Sunday is supposed to have a high in the 30s

01 Sept 23 11 Doves, Daly 410 3” 7 ½ reloads
02 Sept 23 13 Doves, Daly 20 gauge
04 Sept 23 15 Doves, Browning Superposed Chisled 20 IC/Mod
05 Sept 23 01 doves, L.C.Smith Q3 (1893) with Briley 20 ga tubes
06 Sept 23 11 Doves, Rem 3200 with 20 gauge barrels
NO HUNT HOT 105 degrees
09 Sept 23 15 doves, Browning Superposed 20 ga IC/Mod LTRK
11 Sept 23 15 doves, Remington 1100 16 gauge with cut barrel no vent
12 Sept 23 03 doves, Superposed 20 4 digit, farmer plowing field
No hunt for three days, wet roads
18 Sept 23 15 doves, Citori 16 gauge
19 Sept 23 8 doves, Zamacola 12 gauge, short hunt,
23 Sept 23 15 doves, Remington 3200 with special barrels
25 Sept 23 10 doves, Bernardelli Gamecock Premier 12 ga, use light ammo
30 Sept 23 10 doves, Rottweil Olympia 12 ga
02 Oct 23 10 doves, GECO 16 gauge WINDY and Cold
03 Oct 23 05 doves, Daly Superior, 20 ga, VERY WINDY
09 Oct 23 06 doves, Amercan Arms Brittany 20 gauge, FEW DOVES
15 Oct 23 00 doves, Liege a Feu 16 gauge, was 32 degrees yesterday
24 Oct 23 00 doves, Citori 12 gauge, NO DOVES, SEASON OVER
163 DOVES

Wow, that was a good season. And all those different guns you shot as well

Got pheasants? Perfect conditions for hunting the cover around harvested small grain fields.

Best,
Ted

163 doves is a good season. I always hope and try to top 200, but seldom succeed.

Well done. Also interesting that from Sept. 8 to Oct. 14 the temps went from 105 degrees to 32 degrees!

I have been fortunate enough to be invited to dove shoots on a diary farm in Phoenix. They are inundated with eurasian doves with no season or limit. To shoot a couple hundred in an hour with two shooters is quite common. Interestingly the owner said there were more born in that hour of shooting than we had shot. It's 'high fence' so to speak but for a Canadian kid with no dove season at all, it was a delight.

Mike, always good to season your season's end report. It's a toss up as to what is more impressive, the number of birds or array of guns. Gil

Mike/ Methinks you need more guns!

He he he
I use a different gun each outing.
I try to use them all in a 5 year time span.
The first three doves are usually quite safe

Hardest to shoot is an Ithaca NID 10 gauge with 32 inch barrels
and doves in a 25 mph wind, WHEW!!

Mike, for the Ithaca - this was for sale recently and might be modified to accommodate the 10 bore.

Care to say how many shells were expended? Absolutely not picking on you. Just curious if you also kept up with that too. That's a fine season by any standard, given the limits and difficulty. And I quite like that you used a variety of different guns. I've done some of that as well at times, just taking a gun out because it hasn't been out, and I've not shot it in a while but have never been as methodical as you on that count and a lot of my doin's anymore are just target games for enjoyment because it's whot I have easiest access to. Dove hunting now involves overnight stays for me and traveling w/a pair of guns is about all that I want to fool with, even on a short trip. Was a time that huntable mourning dove were plentiful around here. The birds are still here in areas but the urban sprawl/development(?) has made places one can hunt close by almost extinct. And too, my desire to drive any distance returning after a day's hunt has abandoned me as I've aged, so a hotel or motel comes into play for a roost, even when out shooting on friends, if one isn't too far removed. Enough.

I have always felt that anyone who can pass shoot our panhandle and W TX mourning dove in a flyway at the 75% level, taking all comers, is doing some serious world class rough shooting. Very few can manage that. Not talking about birds leaving fields in the afternoons or coming into tanks or water troughs by wind motors. Talking about highflyers in open flyways where the distances between food and water is miles and being positioned somewhere out in the middle, well away from either. I don't think there is a more sporting game or rewarding bag than that type of game shooting.

TW
Thanks for the post
NO, I do not keep the shots per dove data
Some days I will shoot 15 doves for 20 shots,
sometimes a box of shells is required
and sometimes ........

Yes, I am shooting whatever, no tanks or grain fields, tough birds but FUN

I, also, am getting older and do not travel well, at 75,
overnights is not on my list of fun things to do.

Mike

Congratulations on a Fine Season Sir.
My country ,some 3.5 hours south of you had our greatest Dove abundance in 6 years. Both resident birds and the later migrants were VERY numerous from opener until the last.
Shooting only slowed in the face of much needed and appreciated rain intervals. Each weather change was quickly followed up with a new influx of birds to fill the temporary void of flights leaving ahead of the weather fronts.
I shot here at the ranch on almost every afternoon. I can't recall but one season (2011) starting and STAYING as HOT as this one did.

Glad to hear that great report, Paul. We're between seasons here in GA now. We had a good first season, basically native doves, which ended October 8. We have another short one that comes in Nov. 18 and lasts 8 days. Then it's out until December 19, when it comes back in and lasts until the end of January.

My grandson and I started seeing big droves migratory birds hitting my picked corn fields last week, and we are about to start combining peanuts either tomorrow or Tuesday, so they will start pitching in behind the peanut combines then. I love the long, late season here and am super excited about the prospects!

Every time I see you gentlemen post about dove shooting in TX I remember the wonderful fictional story by Bob Brister entitled A Small Wager Among Gentlemen in his excellent book Moss, Mallards and Mules. I just have to reread that story every year or so.

Having a season end, even after a good one, can be a hollow feeling. What does one do after all that activity ends and you must go back to the more "ho-hum" day-to-day stuff. I'm at the point now where all the anticipation in advance of a "season" is lots of fun too, the planning and the logistics. The whole time you're planning for it, you also worry (a little) about the vast raft of things than could upend all your plans and it's only after you're there, deeply involved in it all, that you (or I) can let go of that alternate planning and fully enjoy the processes. When it's all done, when the guns (& birds) are cleaned and the gear has been put away for another year's slumber, then the silence starts to creep in. You're grateful, of course, that it all worked-out so-well, but now what? That's even worse when winter has completely bowled you over and it's a Monday morning and you've just shovelled deep snow off of your driveway...Fall is just too-brief, too-ephemeral, darn-it.

I suppose you must just begin again, and start making plans for the next "adventure", the next season, and move forward to putting the pieces together. You know, there's a now oft-unused Spanish 12 sidelock double in the gun cabinet and a small, late, trip to South Dakota for pheasant might just be the ticket...

Nah. First doves, then ducks, then quail and pheasants (hunting the corners), then geese and sandhill cranes,
All of these can be non walking intensive with some planning.

Then fishing after that, I use my Osagian Freighter Canoe with 2 HP Johnson

Last year , walleye about 60 miles from Amarillo,

That's the spirit! I know I'll snap out of it once I get back into the swing of things here. I've got elk and deer tags to deal with here shortly as well. If only our fishing here hadn't been just so-overrun by endless users of the resource. I used to really fill-in the seasons nicely with that option using my flyrod(s).

Pretty grim in that department here now, just too-many people competing for the use of that specific resource (water). All our local rivers (not to mention lakes) are a circus now, and almost all the time. Everybody seems to have recently moved out here to smoke pot and go flyfishing. I guess if you're properly stoned, you don't seem to notice that you're not alone and you are not catching fish? I really miss it but...I'm either too-old or too-spoiled (or both) to put up with all of the horse-manure that goes with fishing here these days.

Either you have a walk-in freezer the size of my apartment's kitchen, or you have a frying pan the diameter of a kiddie pool.

In the old days. . .when I was in Belgium. . .9/10th's of the hunters' game wound up in the Belgian restaurants - same as the old pigeon shooting days in England. You had to be careful biting down because of the shot. One would hope that the game is consumed likewise (Though I have a Vietnam era friend whose freezers are like archeological digs).

He may have friends who cannot hunt anymore who enjoy eating doves, as do I. He has almost a whole year to eat them himself, if he so chooses, and he can buy a chest type freezer at Walmart for under $200 that will hold a lot more than 163 doves. I recently bought one to put in my shop into which I put 180 ears of sweet corn.

Your post leaves one wondering about it's motivation .......... envy, or sarcasm?

WELL . . .

You must have a very small apartment

Fudd, what do you do with your harvested game?

20.1 cubic foot freezer in the garage. Had it for years
https://www.lowes.com/pd/Whirlpool-20-1-Cu-Ft-Upright-Freezer-Color-White-ENERGY-STAR/3291100

66 1/2" x 31" x 30" external dimensions

Some were donated to homeless shelter, some went
to friends or wives of those no longer able to hunt.

All birds were cleaned, soaked for 3 days, bagged in
water. frozen or donated after being cleaned.

Mike

Neither. Sheer different-circumstance happy bewilderment.

I need to wear elbow pads to chop celery, yes.

No slight intended, I assure you. I was just, like, where would I put them all?? And how quickly could I eat them?

I love, love, love the notion of donating wild doves to a homeless shelter. Wow. Bravo.

Canada is BIG
Do you live near waterfowl areas,
Ducks or Geese?
Thank you
Mike

p.s. If you are ever in Amarillo, I will show you kindness and a great
shooting time.

In preparation for a possible visit, what rifle or pistol or shotgun would you
like to shoot??
I have rifles from 17 Ackley Bee to 577 Snider
pistols from 22 Harvey K-Chuck to 45 Colt
and Shotguns across the spectrum, self-loading, pump, O/U, SXS, in sizes
from 410 to 10 gauge.

Come play

I'm a block and a half away from the Saint-Lawrence River. I could shoot migrating Canada geese from my kitchen or parlor window, were it permitted. But I'm not an active hunter. I've just got nowhere to put them!

Your extremely gracious postscript crossed my initial reply. I won't clog your thread further, so I shall reply via private message.

Looking forward to your PM

Mike

p.s. Great PM, Thanks

"All birds were cleaned, soaked for 3 days, bagged in
water. frozen or donated after being cleaned."

What do you mean by bagged in water? Wondering if you mean you froze them in a bag of water. Would you please describe. Tks.

Yes,
After soaking in water ( water changed out daily) ,
The dove breasts are placed in zip lock bags
and water added to cover the doves, then any
air is expelled and the zip lock closed.
Then the bags are placed zip lock up in the freezer.
Once frozen the bags can be orientated any direction.

This method prevents freezer burn and extends to life
of the meat.

Some folks prefer a vacuum sealer, but I do not have one.

Thank you for your interest

Mike

Mike: That is how I preserve my gamebirds as well (grouse and woodcock). Very effective. Quart freezer bags work up to even 2 birds that are grouse-sized and then I move-up to gallon-sized on bigger birds (pheasants come to mind, ducks as well). Two or even 3-years in the freezer are not a problem.

I have a buddy who freezes squirrels that way. Lasts up to 2 years.

I freeze my game birds that way and have for as long as I can remember. Fish, too.

I used to freeze my birds and squirrels in water, but have gone to a vacuum sealer with the same results and less volume and leakage. I even vacuum seal on the tailgate of my truck when hunting away from home. Super easy and makes traveling a lot simpler.

Mike,

Thanks for explaining.

I've had a household vacuum sealer before they were available in Canada. Unless some other way for a better shelf life I only use the vacuum sealer for all my fish and game.

When we lived on Kodiak Island we would spray/spritz fresh caught salmon with water mist repeatedly for a solid ice coating. We did this mostly so relatives could enjoy shipped salmon as close to fresh as possible.

I used to use one of those vacuum sealers but I don't anymore. Those things really suck!!......Aw.. c'mon guys!! That was funny!!

Don't quit your day job, Jimmy.

My folks used to freeze bream, bass and crappie in the wax coated milk cartons filled w/water, and they kept perfectly until thawed and eaten. We still do some of that at the cabin, if we have one handy but the vac pack sealers have also served us very well. Dove taken, as well as those legally given to us are all eaten here. I've some friends whose wives simply do not allow game of any sort to be brought into their homes; a VERY sad reality, that but we've been the happy beneficiary of it on more than one occasion. They think that meat comes from the grocery store, period. I know of others with $50K plus kitchens that have NEVER been used and one where only the kids know how to use the microwave! You can't fix stupid.

Well.... Since this post was originally about the Texas season, I'm happy to report that we have had Exceptional shooting almost daily here since this discussion started....Our first season segment runs on until this Sunday the 12 th and reopens again on December 15.....
Birds, lots of large fully feathered migrants, are still using all of my fields here and providing wonderful outings....Birds are wise and canny, offering the most challenging shooting one could ask for on a windy afternoon....