Photo by Wayne Williams

Dove season's opening day is, in many instances, something of a social event. That means that spaced around the field will probably be some of your best buddies with a few others you really care considerably less about. All of this is forgotten when the first wave of gray darters puts in an appearance only to leave you with an empty gun and a solitary tail feather spinning slowly to earth. You no longer wonder how a gladiator felt when he stepped out into the arena because you're sure that every eye is focused on you. At least doves don't bite.

Many years back, someone wrote that an average of four shotshells are fired for every dove brought to bag. Judging by the number of empties lying around the perimeter of a busy field shortly after the end of festivities, either somebody took over the limit or the average might well be somewhat higher than that, a fact that appeals to few who do not own stock in an ammunition company.

The truth is that on opening day when there are plenty of young and semi-dumb birds around, there is little excuse for anyone with even modest physical skills not to shoot around 50 percent. Before you break out the boiling tar and bags of feathers, let me explain.

Doves do not have the option of scaring you like a covey of quail bursting out around your bootlaces or that rooster ringneck that bounced, clacking like mad, from the cover you just walked past. The good old American mourning dove shows up in plain old open air and gives the gunner plenty of time to get his pet smoothbore into position most of the time. With that established, let us see what needs to be done on the shooter's end of things to put meat in the pot rather than a lump on your cheekbone and a shoulder with all of the colors found in a Texas sunset.

LIGHTEN UP/OPEN UP
Doves are small, have a light and easily broken bone structure, and require very few small pellets to drop them cleanly. Why then do some hunters insist that they need a medium to heavy load of shot and pellets no smaller than a No. 7 1/2? I have one friend who swears that he needs the same 1 1/4 loads of No. 6 shot that we used on decoying ducks back in the "good old days." He also sticks doggedly to his full-choked 12 gauge under the misguided rationale that because he feathers so many birds, he needs more punch. The idea that he scratches a bird with a single pellet from the edge of his pattern just won't soak in for him.