Post by Bobcat on Oct 5, 2003 16:00:41 GMT -5
Ron Henry Strait: Give dove season a second chance this year
Web Posted : 10/05/2003 12:00 AM
South Zone dove hunting has gotten hot as the weather has cooled down.
What a difference a few days of good weather can make.
When the season opened Sept. 20, the heavens opened up the same day — as well as the day before. Black clouds dumped buckets of rain on area pastures, leaving them under water in some places.
The birds were gone, too.
In early September, it had been common to see power lines loaded with white-winged doves. By mid-September, when a rainy spell crept into Central Texas, the dove numbers had thinned. Then the rain got serious and the birds were gone.
The dove hunting at the lease near Woman Hollering Creek might seem pointless, but, then, last Sunday morning was too nice to stay inside. The pre-dawn air was cool and dry. A northeast wind held steady.
The long, narrow road along the west side of the lease was dry. I drove the truck through the first pale light of dawn, opening the gaps, moving pasture to pasture toward the back of the grain field where we hunt.
A big hill crests in the middle of the field, and there were a few doves moving in the freshly plowed ground alongside the road.
Seeing a few birds is always a good sign — a lot better than seeing no birds — but hunting doves on open, dry ground presents a problem. They flush and fly way out of shotgun range.
There was another problem. All the doves in the field were mourning doves. They are small, they are fast and they dodge and dart as they fly full speed barely 20 feet off the ground. In this weather, they would use the northerly breeze like an afterburner.
Tough targets, great fun.
When I posted up with my 20-gauge over-under along a barbed wire fence, the birds continued to work into the field, but none ventured my way.
As yellow light finally fell across the western slope of the field, it revealed more than moderate dove activity toward the crest of the hill, and it appeared that the rains a week earlier had chased more than just the hunters from the field.
There was the 30-acre patch of plowed ground next to the road I had just traveled. Next to the plowed ground was a 30-acre patch of ground that had not been plowed as recently.
The waste-grain — milo, in this case — had sprouted in the second patch of ground and the huge swath of older furrows was covered in a green carpet of volunteer milo sprouts 3 inches high. A lot of doves were finding food in the greenery.
The remainder of the field to the east was the real story, however. It is about 50 acres, and the farmer had not touched the ground since the grain was cut in August. There was knee-high milo stubble all the way up the slope and down the hill.
The long, straight rows were cluttered with grain stalks, flat leaves, trampled heads of grain and fresh weeds.
Many of the doves I could see from my fenceline were landing in the stubble.
After a few minutes, I walked uphill, toward the stubble, hoping to get at least a shot at a bird.
I didn't get far.
Two steps into the stubble, a pair of mourning doves jumped up at 20 yards. As I picked up the one that fell to the gun, three more doves jumped, catching me out of position to shoot.
A few steps more, and another group of doves broke from their cover to catch the wind.
Unlike the birds in the open field, the birds in the stubble couldn't see me approaching until I was within gun range, and the sunrise dove hunt turned into more of a quail-type shoot, picking off an occasional bird as the groups flushed.
In an hour, I had zigzagged most of the stubble field, killed seven birds and lost two others that seemed to disappear when they hit the ground.
It wasn't a limit of birds, but it was a great and memorable hunt full of surprises.
A hunting buddy came out Tuesday afternoon, and we shot late-day birds over a stock tank, picking 13 mourning doves and one white-wing between us.
The popular wisdom is that these doves are northern birds blown in from Kansas and Nebraska by the first cool winds of the season.
It doesn't really matter where the birds are from. Give the season a second chance.
The hunting is caliente, at least for a while.
Web Posted : 10/05/2003 12:00 AM
South Zone dove hunting has gotten hot as the weather has cooled down.
What a difference a few days of good weather can make.
When the season opened Sept. 20, the heavens opened up the same day — as well as the day before. Black clouds dumped buckets of rain on area pastures, leaving them under water in some places.
The birds were gone, too.
In early September, it had been common to see power lines loaded with white-winged doves. By mid-September, when a rainy spell crept into Central Texas, the dove numbers had thinned. Then the rain got serious and the birds were gone.
The dove hunting at the lease near Woman Hollering Creek might seem pointless, but, then, last Sunday morning was too nice to stay inside. The pre-dawn air was cool and dry. A northeast wind held steady.
The long, narrow road along the west side of the lease was dry. I drove the truck through the first pale light of dawn, opening the gaps, moving pasture to pasture toward the back of the grain field where we hunt.
A big hill crests in the middle of the field, and there were a few doves moving in the freshly plowed ground alongside the road.
Seeing a few birds is always a good sign — a lot better than seeing no birds — but hunting doves on open, dry ground presents a problem. They flush and fly way out of shotgun range.
There was another problem. All the doves in the field were mourning doves. They are small, they are fast and they dodge and dart as they fly full speed barely 20 feet off the ground. In this weather, they would use the northerly breeze like an afterburner.
Tough targets, great fun.
When I posted up with my 20-gauge over-under along a barbed wire fence, the birds continued to work into the field, but none ventured my way.
As yellow light finally fell across the western slope of the field, it revealed more than moderate dove activity toward the crest of the hill, and it appeared that the rains a week earlier had chased more than just the hunters from the field.
There was the 30-acre patch of plowed ground next to the road I had just traveled. Next to the plowed ground was a 30-acre patch of ground that had not been plowed as recently.
The waste-grain — milo, in this case — had sprouted in the second patch of ground and the huge swath of older furrows was covered in a green carpet of volunteer milo sprouts 3 inches high. A lot of doves were finding food in the greenery.
The remainder of the field to the east was the real story, however. It is about 50 acres, and the farmer had not touched the ground since the grain was cut in August. There was knee-high milo stubble all the way up the slope and down the hill.
The long, straight rows were cluttered with grain stalks, flat leaves, trampled heads of grain and fresh weeds.
Many of the doves I could see from my fenceline were landing in the stubble.
After a few minutes, I walked uphill, toward the stubble, hoping to get at least a shot at a bird.
I didn't get far.
Two steps into the stubble, a pair of mourning doves jumped up at 20 yards. As I picked up the one that fell to the gun, three more doves jumped, catching me out of position to shoot.
A few steps more, and another group of doves broke from their cover to catch the wind.
Unlike the birds in the open field, the birds in the stubble couldn't see me approaching until I was within gun range, and the sunrise dove hunt turned into more of a quail-type shoot, picking off an occasional bird as the groups flushed.
In an hour, I had zigzagged most of the stubble field, killed seven birds and lost two others that seemed to disappear when they hit the ground.
It wasn't a limit of birds, but it was a great and memorable hunt full of surprises.
A hunting buddy came out Tuesday afternoon, and we shot late-day birds over a stock tank, picking 13 mourning doves and one white-wing between us.
The popular wisdom is that these doves are northern birds blown in from Kansas and Nebraska by the first cool winds of the season.
It doesn't really matter where the birds are from. Give the season a second chance.
The hunting is caliente, at least for a while.
;D
