Plate 17 – Carolina Turtle Dove

Of the eight pigeons, or doves, that John James Audubon documented and drew in Birds of America, only one, it could be said, has been able to sustain its numbers: the Carolina Turtle Dove or the bird that is commonly known today as the Mourning Dove. John James Audubon points out a number of reasons for its success. The bird can take off quickly and fly fast, typically close to or just above trees as if keeping cover. The birds tend to be resident and seldom form large flocks unlike the massive flocks that Passenger pigeons formed during migration or when they were moving about in search of mast. Mourning doves are not especially particular about the kind of tree needed for a nest or how the nest is built: “It is formed of a few dry sticks, so loosely put together as to appear hardly sufficient to keep the eggs or young from falling.” The Mourning dove can be spotted roosting just about anywhere, “But in all these places they rise and fly at the approach of man, however dark the night might be, which proves that the power of sight which they then possess is very great.” Although unless the birds are mated, they will likely keep a fair distance between one another, unlike the dense packs in which the Passenger pigeon preferred to form when roosting. And while hunters have gunned down many a Mourning dove, the rest have saved themselves by being regarded “more as a gleaner than as a reaper of the husbandman’s fields.”