Dove, Dogs, and Shotguns

Early July, probably the most boring time for a sports fan and hunter like myself. No football, basketball, dove hunting, or anything else to entertain me on the weekends. I’ve even caught myself trying to get in to soccer, but it’s not working. The best sport on right now is politics, and I can only stand so much of that before I wanna puke. So what’s a person supposed to do? Here are a few tips to help make for a better opening day.

1. Get your dog in shape. Dogs are just like people, if they lay around for a few months, it’s difficult for them to get out and hunt all day. If you’ve ever had your dog lay down on you in the middle of a shoot, it can be frustrating to say the least. Break out the decoy and scent, and get to training. The small investment of time will pay great dividends come opening day.
2. Get yourself in shape. Whatever this means for you. It could mean shooting shape or physical shape, or both. Join a league, shoot, shoot, shoot. This way your dog is not the only one ready to hunt come September.
3. Get your gun in shape. Clean it, if it’s gas operated, soak it the gas cylinder in mineral spirits for 12 hours. Doing this will dramatically decrease the amount of problems you will have in the field.
4. Get your accessories in shape. Things get old,  wear out, or just need to be replenished. Go out and get that new chair, or camo you’ve been needing. Things like bug spray, flashlights, batteries, shells, and other accessories can be purchased ahead of time. By shopping early, you will be more thorough and you will spread the cost out over a period of time instead of one lump sum.
5. Scout. Early season scouting can pay off big time. It may save you some money by stopping you from buying the lease, save you time by not wasting it on opening day false alarming on dragonflies, or make you look like the hero to your hunting buddies.

Off season sucks, make it suck less by preparing for the on season.

• Dove, Teal Seasons Set BIg News for Texas Dove Hunters AUSTIN, Texas — The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service SRC (Service Regulation Committee) has approved the 2009-2010 Texas dove season, including a 70-day season and 15-bird daily bag statewide, and a 16-day early teal season. Additionally, the SRC approved moving the Texas South Zone......
• TPWD Dove Season Framework Gets Commission Approval AUSTIN, Texas — Changes proposed for the 2009-2010 Texas dove season, including a 70-day season and 15-bird daily bag statewide, received approval from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission. The season framework change is part of a new adaptive harvest management regulations package developed for the 14 states, including Texas,......
• Tips on Starting Kids Out Shotgunning Starting a youngster out with a shotgun can be a great experience for both of you. If you follow a few guidelines, you can help ensure that you pour a solid foundation. A foundation that will be the basis of a lifetime of hunting and shooting. I'm not going to......

• Prepare for Elk Season Hunters who enjoy hunting big game get excited when elk season approaches. One way that you can help yourself if you're aiming for a trophy elk or any elk at all is by practicing a great deal long before the season starts. Too many hunters leave the guns and bows......
• Bow Prep Pre Season When the air begins to get crisp, when the leaves begin to change, that is when you know the season for bow hunting is on us again. Bow season is coming, and it is not far off now. By this time, you should hopefully already have a game plan figured......
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With 84 days until the 2010 dove season, it’s time to inspect your geat and begin to make any purchases needed before the season. So I thought I’d make a blog post of my findings.

First up for me is a shell/field bag. Currently, I’m using a 3 pouched belt that has done it’s purpose over the years. The problems I have with it is the pouches are too long and they make walking cumbersome to say the least. Also, keeping track of flashlights, bug spray, water, etc. is a pain in the as$.

I’ve done a little online searching an found what looks like the perfect fit. I just wish it was camo.
Check it out, and if anyone has already purchased it, let me know what you think about it.

Upland Gear Quail and Dove Caddy

• Bird dog training (part I) The following is the first article, written by my brother, in a series on how to train your bird dog. Darla. his lab, is an awesome bird dog. He has trained her since she was a puppy. Not only is she awesome hunting dove, she's great hunting quail also. If you've......
• 6 New Texas Dove Leases If anyone has hunted these leases, feel free to leave a review on them. Thanks for posting them, and keep them coming. Below are the details: NAME OF LEASE: Carol Knutson EMAIL: info@muysecoranch.com CONTACT NAME: Carol CONTACT PHONE NUMBER: 830-363-4281 PREFERRED METHOD OF CONTACT: Either LOCATION INCLUDING CLOSEST CITY OR......
• TPWD Scoping Migratory Bird Issues at Public Hearings News Release Media Contact: Steve Lightfoot, 512-389-4701, steve.lightfoot@tpwd.state.tx.us April 28, 2009 AUSTIN, Texas — In addition to public comment on proposed fee increases and dove hunting seasons, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is inviting input on a series of scoping issues related to migratory game birds during public hearings......

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• Day After A Binge Holidays are prime times to eat way more than is necessary with meals that are extremely rich and loaded with calories! It's fun to visit with family and feast on foods we normally would not allow past our lips, but it's not fun afterwards when we're in a food coma......

Joe Cermele has some good points on not blocking your target with your gun. This is a common mistake usually caused by rushing your mount or excessive gun movement. Follow these pointer below and you will use less bad words and break more targets.

A major cause of baffling misses on the range and in the field comes when shooters block their own view of the target with their gun. Your muzzle should always be below the line of the target’s flight. When you have an unobstructed view of the bird and the gun is in your peripheral vision, it’s very simple to focus on the target, see where the muzzle has to go, and put it in the right place. On the other hand, if you hold the gun up in such a way that you block your view of the target even for a moment your eyes will go to the gun, which then stops, causing you to miss over and behind. On crossing and quartering targets, be sure to start your gun below the line of flight.

On birds that go up like springing teal or fly straight away like the one in this picture, you need to start your gun to one side of the target or the other to keep it from blocking your view. Typically, if you are right handed you want to hold your gun to the right of the target’s line of flight, as the shooter in this picture is doing.

Where you start your gun is as important in hunting as it is in target shooting. And, while shot opportunities come quickly and unexpectedly in the field it’s still possible to train yourself to set up for a shot in such a way that the gun doesn’t block the target. If you’re used to carrying your gun safely with the muzzle pointed straight up, try moving it down until it’s almost parallel with the ground and below the target before you mount the gun and shoot. You will find yourself hitting birds you used to mysteriously miss.

• Shooting Fundamentals Shooting Fundamentals        The fundamentals of shooting a shotgun are vital to becoming a successful dove hunter. There are many things that contribute to actually hitting the target. In our previous article about avoiding mental breakdowns we talked about how to keep your mind from getting in the way of......
• Follow the 2010 Shot Show @ Browning.com Starting tomorrow, Browning will begin their coverage of the 2010 Shot Show. Not to mention, they are offering some pretty good deals. There is no event that is more important for the hunting and shooting business than the annual Shooting, Hunting and Outdoor Trade Show (SHOT Show). And it is......
• The History Channel is Looking for 16 Top Shots This is right up my alley. Sixteen lucky contestants will battle weekly for a 100,000 dollar prize. The game, shooting. Each week they will be tested with different weaponry, with one elimination per week. So if you're interested, scroll down and click on the link to get started. Check out the......

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Bourjaily tried this on his son and he went from 4×25 to 19×25 in trap. I know it’s effective because one time while shooting sporting clays, I got something in my stronger eye and had to shoot with that eye closed the whole round.( Actually, that was how I learned I had a dominance problem).  I usually hovered around the high sixties, low seventies. I busted 86 that day, the best round I ever shot. So, if you are struggling, try this….

From Field & Stream:

Click on the Field & Stream link to read his article.

• How to Find Your Dominant Eye In my readings I found a simple test to determine which eye is your dominant eye. I just found out that I am cross-eye dominant. Damn, no wonder I'm always struggling with my eyes when I shoot skeet or sporting clays. I'm left handed and right eye dominant. Now that......
• Judge takes away 9-year-old's shotgun The spokesman reported that a judge in Spokane, Washington ruled that a father is not allowed to give his 9-year-old a shotgun. The court was involved due to a divorce between the boy's parents. The mother filed for a restraining order on the shotgun, claiming the boy was too young......
• Skeet Shooting is Best Practice for Dove Hunters According to Phil Bourjaily of Field & Stream. Phil is a well known writer/gun expert and has some really good points on improving your kill ratio. I've always felt that skeet was a great warm up for dove season. I always start with my shotgun a little lower than most shooters to......

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I know, not exactly on subject, but what can I say, I thought this was a cool story.

From Houston Chronicle:

PHOENIX — A missing handwritten transcript from a coroner’s inquest done after the legendary gunfight at the OK Corral has resurfaced in a dusty box more than 125 years after the most famous shootout in Wild West history.

The document resurfaced when court clerks stumbled on the box while reorganizing files in an old jail storage room in Bisbee, about 20 miles south of Tombstone.

Stuffed inside was a modern manila envelope marked “keep” with the date 1881.

Court officials turned the document over to state archivists on Wednesday. Experts will immediately begin peeling away tape, restoring the paper and ink, and digitizing the pages.

The first pages could show up on the library’s website for historians to review as soon as next week.

It’s unlikely the transcript will provide any shattering revelations, since historians have already reviewed photocopies of the document and the inquest was covered in detail by local newspapers at the time.

But history buffs said the transcript is enlightening nonetheless, clearing up fuzzy points in the copies and revealing small notes that might not have appeared on the photocopies.

“They were handled by the people of that moment, and they’re the actual artifact that encapsulated that time period,” said GladysAnn Wells, Arizona State Librarian.

The 1881 gun battle between the forces of law and a gang of rustlers left three men dead, made folk heroes of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday and inspired numerous movies about the untamed Old West.

The inquest was done on the same day Earp, his two brothers and Holliday confronted a gang of drunken outlaws, sparking a 30-second gun battle in the streets of Tombstone that killed Frank and Tom McLaury and Bill Clanton.

The document has been missing for decades — last seen when it was photocopied in the 1960s. The pages include verbatim testimony from eyewitnesses to the shootout.

The document is legible, but the paper has darkened to an amber beer color and is brittle like a potato chip, said Cochise County Court Clerk Denise Lundin. The handwriting can be difficult to read because the court reporter was rapidly taking notes, she said.

Even if the document doesn’t reveal new information, the discovery helps historians feel more comfortable with the record, said Gary Robertson, a Wild West historian and author of the book “Doc Holliday, the Life and the Legend.” But most importantly, it sparks the imagination.

“Every time you find one it gives you hope that maybe you’ll find some more,” Roberts said. “Maybe there will be something else that we’ve all been dying to get our hands on.”

Lundin is convinced that somewhere in her courthouse are records of the inquest for Johnny Ringo, another legendary outlaw.

“These things aren’t something you can go search for,” she said. “You really just have to watch for them.”

In doing a little online reading about the shootout, it appears the Clantons are still pissed about getting there ass kicked a century ago

• Hunting South Texas I know we have a page to review hunting land, but I figured since this particular land is where we have our Top Gun competition every year, it deserved its very own post.     Since 2003 we've been hunting opening day of the south zone at the Las Palomas WMA in......
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• Bird dog training (part I) The following is the first article, written by my brother, in a series on how to train your bird dog. Darla. his lab, is an awesome bird dog. He has trained her since she was a puppy. Not only is she awesome hunting dove, she's great hunting quail also. If you've......

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Communist, no dove hunting, that would be like no birthday or Christmas.

From the PostStar.com

It may have been nearly 50 years ago, but local real estate agent David Collins still fondly remembers his dove hunting outings while stationed with the U.S. Army in Kentucky.

“It was a whole lot of fun,” he said.

Unfortunately, he hasn’t hunted doves since, because New York does not allow dove hunting.

But Collins is among a group of bird hunters statewide that is making a push to convince state officials to create a dove season. As he has gotten older, the 68-year-old was looking for a less labor-intensive bird hunting opportunity that he could share with his grandchildren.

Unfortunately, misconceptions about doves have not helped the cause, he said. The dove population is healthy, and hunters nationwide account for only about 10 percent of dove mortality. However, many still think of them not as a potential game bird, but as the cute birds that frequent their bird feeders.

“It’s not a songbird, it’s not a bird of peace,” he said. “Yes, people feed them in their backyard, but they also feed deer in their backyard.”

Then there’s the issue of the potential revenue the state could bring in through additional hunting license sales, Collins pointed out.

The sportsmen federations of Warren and Washington counties have gotten behind the movement, as have their counterparts in Greene and Columbia counties.

The New York State Conservation Council has also gotten on board, asking the state Department of Environmental Conservation to survey hunters on the issue.

Collins is working with hunters from around the state, and has gotten support from other sportsmen federations, as well. He said he and other would-be dove hunters plan to meet with Assemblywoman Teresa Sayward, R-Willsboro, this week to discuss the issue.

Efforts to get New York to allow dove hunting have popped up periodically since the 1980s, but for some reason have not garnered the political support needed.

Thirty-nine of the 48 lower states have dove hunting seasons of up to 70 days, with daily bag limits of up to 15 birds in some states. Pennsylvania and New Jersey are among the states that allow dove hunting.

At the request of the NYSCC, the state Department of Environmental Conservation surveyed 5,000 small game hunters last year about their thoughts on a dove hunting season

The survey found 23.4 percent answered that they’d support or strongly support dove hunting in New York, while 11 percent said they went out-of-state to hunt doves, wrote Bryan Swift, the DEC’s game bird unit leader. More than 64 percent either did not answer the question or responded that they didn’t care either way.

“There is no biological reason why doves could not be hunted in New York,” Swift wrote. “However, until political support increases to the point that a bill to amend the Environmental Conservation Law is introduced, passes both the Senate and Assembly, and is signed into law by the governor, we encourage small game hunting enthusiasts to continue to enjoy New York’s other game bird hunting opportunities for turkey, grouse, woodcock and waterfowl, available in a variety of habitats across the state.”

Collins said anyone interested in helping the effort can call him at 791-0188 or e-mail him at davecollins@roadrunner.com.

• And the Season Begins Today, in central and north Texas, thousands of hopeful dove hunters seek to bag their 15 dove. Stores like Academy and Bass Pro have pallets of shells and dove decoys on the floor seeking to entice last minute buyers and me I'm stuck at work. A mild cool front set......
• Only in Texas .... Apparently some of the people moving out to the country are surprised during dove season. I came across this article from WFAA, and couldn't help but see some humor in it. Lori Castoldi awoke last week to the sound of gunshots near her Prosper home.      "It was all around......
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• Successful Grouse Hunting Grouse hunting is popular sport for hunters who like the challenge of hunting birds. Grouse hunting often gets grouped in with partridge and quail hunting because there are ranches and land with fairly enclosed areas that offer grouse hunting tours and guided hunts. Grouse hunting is a sport that many......
• Hunting and Legislation - the Eternal Battle In Texas, it is the occurrence that is the bane of hunters that comes only once every other year. During the four month season, hunting and fishing finds itself in the Texas Capitol building in Austin. Many hunters are unaware of the impact of the legislature on their activities. There......
• 2011 Deer Hunting Proposed Changes Irk Some Hunters In Indiana The Indiana Department of Natural Resources (IDNR) is proposing changes to the rules regarding deer hunting seasons. An Indystar.com columnist wrote about information contained in a relevant news release and was lambasted by several readers. Though he was accused of simply publishing an IDNR news release and being biased, he......

Or else you might have a little surprise….

They have done a really good job in making the lighter really look like a shell.

From everydaynodaysoff.com

It retails for about ten bucks. There is a link to buy it off Amazon over at everydaynodaysoff.com if you wish.

• One Way to Overcome Eye Dominance Bourjaily tried this on his son and he went from 4x25 to 19x25 in trap. I know it's effective because one time while shooting sporting clays, I got something in my stronger eye and had to shoot with that eye closed the whole round.( Actually, that was how I learned......
• Getting Started (part II) WHAT TO DO? Okay, you've acquired everything you need to begin dove hunting, NOW WHAT!?!? There isn't too much to it, but if you take a few steps prior to taking the field, you'll have a lot more fun and a lot less stress. Let's begin. Get familiar with your......
• Proposed legislation to infringe on hunter's rights Infringe is putting it mild. There are two bills in the Texas House of Representatives that are aimed directly and Texas hunters and gun owners. If passed, we could find ourselves needing some legal counsel. The following is from Texas State Rifle Association's website: Bad Bills~Bills to Stop HB 736 by......

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In an interesting twist, a gun conviction ruling by the Supreme Court becomes the precedence in a Texas lawsuit against Obama Care.

From the Houston Chronicle:

A Texas high school student’s decision to bring a .38-caliber handgun to school in 1992 could end up at the center of the legal fight over President Barack Obama’s health care reform plan.

Alfonso Lopez Jr.’s arrest at Edison High School in San Antonio set in motion a legal battle that may prove crucial to 13 state attorneys general fighting the new law.

Lopez, a senior when he was arrested for handgun possession in March 1992, ended up facing federal charges of violating the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. But the Supreme Court, on a 5-4 vote, threw out his conviction five years later on the grounds that Congress exceeded its regulatory authority under the Constitution when it approved the 1990 law, which makes it a violation of federal law to possess a firearm in a school zone.

Commerce clause cited

In filing a lawsuit last week challenging the new health care law’s mandate that everyone must have health insurance, the 13 state attorneys general — including Greg Abbott of Texas — cited the same legal reasoning that went into the Lopez ruling.

At issue in both cases is the Constitution’s commerce clause, which limits the regulatory powers of Congress to matters involving interstate commerce. In the Lopez decision, conservatives on the court led by then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist ruled that the 1990 gun law was unconstitutional because it had nothing to do with commerce between states.

Upholding the federal government’s right to control guns in school zones would give Congress “a general police power of the sort retained by the states,” Rehnquist wrote for the majority.

That’s almost exactly the argument the states are making now in a lawsuit filed March 23.

Drawing parallels

Abbott and the other 12 state attorneys general say that health care does not meet the legal definition of interstate commerce, rendering illegal the congressional mandate that all Americans must purchase health insurance.

“In the past 15 years the Supreme Court has scaled back Congress when they’ve tried to inject themselves into purely state matters,” said one of the 13, Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, in an interview on MSNBC.

The Lopez ruling was one of two Cox cited, saying it was a case where the federal government “tried to criminalize purely state behavior within a state.”

Prior to the Lopez ruling, the Supreme Court had for 60 years mostly followed the lead of Congress, ruling that congressional claims of regulatory power were valid under the Constitution. With the Lopez ruling, court watchers predicted a wholesale scaling back of such claims, clipping the wings of Congress to legislate in any area it wanted.

Hedging their bets

In the 2000 case of U.S. v. Morrison, the justices knocked down a provision of the Violence Against Women Act that gave victims of rape, domestic violence and other gender-motivated crimes the right to sue attackers in federal court. Rehnquist also authored the opinion.

Still, the attorneys general are hedging their legal bets. They also argue that the health care law’s insurance mandate for individuals violates the 10th Amendment, which states that powers not specifically delegated to Congress by the Constitution are “reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.”

Critics of the lawsuit say the U.S. health care system is national in scope, transcending state lines, and that extending benefits to the uninsured is an economic activity that requires the participation of all in the insurance pool.

If Obama administration lawyers can establish a connection between the health care law’s goals and interstate commerce, the high court’s conservatives may be hard-pressed to rule against Congress, skeptics say.

“The courts are not supposed to overturn the will of the elected representatives of people; that is something that’s generally anathema to conservatives,” said Paul Rothstein, a law professor at Georgetown University. “Conservatives may not like the health care plan, but they don’t want to be put in a position of judicial activism, overturning what the people’s elected representatives put in place.”

Supreme Court changes

Other experts see the lawsuit as having a very good chance of success, especially since Congress entered uncharted waters in approving health care.

The lawsuit “is definitely not frivolous,” said professor Randy Barnett of Georgetown University in an interview with the National Law Journal. “Anyone who says it is — and I know a lot of law professors have — they’re whistling past the graveyard,” Barnett said. “Anything that has never been done before has no precedent for it. And this (health care reform law) has never been done before.”

Since the Texas case was decided, Rehnquist has died and Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a swing vote who sided with the majorities in the 1995 and 2000 rulings, has retired. In their places are two solid conservative votes, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito. Last year, moderate-liberal Justice David Souter resigned and was replaced by a like-minded jurist, Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

It’s not exactly how I thought we would have to use guns to fight healthcare, but hopefully it works.

NO Bama ‘12

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• TPWD Sets Hearings on Lastest Proposals In a news release from Steve Lightfoot with Texas Parks and Wildlife, he announced the the department would conduct 21 public hearings. The hearing would cover the topics of increasing fees and yhe new dove season propsals. Changes proposed for the 2009-10 Texas dove season include a 70 day season......
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Check out this animation of Winchester’s new PDX1 12 gauge personal defense load. I don’t think anyone would be standing afterwards.

Thanks to gunholstersandgear.com 

• New Texas Dove Lease Mr. Carrales has listed what looks to be a great dove lease in the heart of whitewing country. If anyone has hunted this lease please send us a review. Below are the details: Name of Lease: Gus Carrales Leases Email: gus.carrales@oxea-chemicals.com Contact Name: Gus Carrales Jr. Contact # : (361)522-4070......
• Twitter Updates for 2009-06-27 RT @DoveHunting101: New blog post: Man Fined Over Migratory Bird Treaty http://bit.ly/dHVQM FOR BEATING A SEAGULL # Swine Flu declared pandemic, 1st in 41 years http://bit.ly/CnWqt # Using positive reinforcement training yo train your hunting dog. http://bit.ly/Zt81d # Tips on Starting Kids Out Hunting http://bit.ly/jdFYt # Just broke 100......
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Remington recently sent Phil Bourjaily of Field & Stream their prototype Competition 1100. I like it. I’m sure mine is coming soon

Features:

• Fully adjustable comb
• Very low recoil
• Adjustable butt plate
• Extended choke tubes
• 30″ overbored barrel
• Dipped synthetic finish, looks pretty sharp.

• Left Handed Shotgun Catalog Okay, I've been doing a little research on left handed shotguns. I figure I'm not the only left-hander that finds it difficult to find a left handed model. So I compiled a list of left handed shotguns available for 2009. Hope it helps my fellow left handers in their quest......
• The History Channel is Looking for 16 Top Shots This is right up my alley. Sixteen lucky contestants will battle weekly for a 100,000 dollar prize. The game, shooting. Each week they will be tested with different weaponry, with one elimination per week. So if you're interested, scroll down and click on the link to get started. Check out the......
• One Way to Overcome Eye Dominance Bourjaily tried this on his son and he went from 4x25 to 19x25 in trap. I know it's effective because one time while shooting sporting clays, I got something in my stronger eye and had to shoot with that eye closed the whole round.( Actually, that was how I learned......

• Latest on Flex Accounts As I discussed in Flex Accounts at Risk a couple months back, congress is looking at reducing the benefits that a Flexible Savings Account can offer you. Right now, there's no specified limit on the amount you can put away pretax to be used for nonreimbursed medical expenses, although most......
• Stingray Boats Stingray Boats resides in Hartsville, South Carolina. In only a few short years, Stingray Boats has emerged as one of the leading independent manufacturers of boats in the entire Nation. With more than 225,000 square feet worth of space designated for manufacturing, Stingray boats has one of the most technologically......
• Sunday Roundup: Blogging Tips and Resources Good morning Sunday readers! Are you looking for some blogging tips to help out your blog or thinking of starting one? Check out our quick guide below to some great places for ideas and resources. General: Marketing 2.0 asks Corporate Blogger: Angel or Demon? For a humorous look at Thoughts......