by Daryl Gay

Preparation for a Labor Day dove shoot begins several months and quite a few dollars in advance.

That’s roughly what I was thinking a couple of days past as the rain blew sideways in sheets across a manicured field of sunflowers and corn. There’s plenty of time to think and reason as you count the minutes and hope for a break in the weather.

There’s never a good time for a hurricane to hit, but I really can’t think of a worse one than opening weekend of dove season. For some, it was a good morning to sleep in; but things don’t work that way around my household.

Fortunately, I can remember as a boy the unmatched excitement of opening day. Fortunate, that is, for the sons huddled against the rain on either side of me Monday morning just after first light.

They felt lucky to be there, for I had told them the night before that if it dawned raining, we probably wouldn’t make the trip to the field. Directly overhead inside the trees bordering the field was a condominium of a deer stand, perched on huge poles and boxed in on all sides.

Probably six by 10 feet, it provided welcome shelter — except for when the rain came sideways. And as I sat watching the fellas watching the field, I mused about the hunt and the weather.

Maybe we WERE crazy to be here. I’ve been accused of it before. But Labor Day dove shoots come but once a year, or in the case of 2003, not at all. And the weather? Well, I look at it this way: no birds will be bagged by diving back under the covers!

And they’re gonna fly, make no mistake. Sooner or later, the breakfast bell will go off and they’re going to come searching for a few seeds of sunflower or corn. And I’m going to be waiting for them when they do. On the other hand, this is a new field. As far as I know, it has never been planted for birds, and doves are nothing if not creatures of habit. But there is always hope...

The unique, whistling whirr of an overhead dove shakes me out of the reverie and I look up to notice the rain has dropped from downpour to drizzle. Now — within seconds — is the time to hit the field again. Even as we dash for our stands, birds whirl in from three different directions. They circle the field, then come back in lower to light.

Fatal mistake.

For 10 minutes birds buzz in and sometimes back out, but those that leave are lighting in the nearby trees, assuring me that they want to come into the field, and are not jilting us for someplace else. And so the morning goes; we tough out the periods of rain in order to enjoy the periods of all-out bird assaults on the field.

The instant the rain drops to a mist, in they come. Between bands of the hurricane’s fury, we shoot and get soaked, rainsuit notwithstanding. It is simply a fact of life that if you trek around in this type of weather, you’ll get wet and muddy, not necessarily in that order.

But within the day’s events I am reminded of those Other Homegrown Safari Tactics that developed over the years along with Rabbit Stompin’.

You’ll find that game from birds to bears don’t have a whole lot of choice about what goes on in their surroundings when it comes to the weather. They simply adapt to survive and thrive. If the hunter is to be successful, he must do likewise...