Beating The Dove Hunting Drum.......

[Lawdwaz]

Dug up some pics from my first dove hunting foray in 1998.  A friend and I loaded up and headed down towards Reading PA looking for dove.  We were pretty much shut out in three days of hunting, never really got into them for some reason.  Beautiful country and nice landowners but not many dove. We camped a couple nights and spent one night in the No Tell Motel along Rt 15 so all in all it wasn't a bust.  On the way home my buddy suggested we stop just south of the NY border in Tioga County near where we had been deer hunting for years and snoop around.  I didn't have any hope but figured why not??

 

We asked a farmer friend if it was OK and he said "a....you wanna hunt WHAT?"  He couldn't believe we wanted to hunt them!  Of course we could hunt......"have fun guys, whatever......" 

 

We hit 'em pretty good, I got ten that afternoon.  I don't recall what my buddy got but it was a similar bag.  We had my old girl along with us.  She did good after she questioned me on WTH are we hunting these things for?  IIRC she'd have been 11 years old.

 

Camping.........

 

 

 

Can you tell by the smile on my face how much fun this stuff is?

 

 

We hunted about 13 years straight and sometimes we'd make multiple trips down.  My dog started having some issues in 2011 and we haven't gone back since.  I miss it greatly but can't justify doing it without a dog for a few reasons the biggest is the fact that it just isn't fair to the dove (makes perfect sense huh?) in that they are darn near impossible to find under some conditions.  Mother Nature colored them in the most beautiful subdued colors I've ever seen.  Really difficult to spot in some places that seem like it'd be a piece of cake!

 

Jenny is 12 and I don't know if we'll get another after she's gone but one thing I can say it if we pass dove hunting in NYS I guarantee I'll be sporting another lab.  GUARANTEED 

 

From 2006 I think.......

 

 

[greg54]

Great story and great pics!! Hopefully it will happen in New York State sooner than later!!

[Pygmy]

Nice, Larry...I especially like the last pluckin' picture !

 

I love any kind of wingshooting, but dove hunting is some of the best ...

[ATbuckhunter]

Hopefully we'll have a season in NY soon. Ive never hunted dove but it seems like a lot of fun.

[Paula]

Nice. Thanks for sharing

[NFA-ADK]

Very cool, thanks for sharing!

[Estobles]

Today is opening day for dove hunting in Texas. Being originally from Clinton Corners, N.Y. I never hunted dove until I got to Texas. I considered myself a pretty good wing shooter but shooting a dove is a whole new and humbling experience. It is like a state holiday in TX. If you ever get to hunt dove I highly recommend it.

[Lawdwaz]

Opening Day in Pennsylvania today.  Last week while thinking about the soon opening day in PA is what spawned this thread.  A buddy is down there right now, roasting his butt off!!  3 doves in the bag, so far with better than 100 on the wires when he got there around noon time.......

 

 

I've seen so many dove up in Niagara County lately, hopefully soon we can hunt them here in NYS.

[Lawdwaz]

My buddy ended up with 10 for the day in PA.

[NFA-ADK]

They are fun to hunt.  As a kid I took my share, I was bad.    ​

[Lawdwaz]

They are fun to hunt.  As a kid I took my share, I was bad.    ​

 

I'll tell you what, when hunting the early season geese years ago here in NYS I'd see tons of them passing by.  THAT right there is a big part of why I wanted to hunt them so bad in PA.  I'd pull up on them, lead them with what I thought was enough and whispered to myself "BANG".  Sometimes I whispered "BANG, BANG, BANG" and then "SOB.........missed again!!"

 

I never yerked the trigger but boy would I have liked to.