By Jim Darnell
Columnist
San Marcos —
The Central Zone Texas dove season opened yesterday (Sept. 1) at dawn.
It was hot and humid. I had hoped for another one of those unusual early cold fronts like we had in late August. No such luck. But the quality of the first hunt was worth it, just as the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department had predicted.
“Above-average rainfall across most of the state has created ideal habitat conditions for doves,” said Corey Mason, TPWD dove program leader. “I expect above-average production this year and hunt success should be high provided doves are not dispersed.”
It looks like this year is shaping up to be a good boom crop.
Mason explained that the abundant seed production, predominately sunflower and croton will help recently fledged birds to rapidly put on weight. But, quality range conditions could also cause doves to disperse as native food sources become readily available and make managed fields less attractive early in the season.
My son-in-law, Bill Paschall, hunted with me opening morning. We didn’t get much early shooting since we were not hunting over sunflowers, corn, milo, croton or any kind of feed. We could hear shooting from several directions in different fields.
As the field shooting began to slow down our hunting got better. Birds began to fly the tree lines and into mesquite trees to rest. We did our best to disrupt their naps after they had filled up on milo and corn.
Some of the high birds that I normally would have shot at I passed up since I was shooting a light 20-gauge shotgun.
I have a sore neck and I knew the 12-gauge gun would put some real hurt on it. But the 20 did okay. I did bring down one white wing up in the ozone. My lab Lady saw him begin to fall and she was on him before he hit the ground.
We saw lots of white wings. They seem to increase every year. I asked TPWD Dove Program Biologist, Shelly Kremer, if the rapid spread of the white-wing population form the Rio Grande Valley to much of the entire state of Texas was having a negative impact on the mourning dove population.
“The jury is still out on that,” she answered. “It’s being monitored closely.”
“How about the big non-native collared doves that are so rapidly proliferating?” I asked.
“As far as we can tell the collared doves are not destroying native mourning doves nests or competing with them”, she said. “But they are a non-native invasive species so encourage your readers to shoot all of them they can. There’s no limit on them.”
Dove hunting, whether mourning, white wing, or collared, is big business in the Lone Star State. Texas boasts fall dove populations in excess of 40 million birds and its 300,000 dove hunters harvest about six million birds annually or roughly 30 percent of all doves taken in the United States. Dove hunting also has a major economic impact, annually contributing more than $300 million to the state economy.
Need a place to hunt? Through its Public Hunting Program, TPWD offers affordable access to quality hunting experiences with the purchase of a $48 Annual Public Hunting Permit.
This year, TPWD has leased nearly 50,000 acres of public dove hunting fields in 46 counties: more than 70 percent are located near major urban areas.
“Since the public dove lease program began in 1994, one of our top priorities has been to offer urban Texans affordable access to hunting within close proximity to home,” said Linda Campbell, TPWD public hunting program director. “By setting up dove fields for youth and adult only, we hope families will take advantage of the opportunity to get outdoors and take part in our state’s dove hunting tradition.”
Texas dove season in the North and Central Dove Zones will run from Wednesday, Sept. 1 through Sunday, Oct. 24 and reopen Saturday, Dec. 25 through Sunday, Jan. 9, with a 15-bird daily bag and not more than two white-tipped doves.
The South Zone dove season will run Friday, Sept. 17 through, Sunday, Oct 31, reopening Saturday, Dec 25 through Tuesday, Jan 18 with a 15-bird daily bag and not more than two white-tipped doves.
Jim Darnell is an ordained minister and host/producer of the syndicated outdoors show, God’s Great Outdoors. His column appears every Thursday in the Daily Record.
