The first year, mortality rate on doves is about 70 percent. Banding returns suggest that legal hunter kill is about 4 or 5 percent at a minimum but may run as high as 50 to 60 percent on local juvenile doves during the early season. Trichomoniasis , a disease caused by a protozoan parasite that forms lesions and swelling in the throat, causes affected birds to starve. This disease may appear in epidemic form or in gradual, local outbreaks. Snow and ice storms may also cause severe losses.
Storms destroy nests and young.
Losses to predators are probably of minor importance. Hunter kill of doves apparently plays no significant part in limiting the survival and production of the total dove population. Hunter kill is regulated, and the annual harvest of doves is less than the normal population turnover and annual production. Because the dove is a migratory bird, federal regulations protect it and control hunting. Management units have been set up in the eastern, central, and western United States to regulate dove hunting.