Defective Dove Hunting

Dennis Whiteside shows the big bass he caught on on his birthday, before releasing it.

 Three doves winged in over the sunflower field where Rich and I were hidden amongst the stalks. I fired twice and they just kept going. At that time I had shot 8 shells without dropping a bird.

“Looks like I would get lucky just once,” I muttered.

“Maybe your best chance would be a dove that is just UN-lucky…” Rich thought to himself. I knew what he was thinking. He didn’t have to say it!

For one thing, those 20-gauge shells were bought on sale about ten years ago. Old shells lose their power. I am sure of that, though it hasn’t been proven. And for another thing, I had a defective shotgun.

My old friend Rich Abdoler had owned it since his boyhood, one of two model-50 Winchester automatics, and he knew I wanted one of those badly, so he sold me the one he least wanted. I figure he knew something about the guns inability to shoot straight, and took advantage of me. I am thinking about legal action, partly because the shotgun has a bound up poly-choke, one of those bulging chokes on the end of the barrel that you twist to adjust, from open to fully choked. It was stuck on full choke that evening, and the last thing you want while hunting doves is a full-choke barrel, and you couldn’t adjust it with a four-foot pipe wrench.

So you can understand why, by the time the evening was over, a top-flight experienced shotgunner like me had only killed two doves with 12 or 14 shells.

And honestly, one time I killed ten doves with ten shells, a long time ago when I was younger and not under so much pressure and had a really good shotgun.

So you shouldn’t be thinking I am just a lousy shot.

    I did have a pretty good dove dinner, if there is such a thing. Rich killed 8 doves that evening and gave me his. He was using a twelve gauge, because he was out of twenty gauge shells, having shot all he had the evening before at that very spot, taking a limit before sunset. So the doves I shot at were extremely wary, unlike the easy ones he had found the day before.

    I may never shoot that poorly again, and I doubt that I ever have before, and while it is extremely embarrassing for a grizzled old outdoorsman like me to admit to such an evening, you can see how journalistic integrity would compel me to report the bad outings with the good. I have always felt that honesty is the best policy when there is a witness.
  
You see some strange things when you are outdoors. That evening Rich and I watched three different doves light on standing sunflower stalks and peck away at the seed heads. Neither of us had ever seen that before. Doves are not known to perch and feed, as other birds do. They are ground feeders, and you have to have grain on the ground in fairly open areas to attract them. We saw three of them break the rules. But then again, I have spent enough time outdoors to not be surprised at anything I see. You can never say ‘never’ or ‘always’ about wild creatures.

Wildlife that doesn’t adapt at all seems to have trouble surviving in the changing outdoorsmen have created.

    My friend Rich Abdoler has been a Corps of Engineers Ranger on Truman Lake for many, many years, and he says this year there were seven fatalities on the lake. One of them was a man who died in an ATV accident. He says that the biggest resource problem they have on the 115,000 acres of public land around the lake relates to the illegal use of ATV’s, and the erosion and disturbance it creates. Men are becoming too lazy and overweight to walk, and ATV’s are the answer for a modern-day generation that wants to enjoy the outdoors without any effort. But you are nothing close to a hunter or an outdoorsman if you spend your time in the woods on the seat a motorized vehicle. Every year, there are thousands of people who die or are seriously injured on ATV’s. And you can never really see the woods as it is on one of those. But then again, there is a difference in being a hunter and a shooter. Today’s generation is losing track of the difference.

On that 108-degree day we had back in the early part of August, I floated the river with writer Jim Spencer and his wife Jill Easton. I wrote about that trip and mentioned that a very large bass had made a pass at my buzz-bait that day right near my boat. The bass was close, and I saw his tail as he rolled across the surface. So as it happens, I was on the river last week with my good friend Dennis Whiteside, paddling him down the river on his birthday. When we neared that spot, I told him about the big bass I had missed and eased him to within casting distance of that spot, where some big snags and a log rested in deep shaded water. I’ll be darn if he didn’t cast a white buzz-spin in to the exact spot and that big bass nailed it. He fought him awhile and landed him, we took photos of it and released it. It was a real beauty, and I will never pass that spot again without fishing it well. That big bass will get even bigger! You can see a picture of it on my website, that address given at the end of my column.

On Friday and Saturday afternoon, September 23 and 24, Sondra Matlock Gray and I will be at the Hammons Walnut Festival at Stockton Missouri handing out free copies of the outdoor magazine we produce. It is quite an event; if you have never been there you should come and see it. Then our big outdoorsman’s swap meet will be on October 22, at Bull Shoals State Park in north Arkansas, and it is in conjunction with an annual event they have known as the Dutch Oven Cooking Competition. Last year we drew about 1500 people to our swap meet, but they expect 2000 people to come to that Dutch Oven meeting, so we may have a big crowd. If you have outdoor items or gear to sell, you should attend this as a “vendor”. You can reserve space close to where I will be building my wooden johnboat, just by contacting Tabitha Stockdale at the Bull Shoals Visitor Center, phone 870-445-3629. Or you can e-mail her at tabitha.stockdale@arkansas.gov. Do that early so that all the spaces won’t be reserved already.

    If you want more information, you can write me at Box 22, Bolivar, Mo. 65613 or e-mail me at lightninridge@windstream.net. You can see recent photos from our Canada trip, or that big bass from last week’s trip, on my website, www.larrydablemontoutdoors. blogspot.com