Rock-Dove - 1949

Columba livia livia

Perhaps extinct as a pure race.  Tracy stated that a few pairs nested on the coastal cliffs (before 1850), and Mathew thought a few nested in Huntsman's Leap. Whintle includes it in his list for Caldey.  Three adults and one juvenile were received at Cardiff Museum from Tenby, 1898.  Presumably the few pairs of coast-breeding wild doves (some obviously showing by their colours an admixtue of homing pigeon blood) are descended from the original Rock-Doves of this coast.  Dr C.Walton records a small colony of six pairs with typical pure plumage breeding in rocks ner St Davids Head, 1947, in which year typical "blue rocks" were recorded at Newport Head, Strumble area, St Davids, Marloes, Linney Head, and Stackpole Quay.

R.M.Lockley, G.C.S.Ingram, H.M.Salmon, 1949, The Birds of Pembrokeshire, The West Wales Field Society