Birdlife Malta trustee Mark Sultana was quoted as saying that it is only the strongest turtle doves that pass over the Maltese Islands during their spring migration. Sorry, they don’t.
The strongest birds follow their usual shortest turtle dove migration route over the Central Mediterranean by flying from Cape Bon in Tunisia to Sicily, some 100km to the northwest of Malta.
Should these birds meet with a contrary wind during their spring migration, the ‘strongest’ make it to their breeding grounds while the ‘weakest’ are blown off their course.
Some of these species fly over Malta – our game birds. Any ornithologist worth his salt could have told you that.