Dove season is fast approaching

With the start of dove season just a couple of weeks away, it might be a little late to do a lot of planting to help attract this popular game species, but the experts from Oklahoma State University have some great tips for the future, and some things you can do now to improve this year’s hunt.

Small plots of an acre can be effective in attraction of dove. They do not have to be cultivated crops either. Sunflower, ragweed, croton (dove weed) and other native growth can provide good food as well.

Keep in mind dove and other migratory birds, such as waterfowl, are a national resource protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Because these birds travel across state and international boundaries, Federal and State regulations are established to help ensure that they continue to thrive while providing the most hunting opportunities.

Federal baiting regulations define key terms for hunters and land managers, and clarify conditions under which you may legally hunt migratory birds. As a hunter or land manager, it is your responsibility to know and obey all Federal and State laws that govern the sport. State regulations can be more restrictive even than Federal regulations.

The law seems simple. You cannot hunt migratory birds by the aid of baiting or on or over any baited area where you know or reasonably should know that the area is or has been baited.

A baited area is any area on which salt, grain, or other feed has been placed, exposed, deposited, distributed, or scattered, if that salt, grain, or feed could serve as a lure or attraction for waterfowl.

Agricultural lands offer good dove hunting. You can hunt doves in fields where grain has been distributed or scattered solely as the result of a normal agricultural operation. A normal agricultural operation includes normal agricultural plantings, harvestings, or post-harvest manipulations as well as other normal agricultural practices if they are conducted in accordance with recommendations of State Extension Specialists of the Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service.

You can also hunt doves over lands planted by means of top sowing or aerial seeding where seeds have been scattered solely as the result of a normal agricultural planting or a normal soil stabilization practice.

The key words there are “normal planting practices.”

A normal agricultural planting is a planting undertaken for the purpose of producing or gathering a crop. Normal plantings do not involve the placement of grain in piles or other concentrations. Plantings must follow Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service recommendations.

You may hunt doves over manipulated grain crops, such as corn, wheat, milo, sorghum, millet, sunflower, and buckwheat.

Agricultural activities other than planting or harvesting also scatter grain or other feed in agricultural areas. You can hunt doves in such areas provided the agricultural operation involved is a normal agricultural practice (i.e., one that produces livestock or a crop) and follows recommendations of State Extension Specialists. Examples include “hogged down” fields (where livestock have been allowed to enter fields and feed on standing crops) and feedlots (small enclosed areas where farmers feed livestock to increase their weight). You cannot, however, hunt in an area where grain, salt, or other feed has been placed to improve dove hunting.

Intent is a word used by law enforcement to describe what someone had planned to do. If the intent of any of these practices is to draw doves for hunting, then there is a good possibility that a baiting law has been broken. Law enforcement officials from both the State and Federal wildlife agencies check dove hunters and locations each year for baiting. A little caution might save you some embarrassment and a hefty fine.