It's that time again: September 1st and dove season in Texas!

[SteveM]

A small group of friends will have 121 acres to ourselves; an oak- and cedar-covered mesa with mourning dove flitting through the limbs, sounding like squeaky fan bearings; a field 100 feet below with cut-over seed crops, fed by a year-round natural spring; steaks on an open fire, beer in the cooler (for afterward), stars overhead, a case of Winchester field loads. And I'll be using the gun my Dad gave me some forty-five years ago: A Remington .12 ga. Wingmaster. I wish he were with me.

[Redneck Socialist]

1. Sounds like a good time

Never got into dove hunting myself (can't hunt them in my state anyway) but it sounds like fun.

[SteveM]

2. It is certainly fun, even alone in a field. But it's better with friends...

I sometimes think there is a primal link back to the "hunter-gatherer" times when on those few days our ancestors rejoiced in the abundance of animals and food and re-affirmed the need to cooperate. The specie may have been different and certainly the weaponry, but the impact was the same. I think hunting for most people is trying to hearken back to those times and learn lessons lost. I hope your state changes its outlook; surely, with half a billion dove out there you have no shortage.