PDA

View Full Version : First dove hunt under my belt!


Wombats Are Dangerous
11-11-2012, 10:53 PM
After a year of talk, I finally put my money where my mouth is, got my hunting license and went looking for dove in Imperial Valley this weekend. My uncle wanted to run his three-year old brittany a little bit so he took us out to some fields near Niland.

Having never hunted before and with only two rounds of trap under my belt, holy cow were these suckers fast! Couldn't bag a single bird with 22 shots. I was using a 20-gauge semiauto with a skeet choke. I realized on the drive home that I probably should have switched to a mod or full choke when we walked turned or harvested fields.

Hardest part was judging the distance to the birds. They all looked like they were way further than 50 yards away, but my uncle said they were closer to 30-40 yards. I guess I'll never know unless I take the shot.

My uncle managed to bag his first bird in just three shots with an old Stoeger side-by-side! He was walking the edge of the field along really thick brush and this thing just jumped across his face moving right to left.

I'm not sure if it's common to walk fields looking for birds, but man was it fun! I can't wait to actually take something home to eat!

joemama
11-11-2012, 11:04 PM
I prefer a modified choke with my 12ga for dove. I dont think I would ever hit one with a full choke and if I did there probly wouldnt be much left to eat.

KWalkerM
11-12-2012, 8:49 AM
IC for me, 25 shots between my father and I to get 3 birds lol

Wombats Are Dangerous
11-12-2012, 9:14 AM
IC for me, 25 shots between my father and I to get 3 birds lol


So I guess I'm not too far off! Another 50 shots and I might have had a bird last weekend! :p

I'm going to try a mod choke next time out. We were walking harvested fields, so those doves could see us coming from a mile away.

As soon as I got within 40 yards of a band of doves, or what looked like 40 yards to me, they'd flush moving away from me.

Those little buggers would work across the field and then circle around the outside of the field and drop down at the opposite corner where I just came from. Argh!

joemama
11-12-2012, 11:18 PM
Ya I've never really tried to flush dove out unless it was really slow in one spot. I'll usually set decoy's out and just sit near an area I saw them flying. And I remember when I first started dove hunting I used to use a single shot break action 20 ga and I would still go through ammo like crazy and only get a few birds lol.

Wombats Are Dangerous
11-13-2012, 8:40 AM
Ya I've never really tried to flush dove out unless it was really slow in one spot. I'll usually set decoy's out and just sit near an area I saw them flying. And I remember when I first started dove hunting I used to use a single shot break action 20 ga and I would still go through ammo like crazy and only get a few birds lol.


Yeah, these are the lessons I'll learn as a new hunter. I think my preferences would have been to set up along the brush line and wait for birds to come in and out, but my uncle wanted to run his dog.

On some of the bigger fields, the doves would fly away from us and just make big circles around the field and land behind us. I could almost hear them laughing at me! :rolleyes:

guns4life
11-13-2012, 8:46 AM
Congrats on your first dove, you'll notice that flushing sound everywhere you go now.

I bagged my first pheasant this opener. Got limits on dove and flushed hundreds of quail(to the delight of my group)...one of the best upland hunts I've had. Earlier in the year we got under what must have been 1,000 dove in one spot. All 7 hunters limited in about 25 minutes. It was epic

40 MPH winds this year and I've got one hell of a chest congestion/cold, wondering if I got the fever...other than that of course, it was great.

Congrats again!