (−78% in Britain between 1980 and 2013, as well as −70% in Spain between 1980 and 2017) [1]
E t-tests conducted on nest placement characteristics of turtle dove Streptopelia turtur showed that the nest height (NH) and the nesting-tree height (NTH) were similar between orchards and riparian breeding habitats (Table 1)
Correlation was variable among nest placement parameters and nest dimensions in studied habitats (Table 2)
Summary
Streptopelia turtur is among birds that have dramatically declined in Europe (−78% in Britain between 1980 and 2013, as well as −70% in Spain between 1980 and 2017) [1] It has been classified as “Near reatened” within the European countries and “Vulnerable” throughout Africa and Europe, following recent evaluation [2]. In Northwestern Africa, the turtle dove is a common breeder and summer migrant [8,9,10] It has an important breeding population in Morocco [11], largely dispersed in forest ecosystems [12, 13] that represent 12.7% of the national territory [14] and farmlands representing 1.5% [11] of the total land area. In Tunisia, where this species is less studied, rare information exists on its breeding and foraging ranges [24]
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