A "flappa." One of those decoys with motion wings. You may have seen them for ducks. They make them for doves too.
This is the whistle I referenced above: Academy - Duck Commander Pintail/Widgeon Call To make the dove sound just place your palm flat against the end of the whistle and blow. It will take a little practice to get the right rythm/notes but it makes a great dove call.
Kyle, this has to be a historic first for CS.... You quoted a post of his in which he referred to both "hole" and "bush" without a double meaning. I think someone must have stolen his password. Is CS alright; have aliens kidnapped him?
Ok, here's the update on all of this. We started calling the doves down and popping them with his little pump action bb/pellet gun. Feathers everywhere, bird flies off. We got tired of that and I got my son a Gammo Recon Whisper with a silencer. My son, Landry, and I have been hammering the sh*t out of doves ever since. He lost his dove whistle and then I found it after I ran over it with the lawn mower. So we don't call them down anymore, but they come to eat the bait and to check out the decoys. As far as the hole goes, we never found out for sure. I think it's abandoned. On the trail cam we caught coons, possums, armadillos, squirrels, etc. I haven't been able to capture the foxes on the trail camera, although I see them all the time when I go running. We do have wild roosters/hens that live behind our house. There are feral cats out in the neighborhood that end up with deep gashes in their backs and are always in bad shape. Something keeps getting ahold of them, and I swear it's the big colorful rooster with the spurs lives back there. Just last week, I saw a giant hawk try to swoop down and catch the rooster and the rooster went apeshit. He ran into the thickets and the hawk came up empty handed. We also have ospreys that live behind me (I live a block away from the Gulf of Mexico) and they always have a fish in their talons, but they leave the rooster alone. The hens out back now have a brood of little baby chicks. I don't think they'll make it. Between the snakes, foxes, feral cats and predatory birds, them sumbitches don't have a chance. Where did the roosters/chickens come from you ask? Well, I don't live in the country...I live on the coast and someone last year let a few roosters loose downtown....I guess to make it like Key West. A few of them got famous and hung out at the dives and bars and interacted with the customers and the others went straight for the swampy wetland woods adjacent to downtown. Those chickens/roosters thrived. The "pet" roosters of downtown ended up scratching some kid and after much controversy and publicity, the city took them away. I put out "rutn' apples" which is like a food pellet made of apples meant to attract bucks. The doves love it. We sprinkle it out back and sit behind his little blind and just start lighting them doves up. There is nothing that my boy loves more than doing this with me. At 6 years old, he has learned how to handle a gun (the Gammo is pretty heavy), gun safety, he can aim, etc. There is no doubt in my mind that by deer season this year, he'll be ready to hammer his first deer. We'll hunt over a food plot up in a shooting house and he'll smoke a doe or something. I'll be very proud of him if/when he accomplishes this.
Damn man, you are living the life! I've got a Gammo also. That thing is badass. Do y'all eat any of the doves? Be pretty cool if your son is learning to clean them and such. I'm pretty jealous of where you live. Sounds like paradise, even if it's a tent!
Yes, I clean them, but I have to admit, I don't know the "proper" way. I just poke around until I have a dove breast in my hand. We'll usually soak the breasts in a zip lock bag of salt water overnight (I think someone on this board suggested that) and then we'll wrap them in bacon and grill them. He doesn't like the jalapeno and cream cheese and I don't care either way so we just eat them grilled and wrapped in bacon. My girlfriend is completely appalled that we do this, but I always tell her that when the apocalypse jumps off that she'll be glad that we have the skills necessary to keep them alive. lol
I plan on getting one of these sometime within the next week or two (the next time I make it out to Dick's sporting goods). They are $25 bucks there....I imagine that I could probably find them online cheaper, eh?
