Each year I prepare, plant and shoot a 24 acre field of sunflowers for doves. A close friend owns the field, and I prepare and plant it with my equipment. We have planted this field each of the past 5 or 6 years for doves. It is dedicated to that use. We have sons and daughters (and grandsons in my case), and friends and neighbors each fall. We eat well, and shoot (I'd like to say "well" but will maintain a modicum of honesty in this thread ). The field is exceptional for the number of doves it attracts each year. It is not uncommon for us to bag 1200 to 1500 each year in this field, on 5 or 6 shoots.

I have considered doing this for several years, while I prepared our dove field each year, but decided this year to go ahead with it. With the thought that some of you might find it interesting, I decided this year to chronicle the steps necessary to prepare a sunflower dove field, properly, in our neck of the woods. It will be updated periodically throughout the summer, with pictures and narratives, so that the nuts and bolts of it all can be understood, and hopefully enjoyed, by those interested, right up through opening day. Dave, if you find that this belongs in another forum, please move it. I post it here so that more doublegun dove shooters might see it, but submit to your wisdom.

We begin with the preparation of the field in early April. Last years' sunflower cadavers have been left in the field all winter so that game can glean the leftovers from last years crop. First step is to disc the field, to cut up last years' residue. This was done a couple weeks ago and, now, we see the disc coming back through for a second trip, and applying the grass herbicide trifluralin (Treflan) and incorporating it into the top few inches of the soil profile with a 26' disc harrow.



This took about two hours to do.

Next, we see the frontal view looking out from the driver's seat of the JD 8400 as we begin subsoiling and bedding the field. On the left you can see the tracks from the fertilizer spreader, which broadcast a blended fertilizer which had the analysis 80-20-80-10S. This gives 80# of nitrogen, 20# of phosphorous, 80# of potash and 10# sulfur per acre. As I do this trip I mix the fertilizer in the top profile of the soil, pull 8 ripper shanks which go about 18" deep each and shatter the hardpan layer directly under each row, throw up a bed over the ripper slot, and drag the top off the bed leaving it ready for planting. To the right you can see the flat topped beds from the previous pass.



Next photo is the rear view from the tractor seat, showing the subsoiler/bedder stopped. The ripper/subsoiler shanks are in the ground and can't be seen.



Next contribution will show the planting operation. We will try to get the field planted early next week. It is important to get this done in a timely manner, as the sunflowers need to dry down after maturity, so that there is a few weeks time for the doves to begin to really home in on the field and feed heavily prior to the season opening.

Spring is heah' in the "Souf". Hallelujah!

SRH

Oh Stan, can I call you Dad or Brother or something to help defend this field in dove season? Good for you also, for helping the doves and others for a place to feed.

Stan, have you considered a career in farming?
Gil

Great idea to do this, Stan. Looking forward to each new post as the field progresses. Is this the big field that Ross and I shot with you?
JR

One and the same, John. Lots of local doves still hanging around it this spring. I am convinced that doves become imprinted on a particular place to find food, and teach it to their young. I have found that the more you plant the same field, year after year, the better it gets.

Might be something to help pass the blahs associated with the next 4 months, as we await "The Opener".

SRH

Stan, what a great idea for a thread! I hope Dave will allow it to remain here in the main forum because what you are doing is of particular interest to those of us in the dove shooting states. My friends and I do the same sort of thing here in deep south Ga and comparing your methods to ours will be fun, especially so with the pictorial record of your progress.

Your opinion regarding the fact that some fields attract birds year after year and others similarly prepared don't goes right along with my own experience. I've always figured it was the "recipe" of the soil that caused it, but it may be instead that the birds just remember the good spots...Geo

I sure enjoyed this thread-very interesting. I bet it's a hoot to shoot some doves over this field. I look forward to more photos as the operation progresses, to include the finished product!

We have some land it would be interesting to try this on, on a smaller scale. Problem is, more often than not, the majority of doves have headed south by the time the season opens here. I wonder if a great food source, such as this, would keep the birds around a bit longer?

How early do they typically leave, Cameron? Is there anything much for them to feed on or do you think cold weather drives them south?

Brown top millet is a really good dove attractant, and matures in about 60 days, if I recall correctly. You might could grow it and get it matured before they leave.

SRH

Stan,

It's usually the cold weather that drives the birds south. The season opens Sept 1st and we've usually had a few good frosts by that time, or it's borderline freezing temps. Usually by the 3rd-4th week of August, they're scarce. If we haven't gotten any frosts, it could be in the high 30's-low 40's with rainy/drizzly weather. I can drive down to our property about 50 miles SE and hear doves cooing on the property and I presume nesting in the timber we have, so not much in the way of a good food source on the property or surrounding land. There is about a 15 acre piece that we used to grow hay on, that hasn't been planted with trees, and has lain fallow for 30 years or so. I figure that would be a good piece to play around with, and I do enjoy a good dove shoot, although I have to say, I've never had a spectacular one that you folks are probably used to. The effort wouldn't be wasted though, as there is plenty of whitetails, turkeys some elk and a resident population of CA quail, that drive my dad nuts, due to scavaging on the strawberries in his garden, when ripe.

About 45 miles due south of here, one starts to get into the fringes of the Palouse country, which is mainly wheat. I've driven down on opening day and it's been very spotty as to whether one finds birds or not, so based on that, it could be that even a good food source might not hold birds in the area.

Thanks for the suggestion Stan. I guess one would need to forge ahead to see what the outcome would be, concerning doves.

Cameron, I used to hunt doves a little on the Palouse west of Pullman/Moscow and the one constant we found that would bring them in was...water. We hunted the banks of the Palouse river and any little stock tanks left from the pre-clean farming days. Kilt a few. Missed more.

Doves and clean farming don't mix well. They LIKE weeds.... But it would be an interesting experiment to plant a specific "dove feed" patch so far north!

Neat thread.

Along the CA and AZ southern borders, the whitewings head south into Mexico as the weather changes in the fall. The early departures seem to be related more to rain (monsoon season in Yuma can be spectacular) than to temps. If we get a big storm with temps still over 100F, the whitewings are gone. The mourning doves hang around longer and are usually still abundant in November and December, but they flock up because they are migratory. I'm pretty sure the doves remember fields from year to year because they live a long time if predators or hunters don't get them. I think I read that the oldest dove in captivity lasted something like 24 years. The farmers in the Imperial Valley and around Yuma who plant small plots specifically for doves seem to favor milo.

PS: from http://www.ehow.com/info_8374317_long-life-span-mourning-dove.html

"The average lifespan of a mourning dove is approximately a year and a half. According to the Wild Bird Watching website, mourning doves in their first year of life have a mortality rate of up to 75 percent, while adult mourning doves have a mortality rate of up to 60 percent. Following the survival of the first year, which is the hardest, mourning doves can live up to five years. The All About Birds website states that the oldest known mourning dove lived to be more than 31 years old."

Hey Mike,

Good to hear from you! I did drive down to Lewiston a few years back, the second weekend of the season, to see if I could find a few doves. I think the days take was 5 or 6, but certainly should have been a few more. For me, that was a decent dove hunt!

When I was young, we had a mix of pasture and timber. After logging off some timber, a big patch of Canadian thistle grew up on part of the logged area, that the doves seemed to like. I suppose there was some seed in the head that they fed on. If the cold hadn't driven them off, I'd sneak up on the thistle and sometimes manage to drop a few.

Maybe planting a big patch of Canadian thistle would be the ticket!

Great idea for a thread, Stan! Most kind of you to share the considerable work involved to plant a dove field by design. What kind of sunflowers are you planting?

I hunted on a fella for many years who had a number of native sunflower dove fields scattered about in W. TX within a 50 mile radius of Coleman. These were the small sunflowers that only grow to about a 2 foot height & have heads the size of a daisy w/tiny black seeds. He told me that he needed to have those seeds out by the end of Jan. for them to make & that he sometimes put them out begining as early as Dec. He was just barely scratching the surface on those fields to set the seeds as they didn't require much soil to make them 'take'. Nonetheless, those fields had seen considerable work in years prior w/stone & stump removal and disking and at an earlier time, altogether dif crops.

The heaviest bird population I ever experienced out there was a former native sunflower field outside Lohn of about 20 acres that had been allowed to go fallow for 3 years and it had scattered volunteer sunflowers and some coastal bermuda w/plenty of Johnson grass and a smattering of croton in it. The numbers of birds in that field that year was like being in South America! They were in there in clouds. It abutted a rough old cattle ranch w/plenty of mesquite and prickly pear cactus and a stock tank nearby. It was in early October when we shot it and the birds had been left alone until then.

Cameron, ah, yes--Lewiston the Banana Belt! I bet doves retire there! Idaho's Florida.

I've shot Doves west of Lewiston, along U.S. 12 in Washington State. Pretty slow compared to the wonderful farms I had access to around Mt Jackson, Virginia, for over 25 years!! I went down there a couple of years ago in 1 September and my great streach of "Feel Free to Hunt" land was closed to shooting due to wind farm construction on the hills above!! So, I headed over to Zillah, south of Yakima where we had great Dove shooting in my highschool and college days. I found the field we use to shoot, but it was so built up around it one wouldn't think of shooting there anymore. Guess one can never go home again!!

Cameron,

I'm just across the border from you at Newman Lake. I'll be over at the Spokane Gun Club about 10am to shoot skeet.

Dave

Great post Stan - though I am emerald green with envy, being long removed (chronologically and geographically) from the dove hunting I enjoyed in MD in the '70s. Our best shooting was over sunflower patches my father and his hunting buddies had planted on several farms we hunted. Sitting in a treeline between one of those patches and a large white pine stand on a warm, late afternoon in September - now, that is fun shooting!

My only "regret" is not having been able to enjoy that shooting with a long-barreled 16 ga Fox . . . .

Looks like you are setting things up for another great season - I hope the weather cooperates for you.

They do like clean farming in one sense, Mike. If the ground under the sunflowers, or corn, etc. is free of heavy and thick grasses they are much more likely to "take to" the field. Doves have short little legs and really like the ground fairly clean where they land. We used to have a weed in the cotton fields named wooly croton, or dove weed, as we called it. Roundup has about gotten rid of it, but for many, many years we had some good shoots in the middle of cotton fields as the doves flew down into the cotton to feed on the croton seeds. You dern sure better watch where he fell, though. A dog couldn't see over the cotton to mark him down, and it was mighty easy to lose them.

tw, the kind we plant are the black oil type. They are very small, much smaller than the big striped ones you buy to eat as a snack. I used to grow them both, one for oil and the other for snack market, but the markets dried up around here for them. Now, we just plant them for the doves to snack on. Keeping the fields clean of weeds and grasses is the biggest task we have in being successful with a field. Palmer amaranth, a pigweed, is a terrible problem and costs us $25 an acre to control in the sunflowers.

I'll say a bit more about the seed we use in the next installment, showing the planting operation.

Glad there's some interest in all this. It's fun for me, too.

All my best, SRH

Appreciate the offer Dave, but I'm down in St Maries repairing some fenceing around a small vineyard (if one wants to call it that) and some almond trees I planted a few years back, that are impossible to grow, due to the wildlife, without a decent fence. The plus is I got down here early and went out with friend chasing turkeys. He was able to call in and bag an average sized Tom.

Had to get my small irrigation system turned on as well-looks like we might be in for a dry one this year. Maybe it'll be a late, warm fall and the doves will cooperate.

My brother lives in Newman Lake. I can never remember the name of the road, but it's the development overlooking the large field a mile or so from the corner gas station on Hwy 54.

Eastwood Terrace. Same development I live in.

Stan, will you use electrical fencing to keep out the deer or is 24 acres large enough to outpace with plant growth the deer impact? We're going to electric fence in the 15 acres we hunted last year. Gil

Gil,

They will eat around the edges some, but so far we have not had to replant them because of deer. It is surprising, because they are really bad in this area. I rigged up some scarecrows last year in some peanut fields that worked good. You just have to move them around occasionally. I made them out of 1/2" PVC pipe and used some of my old shirts on them. The wind spins them round and round and spooks the deer pretty good.

SRH

Sounds like a fairly simple fix Stan, for the deer problem. Who'd have thought scarecrows would do the trick! Sure beats fencing a good sized area.

Stan, great idea! But your post is missing a couple of very important details. 1) the exact location of the field and 2) the time we need to meet for your opening day shoot!!!!!

Looking forward to seeing the field grow!

Adam

Great stuff Stan! Sorry you couldn't make the Southern SxS. But it was good to talk with Adam S. and John R. there. Look forward to seeing the field progress over the summer.

---Matt Haney

Thanks, Matt. I'll see you at the Fall Classic at Rick's, things just didn't work out for the Southern. Sorry I missed it.

My intentions are to get the planter rollin' tomorrow. If it happens, pics tomorrow night.

SRH

Matt,
It was great seeing you again last weekend. Judy and I had a really good time seeing everyone again. Best wishes 'til next time.
JR

Stan,
Did you know Rick has moved back the Fall event to Sept. 15th/16th?
JR

It's the 13th-15th, John, and I am just agrinnin' about it. That puts it between corn and peanut picking. I'll be there for three days this time. Only bad thing about it is that I'll miss a Saturday dove shoot. Ah, torn between two lovers...........

I'm all bummed out right now, and needed some good news. Looks as if I'll have to miss the U.S. Open at Rick's next week. We have had so much rain this spring that everyone is behind with land preparation for peanuts and cotton, and I'm gonna have to keep my butt in a tractor seat. I was thinking to drive over for one day and shoot the S x S, but according to the web site all rotations are full already!!

SRH

Got my days off a little there, Stan, but I bet Rick would work you in somehow if you call him now and tell him your situation.

I was afraid the wet ground was causing you headaches with your planting, based on our last phone conversation. As my old turkey hunting mentor Wallace Lowry used to say, "son, there's always something to take the pleasure out of life."
JR

Called Lois Lessing (winscore), who is handling the registration and scoring, and she got us in to shoot the S x S at 11 a.m. next Tuesday morning. Better to be lucky than smart!

SRH

Stan,

Thanks for the great thread and pictures. When I read it, it made me think of an article I read from Outdoor Life that's about a guy who designed a dove field with just one acre - from April of 2011. I kept the article and would be interested in your or anyone else's thoughts about it. It's posted below - hopefully good enough for all to read, but here are the basic desciption of the article:

In the fall he plants a few rows of winter wheat. In Mid April, he plants a field of sunflowers and keeps it weed free all summer. 2 weeks before Dove season, he mows the winter wheat and lets the heads fall to feed the Doves. 10 days before the season, he mows the sunflower field, but leaves some rows in the middle standing for the hunters to hide in. Then he tills some of the ground between the wheat and the mowed sunflowers - giving the doves some bare earth to loaf on. He hunts only between 4 and 6 pm - just the fringe of what uses the field in the day, so the birds don't avoid the field when their going out in te morning or coming back in the evening.

Toughts?

I had to read the article carefully and think about it awhile to really digest it all. My thoughts are: (1) This has been thought it out very carefully. What he is doing is providing a food source for the doves almost year round. The wheat is there for them to eat from the time it matures, about early June, until the sunflowers mature in August. We provide the birds wheat during the same period, until the sunflowers get mature and dried down. This keeps the birds there during the summer and assures that a maximum number will be present in early Sept. when the season opens. (2) This could be done easily by anyone with access to a small tractor for tilling and planting operations. Soil sampling is key. Samples should be taken and sent to the state extension service's lab for analysis in October. If the soil's ph is under about 6.0 dolomitic lime should be broadcast at the rate specified and tilled into the soil to bring the ph up to around the 6.5 level. This assures maximum usage of the fertilizer, and promotes strong plant growth. Good fertilization is very important for maximum yields, which would be even more important on such a small acreage. (3) In an area not containing a good number of doves already it may take a year or two before the doves get imprinted on this small a plot and good shooting could take place. In an area with plentiful doves already, you might be able to get good shooting the first year. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, planting the same place year after year assures that it only gets better and better. (4) Downside? I think the number of 800-1000 bagged on one acre is optimistic. Very optimistic. Not impossible, in an area with lots of doves, but unlikely. Assuming they killed half the doves present, that little acre is supporting 2000 doves? That seems highly unlikely to me. That many doves would eat everything that could be grown on an acre in short order, IMO. We take 1200-1500 a year off our field (24 acres). Now, I understand that putting one man on each corner of a one acre plot ensures there is no spot on the field that is not "covered", and that it is much more efficient than us having 16-18 (at best) on 24 acres, but that is still a mighty lot of shooting for such a small place. I would love to see someone try it in an area, with little agriculture, that attracts doves, just to see.

Very interesting indeed. Thanks for posting, Patrick.

SRH

4 hunters harvesting 500 doves from this field would be roughly ten limits each (assuming a 12 bird limit) - I would think that would be considered a pretty successful season, and enough to justify the exercise. That would be 25% of the birds, using Stan's numbers, which would ensure that the birds kept coming back.

Interesting article.

I think it would be an interesting project to try Stan. The information provided is a good start. We don't have all the planting equipment, but have been kicking around the idea of purchasing a plow for some other projects my brother, sister and I have been talking about. We do have a John Deere tractor and a D4 cat and a disk. Of course we do have an old "foot burner" that I used to plow up (pulled behind the John Deere with me on the handles of the plow) about a 1/2 acre piece to plant the grapes and almond trees in, but I'm not sure I'm up to anything much more than an acre using that plow.

I think it would be "discovered" by doves and if it doesn't get too cold too early, one may be able to have a decent shoot or two before they head south. The big question is, without fencing it would it get hammered too badly by the wildlife in the area, particularly the elk! I'm not sure if they would be frightened off by scarecrows.

Well, I got them planted this morning. After subsoiling and bedding the field last week we got some more rain over the weekend, which settled the beds and charged them with good moisture for planting. Here my helper is loading the planter with two bags of seed. They are really small sunflower seed, running over 5000/lb., so a couple bags will plant nearly 30 acres.





This is how it looked out the front window of the JD 7810 carrying the 8-row JD planter. I plant everything in 38" rows, because that width works best for cotton and peanut rows. I try to keep it as simple as possible.



And out the back window as the planter puts down the seed.



Depth of seed placement is critical for all crops, sunflower included. I set the planter to put the seed 10 1/2" apart in the row, and about 1 1/4" deep, like this. The reason these are purple is that they are coated with fungicides to protect the seed from diseases that may be present that would attack the little germinating seed and seedling, and weaken it at best, or kill it at worst.



That little feller and all his 350,000 counterparts have a big job to do, now. They must germinate within the next 24 hours, and push their way through the soil above them and into the sunlight above, so that photosynthesis can begin. For a few days they are living off the energy stored within the seed itself. It's a delicate little organism that is about to be exposed to a world that is brutally harsh at times.

We'll watch as it germinates and emerges, then grows to maturity in the weeks ahead.

SRH

Great pictures Stan, thanks for posting....this whole thread is great......

Best,

This thread is great Stan. How about a pic showing the entire planting rig tractor and all?

Already cut those planters loose, for a few days, Joel. I'll get you a pic of the cotton planting rig running tomorrow.

Thanks for the comments. SRH

Any new updates on the Dove Field Chronicles Stan? Have the sunflowers started popping out of the ground yet?

Great post, very informative, and please keep up with the progress in pictures.

Thanks for the interest, fellas. Here is the latest on the dove field we planted on May 9, a Thursday. I sprayed it on Saturday, the 11th, and stopped to check on germination. Here's how the seed looked after 40 hours in moist soil. The soil temps were a little on the cool side, so it caused germination to be a tad slow, but not bad.



Note that this soil is very sandy. Moisture leaves it in a hurry in warm, windy conditions, so putting the seed at the proper depth, for the current and future conditions, is important.

Dropped by the field on the following Monday morning, the 13th, and this is how it looked. Soil was cracking up and down the rows from the seed pushing to the top. (Ever wondered how it knows which way is up? Me, too.)



Now, we see the way it looked yesterday afternoon, Saturday, 9 days after planting. We have a really good stand of plants, with timely emergence which means all will be at the same stage of growth and one will not "out-do" it's neighbor, robbing it of growth potential.



.......and, a close up of one of the little fellows with two true leaves. (The other two are really cotyledon leaves and not true leaves, and will shed off and not really contribute to growth and yield after the first few days.



With some regular rainfall and warm sunshine this field will develop rapidly, and well, and we'll watch as it grows toward maturity. Deer will be moving in now, and eating around the edges of the field. I may put up some scarecrows if they get too bad. If the deer damage is restricted to the edges it won't hurt things much, if at all, as the doves really don't like setting down too near the edges anyway.

Rains forecast for this afternoon and this evening. Hope they materialize.

All my best, Stan

Very cool. We just planted about 45 food plots on our quail lease. I now feel a little of what you farmers feel each year.

BTW, looks like some good quail wood in the background.

It is being developed for that purpose, Adam. It is already pretty good but will be great in years to come. My buddy releases 1600 on it each August. You just oughta hear them calling early in the morning around the sunflower field. It's a beautiful sound. Lots of "survivors" from last season. There's some wild birds there too.

SRH

Hello Stan,

Fantastic post!

I have been pestering my hunting buddies to do something similar at
the place we hunt and now, with your instructions I may get to convince them!
Thank you.

JC

Adam, what do you use on your quail food plots?

JC

This is a great thread, Stan, and thanks for taking the time to do it. I have never been able to make a sunflower crop here in AL due to the deer damage. They would always bite them off as soon as they came up and that was the end of them. I don't have a field as big as yours, and they can wipe out one of 2 or 3 acres.

What I do is plant strips of RR corn and browntop millet, and then "plant" wheat a few days before the season, using the state's guidelines for legal top-sowing planting methods. By bush-hogging strips of corn and millet every week, we usually are able to get a decent shoot or 2, but nothing like what you are able to do. Good luck with it!

Coosa, one of the places I am fortunate to hunt is an assemblage of a half-dozen smaller fields separated by tree lines and hedgerows totaling 18 acres overall. The area is densely populated with deer which are kept out with temporary electric fencing set up each year during growth and taken down during the dove season. It does a great job on the deer. Racoons are another matter on the corn, but the sunflowers are intact.

They (the deer) are working around the edges of our sunflowers pretty bad. Many farmers are saying the deer are eating the seedling cotton plants worse this year than ever before. I spent a day early this week putting up scarecrows (scaredeer, actually) around cotton and peanut fields. So far, my son and I have put up between forty and fifty, and need more. It is really bad, and these inept people that decide how many deer the hunters get to kill each season in GA are now talking about cutting the number of doe days by somewhere between 19 and 25. Why, because "hunters", and I use that term loosely, said they didn't see nearly as many deer last season. Makes me want to throw up my hands sometimes. I'll be calling the DNR to get depredation permits very soon, as I have to do every year.

I'll try to get by the field and get some up to date pictures soon to show the progress, and the deer damage. They should be really growing after that 6.5" of rain we got last week.

SRH

We had what most hunter fear last year, a localized die off of several hundred deer in a very concentrated area. Almost 100% total die off. Our deer population had gotten to such over populated levels that the biologist were monitoring for such an event. It appears to have burned itself out because it happen so fast that we were lucky it could not spread. Had it taken longer to spread deer movement could have spread it everywhere and the death rate would have been staggering. Disease outbreaks in stressed, highly dense population are like atomic bombs. Extreme to the max.. They think that they had a 100% death rate in area of several miles.

How many deer are too many some ask? A state biologist suggested that one deer per five to ten acres is a viable population. Of course he is not feeding them on his land with his crops. On one farm I own last year there were a total of 73 deer killed on just over 400 acres. You can not grow soybeans on that farm. The deer population does not appear to be impacted yet by hunting or die off. But the farmer who tends it hates deer destruction with a passion and would welcome a 90% reduction in population like rain in August. People who are against hunting should consider that unchecked deer numbers are destined to crash and the die off will occur as Mother Nature corrects mankind's disruption of equilibrium.

Up here in New England, it is not just a crop destruction issue (I won't bother talking about landscaping), but also an ecological issue. The deer population exploded up here due as much to reforestation in the last 50 years as a lack of predators (except possibly coyotes). Heavy forest grazing by too many deer has adversely affected other species that rely on the low vegetation for cover and food. Most suburbanites around here have little idea that their treasured forests are really ecological deserts due to deer overgrazing. Allowing deer hunting and managed timbering would make a huge difference - the self-styled suburban environmentalists around here are completely unable to comprehend that concept.

But deer overpopulation up here is also a human health issue, because the deer play a role in the transmission of Lyme's Disease. Hunting is not widely supported in this part of the world (modest understatement), but the rampant spread of Lyme's Disease up here is leading to discussion of about "culling" deer herds in the Boston suburbs as Lymes' Disease becomes more and more prevalent. When they look like Bambi, you can't hunt them for food, but when they start acting like rats, it is okay to exterminate them, I guess.

Well, I apologize for my tardiness, but here is the latest "installment" on the dove field. These pics will show a progression of the sunflowers as they grew and matured, with short explanatory captions above each.


Here is a view of the field in early June. Good stand, and receiving ample rain to progress well.



Next two views are what began to happen next. Deer damage, the worst we have ever experienced at this location. Notice how they ate the tops out of all the plants. The terminal (bud) is there, and once it is gone the plant has no chance of producing a bloom and head of seed.



Sad looking isn't it?



Here is a representative photo of the same field last summer, showing what it looked like in full bloom.



Now we fast forward to the present. What the deer left matured and are drying down. Soon the field will be all brown. I'd say the deer ate half the field, around the edges, and inward for quite aways. Fortunately for us the doves like the middle of the field better, so all is not lost.



You may notice that the heads are smaller than usual, and wonder why that is, given the tremendous amounts of rain we have had here this summer. (Some places near here have already recorded 58" in 2013. The average annual total for the whole year here is only about 46-48 inches.) What happened is too much of a good thing, the excessive rainfall leached out the fertilizers we applied, mostly the nitrogen and potasssium, causing smaller than usual heads.

Here is one average sized head, drying down, as the old bloom sheds away from each kernel.



Doves have already begun hanging around the field in
pretty good numbers, an-ti-ci-pa-a-ting as Carly Simon crooned, being able to pack their crop twice a day. Me, too!

More to come soon.

All my best, Stan

Stan, good on you for bringing this topic back onto the front burner. We've already begun turning up the strips between the corn and sunflower strips. Birds are showing up in force. Good luck on your opening day!...Geo

Stan, looks like you got a great crop of sunflowers. Our field came up gangbusters. We had temporary electric fencing so the deer damage was minimal before installation. We have a ton of birds wire sitting on the "dummy" power line which runs down the middle of the field. We expanded the field to about 30 acres from last year's 18. Looking forward to a barn burner in 27 days. Gil

That is sure some sandy soil. I thought all Georgia had was red clay. Are you using Clear Field hybrid seed? I've never seen such a clean field with no weeds. If you need a couple extra guns.....

Georgia is divided, geographically, into three sections- the mountains, the piedmont and the coastal plain. The soil types differ vastly between the three, and even within the coastal plain, where I farm. Sandy loam soil predominates the coastal plain, but even that varies from excellent to poor soil. What you see in the pictures is considered by farmers in this area to be on the poor side, droughty and unable to hold very much in the way of nutrients. That makes it less profitable for row cropping and more desirable for recreation, growing pine trees or hay fields.

I have always used ClearField seed, but may quit and save the money. Cadre, which is the herbicide that is able to be sprayed over the top of CF sunflowers, has become almost completely ineffective in controlling Palmer Amaranth pigweed, our biggest nemesis. I began this year using a new herbicide, Zidua, just recently released and labeled for sunflower. It is absolutely awesome on broadleaf weeds. Of course, for grasses I still use either Trifluralin or Prowl, preplant. OBTW, the Zidua absolutely must be sprayed pre-emergence, that means even before the sunflower crack the ground. Have been using Spartan for broadleaves, but Zidua is better, and at $14/acre it's $11/acre cheaper. Win/win.

SRH

Thanks, George. Good luck to you and Gil, too.

Gil, we will most likely use this for the field next year.

http://www.gemplers.com/product/145520/Deer-Stopper-Plotsaver-Deer-Barrier-System-Kit

I have some friends in the Statesboro area who swear by it. They say it is 100% if you refresh it with solution every two or three weeks. We've got to do something, I know that. You can buy it locally, too.

SRH

Stan, Gempler looks a heckuva lot cheaper than ole Sparky.
Looking forward with anticipation to the Glorious, but Hot, First Saturday in September.

I've had some requests for the recipe for the tomato/cheese grits, to be eaten with game killed ONLY with a doublegun of course, so here goes:

Two 32 oz. containers Swanson' chicken broth
One package bacon
One 10 oz. can Rotel
One 10 oz. can petite diced tomatoes
One 16 oz. package extra sharp shredded cheddar cheese
Grits (quick cooking grits is okay)

Cook your bacon until just barely crispy and drain on paper towels. Do not let scorch, scorched bacon is a sure sign of an amateur .

In a medium sized pot begin heating your chicken broth, tomatoes and Rotel. When it comes to a boil begin adding grits very slowly, while stirring, so as not to let them lump up. According to the consistency you like, you will need from 1 1/2 to 2 cups of grits.

Turn down heat until grits just simmer. Stir frequently while cooking, making certain to keep heat low so they don't stick to bottom. Cook until smooth, or consistency that you prefer, but at least 30 minutes. If you add too much grits and they get too thick you can always add water sparingly to get the proper consistency.

When grits are done crumble all your bacon and stir into the grits, then add all the cheese to them, stirring slowly, so as to allow it to completely melt. Thank the good Lord for his providence, and serve.

No salt needs to be added, as the chicken broth provides all necessary. This is a pretty hefty cooking and will serve about 15-20 hungry bird hunters, or more lesser men . Takes about an hour from start to finish.

SRH

Stan,
I never shot over sunflowers before, do you bushhog strips in the field to open up bare ground for the birds to feed from?
Mike

We do, Mike, but they are more for access for the hunters, and to make it easier to mark down birds, than for attracting doves. Doves really like to light on top of the sunflower heads and peck seeds out. Many will alight between the rows as well. The most important thing, IMO, in preparing a sunflower field for doves, or most any field for that matter, is having the ground clean and free of weeds. Even though doves feed on the seed of many species of weeds, they prefer clean ground to light on. They have short little legs and really are much better suited to the air than the ground.

I'll take some photos after I spray the field next week to dessicate everything, and the strips are mowed for the first shoot.

21 days and a wake-up!! I'm worse than a kid waiting on Christmas day.

SRH

Just realized some may not be familiar with Rotel. Adds just a little kick to the grits. If you want more, use two cans of Rotel and leave off the other can of petite diced tomatoes.

http://www.ro-tel.com/Diced-Tomatoes-Products/Original-Canned-Diced-Tomatoes-and-Chilies

SRH

Stan,
Thanks for the info.
Mike

Geez, and I thought Rotel was the oil you use in your diesels. It would give the grits a little extra character.

If you think Rotel over grits is good, try this:
Shrimp and Grits
4 cups coarse ground grits, prepared with half milk and half water according to package instructions.
4 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons flour
2 cups half and half
1 pound small shrimp, peeled and roughly chopped
1 tablespoon sherry
Pinch cayenne pepper
Salt and pepper to taste
Melt butter in saucepan. Whisk in flour. Cook over low heat for about 2 minutes. Add half and half slowly, whisking constantly. Cook over medium heat until mixture thickens. Add shrimp and allow to cook in sauce for not more than 10 minutes on low heat, until pink. Season to taste. Mix can be refrigerated and reheated on stove top or microwave before serving. To serve, place grits in covered casserole. Have shrimp sauce in separate covered casserole. Serve sauce over grits. From Savannah Entertains by Martha Giddens Nesbit. Great recipe and not hard to make.

OK Stan, GA dove season finally opens day after tomorrow. We've followed the preparation of your sunflower field through the Summer. How about a pic or two of the finished product ready for Saturday's opener? Feel free to allow a drove or two of doves to appear in the pics!...Geo

Wouldn't mind seeing a few double guns with doves falling amidst the sunflowers as well, Stan.

Regards, Tim

Here you go guys. This is the culmination of all the work on the field.

We had a great lunch again (we're better at that than we are at shooting!). Pulled pork, low country boil, macaroni and cheese casserole, and finished off with banana pudding and fresh-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookies.





After satiating our hunger for food we sat around for about three hours. The only game on TV was the Clemson/SC State game. I wasn't really interested in it, so I contented myself, as many did, by relaxing and catching up on a year's stories, since many of us hadn't been together in that long. Lots of youngsters (of all ages) .





As I said, we went to the field about 4 p.m. and the shooting started immediately. As is my tradition now, I opened the season with my little Yildiz .410 S x S. It has done me proud for the previous two years' opening days, and I felt inclined to wring it out again. Grandson Jackson (11) was using a Rem. 1100 LT 20, other grandson Lane was shagging birds again. The little rascal loves his job!! And he's so good at it he has gained the attention of several of the men, one of whom is so jealous he offered to buy my "retriever". Said he was the best retriever he had ever seen in his life. He ain't for sale, I've grown kinda partial to him, myself. You can see that, even though Jackson, who is in the background behind Lane, has shot with me for three years since age 8, I still keep him close by and under my direct supervision.



We called it a day about 6 p.m., so as to allow the birds to feed before too late. Jackson wanted to stick with it until he got his first limit (he killed 14 one day last year at age 10), but was mature enough to understand it was time to pee on the fire and call the dogs. He ended the day with 11, still not bad for his age. I got my limit early with the Yildiz, and sat there with them for the rest of the shoot hoping for a ringnecked dove or two to come by, and helping Jackson watch for doves. Here's my pride and joy together with Jackson's bag, and then a pic of the Yildiz and it's booty.





That's it for now I guess. Oh yeah. One more thing. The Yildiz did get a bonus as we were leaving for home. I wouldn't use a 3" load on him, figuring that 1/2 oz. of #8s should be just about right at 10 feet. It was.



I'll probably post a few more pics as we shoot the field some more, but it's been fun. Thanks to those of you who have followed it all the way, these last 5 months, and have sent questions and encouragements. Thanks to my Creator, most of all, for giving me a start to another dove season. Only He, and I, know how much I really appreciate it.

SRH

Thanks for a wonderful thread Stan. That mac-n-cheese with the pulled pork looks excellent. Care to tell the ingredients of the bottle marked "Swamp Juice".

Great story Stan - start to finish. Land of pleasant living down there, for sure.

Fine looking young men you have there, Stan! Glad the opener was a success for all of you. Have much enjoyed the installments and progression. Looks like you drew near perfect weather as well, so perhaps that helps make up for the extra week's worth of wait;-)

Kind regards, tw

Stan great story and pictures. Thank you for going to all that trouble.

I like your dove day tradition. Very neat.

Is that snake a copperhead? (Edit: Never mind, I finally noticed the rattlers.)

Best,

Mike

Stan, y'all did it up right, as usual. Glad that canebrake rattler didn't give someone a bad day. Looks like it freshly shed. A buddy killed two in SC this week in his dove field during a shoot. They came out about 5 pm to feed on rats in the cornfield. We had a very good shoot as well yesterday. I was out of the field about 4 pm having sat out until 230. My Ithaca M37 16 shot two limits. A man's Remington Auto wouldn't shoot. I handed him my gun and two hours later he came back with a limit. Temps were civilized compared with last year's opener. Gil

Yeah, temperatures were nice yesterday. We have seen some hot ones on opening day, eh?

That's a timber rattler, Mike. Colors and markings were exceptionally bright, like he recently shed his skin, as Gil said. Also, it warn't no trouble. It's been fun.

I've got 10 fields of sesame this year, benne, to some. I got a contract to grow it this year, something new. Having grown it a little in the past strictly for doves, I jumped on the chance to grow some for harvest. Several reasons. Deer and hogs absolutely will not eat it, it is a great rotation crop for peanuts, which I grow, cheap to grow and, last but not least, dove and quail absolutely love it. Sesame to a dove is like crack to a junkie. Once they find it you can't run them off. I may continue this thread with a switch to sesame. I hope to have some good shooting over the fields after I harvest them, in the late season.

SRH

10 fields of sesame? If you could play it right, you could hunt doves every other day during the season. A buddy has it in his field this year. What size fields are they, Stan? Gil

Stan, thanks for the story and pictures. Congratulations on the grandsons - 2 good looking little fellows.

Very nice Stan! I can't wait for the season to open here!

Adam

They range in size from 24 acres down to as small as 4 acres. A couple have powerlines running across them . Sounds like woodcock in the morning and doves in the afternoon, eh?

What do you mean by "every OTHER day" ?

SRH

Stan,
Looks like another fine year around "Hillis Store" Jawja. Ross and I had some good shooting last weekend and yesterday, and speak often of our trip over there. Life is good.
JR

Glad ya'll got some good shooting, John. Just say the word when you want to come again. Sesame fed dove breast is some fine eatin'. We'll cook up a big mess while you're heah.

SRH

Thanks to Stan for a most interesting thread; it has pictured one of the things we love most about the South! The benne fields are a throw-back to my childhood when farmers planted the stuff just for doves. Man alive, I had some good November/December shoots on Benne fields. Makes good peanut/benne brittle candy too!...Geo

I used to be a designated gun on a low country plantation. We were provided shells for the hunts and we gave the game to the plantation. The owner and most of her friends were relatively old and couldn't hit the inside of a barn if they stood in the middle of it. In addition to large sunflower/corn fields, the 21,000 acres had scattered 10 acre fields of benne. My buddy and I shared a field with Adlai Stevenson III. My impression of him wasn't favorable as he wouldn't call birds and he wasn't very friendly. Gil