by Matt Flanery
If you were to ask the average Texas outdoorsman to tell you their favorite hunting season, you would almost certainly hear “deer season!” Every year, Texas hunters spend thousands of hours preparing for deer season, and why not?
White-tailed deer are the most numerous big game animals in this state, and Texas has more deer than any other state in the union. Deer hunting is a 1.2 billion-dollar industry in Texas, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that approximately 814,000 Texans engage in deer hunting every year. Accordingly, deer hunting is the undisputed “king” of hunts in this state.
However, there is another hunting season that is also a favorite pastime in Texas – Dove Hunting. Although the first whitewing dove season took place in 1916, the first mourning dove season didn’t take place until 1925. Now, almost one hundred years later, roughly 300,000 Texans take to the fields every September to engage in this incredible hunting tradition.
Why You Should Try
Dove Hunting
If you tried deer hunting and certain aspects of it just weren’t for you (like yours truly), or if you are just looking for an additional hunting season that will produce hours of enjoyment, entertainment, and camaraderie, you may be one of the thousands of Texans that would love dove hunting. This article will explore what makes dove hunting so special and why you should give it a try.
Pick up the Pace
The first, and most striking contrast, that you will notice about dove hunting, is the “type” of hunt you experience. It’s generally fast-paced. Unlike deer hunting, which involves a high degree of patience and long periods of peaceful solitude, dove hunting is often an action-packed social event.
However, before elaborating on the virtues of a fast-paced hunt, I should probably pause to issue a literary disclaimer – not every dove hunt is a frantic shooting fest where you are in danger of melting your shotgun barrel. Those hunts exist, but they are in Argentina and other countries far outside the boundaries of our great state.
What Makes for a Successful Dove Hunt
In Texas, the pace (and overall success of your dove hunt) will be affected by various factors including weather, the type of dove field you are hunting in, the number of hunters in your group, and most importantly, the seasonal breeding yield of this great bird. Some years, there just aren’t as many birds to target because of the way environmental factors can limit the dove breeding season.
Dove hunters can also be frustrated during a hunting season that has a bountiful breeding period if the prevailing weather conditions change immediately prior to a hunt. That’s another way of saying that you can have a great dove hunt on a Thursday, and then a cold front can move in and push your region’s dove down further south to stymie your hunt on a Friday. The next week might be phenomenal if another cold front brings more northern dove down to your hunting area. Some of your dove hunts WILL be inconsistent, that’s just how it goes! But when the dove numbers are up due to a good breeding season, and when you find a decent field with sunflowers or other seed-bearing plants to hunt in, you are in for an exciting and rewarding experience that is hard to top.
Know Your Prey
Dove are mostly migratory birds that are known to fly from their birthplace in lower Canada and the Northern-Central United States through Texas on their way to the warmer wintering grounds of Mexico and Central America. Every sunrise, when the West Texas sun blankets the region with golden beams of sunlight and heat, dove instinctively fly to seed fields and water holes to gorge themselves on various food sources for their daily sustenance.
Keep Your Head on a Swivel
Early in the morning and late afternoon,
hunters can expect to take aim at birds that are franticly flying in every direction! Although an attentive dove hunter can usually recognize a rough flight pattern that develops over a dove field in relation to power lines, fence lines, tree lines, water locations, and seed zones, dove will frequently and suddenly “appear out of nowhere” and fly right over a hunter in an unanticipated manner.
A great dove hunt is almost always enjoyed by a hunter who “keeps his head on a swivel” during the hunt. Although the erratic nature of dove flight can be frustrating at first, once a hunter settles in and learns to scan the skies frequently, their “kill-to-shot” ratio will inevitably improve.
Enjoy the Hunt and Hone your Skills
Unlike some hunts where one perfect shot ends your hunt or one errant pull of the trigger results in an unsuccessful and frustrating hunt for you and your buddies, dove hunting offers multiple opportunities to succeed through repeated failure! You are not done when you get three bucks in a season, or bag three wood ducks in the morning. The limit is fifteen dove per day, so hunters can sharpen their shooting skills with each attempt to bring down their prey.
Dove hunters “learn as they go,” and they are rewarded with the instant satisfaction of a downed bird or with the knowledge that comes with the all-too-common three-shot-salvo of failure. “I must be shooting blanks!” is a common refrain from a dove hunter who has not yet hit mid-season form.
High Returns on Low Investments
Another great aspect of dove hunting is that it is relatively inexpensive to get into. Although some seasoned hunters spend large amounts of money on fancy hunting clothes, gorgeous over-and-under shotguns, dove decoys, dogs, dog trailers, and hunting vests, it’s simply not necessary. Anyone with a Remington 870 shotgun, a box of shells, and a hunting license can do it, provided they have a place to hunt.
Where to Hunt
Most of the 300,000 Texans that dove hunt each year do not own their hunting land. Thankfully, property ownership is not necessary to enjoy dove hunting. Much like other forms of hunting, Texans can hunt on public land, or they can go on “private” and “guided hunts.”
Let’s Go Public
According to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, there are over one million acres of public hunting lands where you can hunt for the cost of a $48 Annual Hunting Permit.
This seems like another great place for a disclaimer. Although I’m sure that there are great public places to hunt for dove, I’ve honestly never found one that I enjoyed in East Texas where I live. Anytime I’ve tried to hunt public lands for dove, I have always been disappointed. I’ll have to defer to others as to the best strategy for this type of hunting, and I wonder if I would love dove hunting as much as I do if I had limited myself to public lands.
Private Guided Hunts
I had a great dove-hunting buddy who passed away this year. He was in his 80s, and he was staunchly opposed to paying to hunt and instead relied on his charm and connections that he had developed over half a century to provide him with unpaid hunting opportunities. He took me on a great hunt once and it only cost him a few phone calls and a camo tee shirt that he bought from Walmart and gave to the land owner.
I’m not that lucky, and chances are, you are not either. To give dove hunting a fair shot, I would suggest that you try hunting with a hunting outfit that provides a “guided” hunt. I put “guided” in quotation marks because it is not a “guided” hunt like you might imagine with a personal guide leading your every move.
In dove hunting, a guide is generally a hunting outfitter that allows you to hunt on one of the many fields they lease and maintain yearly for dove hunting. They take you to a field and position you (and several other hunters) in the best possible areas surrounding a food source, such as a sunflower field, and then they leave you and your buddies there to hunt. The only real insight dove-hunting guides impart on their clientele is to scout their many fields throughout the season so that they can provide the best possible dove hunting experience.
Do you take Venmo?
Prices vary, but for approximately $100-$200 a gun per day, any Texan can try his or her hand at this type of hunt. Although spending $200-$400 on a weekend of hunting may not fit everyone’s budget, that amount pales in comparison to the financial investment that is required to deer hunt successfully and comfortably. You don’t need a deer lease, a bunk house, expensive rifles, scopes, deer feeders, range finders, scent-proof camouflage, all-terrain vehicles, and heated deer stands with leather seats to enjoy dove hunting. You can literally walk out into a sundrenched sunflower field wearing shorts and a camo tee shirt and have one of the most enjoyable hunts of your life.
Bring Your Buddies
The best part of dove season is that it can be a very “social” form of hunting. That may be because the weather in early September is generally a welcome relief from the dog days of a Texas summer. Hunts are in the morning and late afternoon when temperatures are often mild. Dove hunters don’t have to wake up at 3:45 AM and freeze to death while sitting in a deer stand or duck blind with a limited number of fellow hunters.
In fact, the typical structure and strategy of a dove hunt lends itself to large groups that can socially interact while hunting. Dove hunts vary, but often times they consist of a group of hunters surrounding a field containing a food source to attract the dove, such as sunflowers. If you are hunting a big sunflower field with only a few hunters, the dove quickly learn what portion of the field is safe and most of the dove will fly to that location and land. Alternatively, if you have a large number of hunters in your group, you can prevent this from happening by surrounding the entire field which keeps the birds stirring! In dove hunting, more is better!
Make a Playlist
While you are in the field, you aren’t bound by strict radio silence because you don’t want to ruin a hunt by spooking a deer or turning a flight of ducks. You can talk, tell stories, and laugh with your buddies at full volume. In fact, dove hunters often hunt fairly close to their trucks, and it is very common for hunters to roll their windows down and play music, especially in afternoon hunts.
Make More Memories
I have several hunts I go on each year, but my favorite one is when I hunt with my dad, my brother and our four boys. We call it “The Boys’ Hunt.” Between shots, my dad teaches the same safety rules and imparts the same fatherly wisdom to my boys just like he did to me 40 years ago! When you are dove hunting, you have time to talk, encourage, and to teach kids how to shoot. Our yearly pilgrimage to the West Texas dove fields has become a multigenerational pastime for the Flanery family. We talk about it every time we gather to celebrate holidays with our families and they (seemingly) enjoy hearing our stories.
Make Some Noise
Over the years I have hunted with several hunters who will cheer a great shot, or a double kill. Likewise, I have a couple of buddies that curse up a blue streak when they miss an easy shot (or several easy shots in my case). It’s a great feeling when you are in the field, you make an adjustment from your last embarrassing three-blast failure, and drop a dove in a single well-aimed crossing shot. It makes it even better if you hear a friend yell “NICE SHOT” from across the field.
Give ‘Em Hell
However, that is not to say that the social interaction during dove hunts is always positive. In fact, it can be hilariously humiliating. One of the hunts that I attend every year is comprised of a group of guys who have known each other since they were kids. They are such good friends that they can naturally be ruthless to each other in the field. They have a tradition where the hunters that have shot their limit of dove early in the hunt gather around the hunters who are struggling to kill birds and heckle them profusely while drinking beer. They call it “The Peanut Gallery” and it is as brutal as it is hysterical.
What More Do You Need?
Social interactions like those mentioned above really make dove hunting special, so grab a couple of buddies and family members and join me next September in the dove fields of West Texas! You might just find your new favorite type of pastime!
