Early Autumn Season
Annual Opening Day Dove Hunt
Jon Mitzel
DAKOTA COUNTRY MAGAZINE PO Box 2714 Bismarck, ND 58502 Subscribe On-Line at www. dakotacountrymagazine. com 701-255-3031
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The North Dakota Game and Fish Department calendar on my office wall tells me it’ s hunting season, even though it feels as if we should be spending the rest of our good weather days fishing. So many seasons open already it’ s easy to overlook early fall fishing opportunities. A favorite of ours, mourning dove hunting, we’ ve gathered a decent spread of full body and silhouette dove decoys that look very realistic when spread out on fence wire. To add more to our growing spread we added two mojo doves giving us motion in the spread. Very realistic. They do help bring crafty flying doves into effective range.
Doves tend to fly at a fast pace. We’ ll often see them flip and flutter in midflight, making them challenging to kill. Certainly an exciting bird to hunt. They do tend to decoy nicely, considering the conditions. Doves are abundant., and good on the table. Water holes and feed fields are good places to consider setting a spread.
Like other game birds, there’ s areas with a few doves here and there on a fence line, and other areas you may see 30-40 in a flock, maybe more. Those are the areas to focus on— the areas between their feed field and roosting. Catching them while they’ re moving from one spot to another.
There’ s spots where it’ ll seem as if there’ s no shortage of doves … birds zipping and zagging all over the place. Sometimes you spend three shells quickly with nothing to show, and find yourself trying to reload before the next birds are out front.
As weather gets less friendly, we turn out attention to waterfowl, complete with all its magic. I envision duck hunting over a slough in October with a northwest wind, dropping temperature with light snowflakes and gray skies. That’ s an ideal duck hunt for me.
For now, though, dove hunts tend to be more relaxed, more casual. Light winds and tolerable temperatures provide good dove hunting conditions. The only bird where you can shoot a half case of shells for 3 birds and call it a good day. •
Page 6, Dakota Country, September 2025
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Field Staff
Bill Antonides..................... Aberdeen Mort Bank........................... Bismarck Brian Blackwell...................... Webster Chuck Dieter...................... Brookings Peggy Hankey................... Park River Jason Mitchell.................. Devils Lake John Pollman................... Dell Rapids Patricia Stockdill.................. Garrison Clint Lindemann.................... Enderlin
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