Before you read this, the dove season will have opened. Dove hunting is fairly easy, and it isn’t high on my list of things to do, but I will do it anyway, because I am a grizzled old veteran outdoor writer and that kind of thing is expected of me. I know you hear young inexperienced outdoor writers talk about how hard doves are to hit, but not for me. I got to where I can sneak up on a bunch of them and get four or five before they fly with only one or two shells.

I got to be such a good shot by practicing when I was young. In the fall I’d go out and throw darts at butterflies. When you get to where you can hit a butterfly with a dart or a BB gun, you won’t have any trouble hitting doves with a twelve-gauge shotgun about half the time.

I won’t go dove hunting in September though. I will wait until October and hunt at a waterhole somewhere. I am going dove hunting mostly because intend to take a young Labrador out and see if he will retrieve one. If my Lab takes to dove hunting, it will likely be a great retriever by the time duck season gets here. Most all the dove hunters will be out on opening day and within a week there won’t be hardly any of them left… hunters that is. Many doves won’t migrate in until late September. Some hunters can’t afford the shells it takes to go on three or four hunts, me included.

You need harvested grain fields for good dove hunting, or a small pond used as a water hole where they come to water in the evening before they go to roost. I like hunting those water holes because if you have a young retriever and if you can drop a dove or two in the water, it is really good experience for his future as a waterfowl dog.

Early season dove hunting is sometimes hard on dogs because of the heat and humidity, and dove feathers come off in their mouths and they don’t like that. A Lab doesn’t mind a duck feather or two, but they hate dove feathers. You can see why if you ever put a freshly shot dove in your mouth. You can’t hardly get those feathers out of your throat.

Teal season will open in a week or so, and they too are hard to hit. But because I am an old time duck hunter, I look forward to that more than dove hunting. You’d probably be better off not doing either one because in September, if your time is limited, you will catch a lot more fish on top-water lures than you will in the spring. Of course you have to know what you are doing there too. A blue winged teal is small a flying biscuit, fast and erratic in flight. Many times I have shot more at where one was than where one is!

When I was young, dad and I use to float the Piney in mid September with a blind on our wooden johnboat, hunting blue winged teal. One September after a good rain the river was up a few inches and we took along one rod and reel and a wiggle wart lure and began to catch some nice smallmouth, one after another. Dad would catch two or three from the front of the boat while I paddled and then we would switch places and I would catch some, all the while watching for teal. We killed a few teal that day, but caught more than twenty hard fighting smallmouth in between the flocks we flushed. What a day that was!

I have a picture of dad fighting a fish that day with a shell belt around his waist with shotgun shells in it, causing all who see it to question why he would have those shells on a fishing trip. That was in 1965, and you can see some of those photos on my blogspot page, www.larrydablemontoutdoors.blogspot.com

My Big Piney Nature Center and Museum a mile south of Houston, Mo, will be pretty much finished in October and I have an unusual plan to open the finished building, minus the exhibits, sometime during that month to hold a big ‘fishing gear and antique gun’ swap meet.

Anyone who wants to bring guns made before 1965 and fishing gear of any kind is welcome. I intend to bring several hundred fishing lures, myself, and some are antiques I used when I was young. That wiggle wart dad and I used back in September of ’65, which we used to catch those smallmouth on, will be there for sale to the highest bidder. I hope that some folks who have old shotguns or .22 rifles will bring them to sell. To reserve a spot just call me, 417-777-5227. I will announce the date of that event soon.

You can also contact me via email… lightninridge47@gmail.com or at P.O. Box 22 Bolivar, Mo. 65613.