Cheap dove field

[rawalley]

I have 15 acres I would like to plant for dove season but I have never attempted this before. What would be the cheapest method to do this and about how much would that run me? Thanks in advance.

[RiverDuck]

Disk it up and throw some wheat out...about $750

[JaMak84]

Plant brown top. Cut it, bale it, burn the stubble and hunt. Sale the hay and get some of your money back.

[TODO]

Disk and spread wheat by far the easiest. Only trick is once it gets a rain its gonna sprout.

[redspeckable]

Plant Milo/Sorghum. Broadcast at 20-25lbs/acre. About 3 weeks before season start bushogging and discing strips throughout the field every 5-7 days. Total cost: 8 bags of milo @ about $20/bag and diesel fuel for tractor.

[rawalley]

Thanks for the help guys...

[MSRetrievers]

has anyone tried putting out bird seed?

[TODO]

has anyone tried putting out bird seed?

Like spreading bird seed to hunt over? Thats baiting buck!

[MSRetrievers]

Even if you disk it under same as wheat isn't it?
Does bird seed grow and put off more seeds?
What if you plant it?

[RiverDuck]

Even if you disk it under same as wheat isn't it?
Does bird seed grow and put off more seeds?
What if you plant it?

It has to be a normal agricultural practice. Planting bird seed is not normal...

[Smoke68]

Even if you disk it under same as wheat isn't it?
Does bird seed grow and put off more seeds?
What if you plant it?

It has to be a normal agricultural practice. Planting bird seed is not normal...

Neither is burning a field full of sunflowers you just spent tons of $$$$ to plant, but that's another discussion huh? The regs on what is legal and illegal on doves is pretty humorous IMO

[Wingman]

The regs on ducks and doves used to be the same...couldn't manipulate any crop or natural vegetation for either.

After reading one of Terry Grosz's books I found out why the dove rules changed. A California wildlife commissioner and his high falutin' buddies got smoked one year for spreading safflower seed on a safflower field (according to Grosz it was seed several inches thick in places and seed that was stored in a shed and spread across the field later) and bush hogging a bunch of the standing crop down. Not long after that, the Federal regs were changed to allow manipulation of standing crops for hunting doves, but not the addition of additional grain once removed from the field.

So it has nothing to do with "normal ag practice" when it comes to manipulating standing crops pertaining to dove hunting. It is not a normal practice to bushhog a crop down..but it is legal.

If you are spreading wheat or other seeds on top of the ground, it must be done as a planting practice, not a dove hunting practice. Therefore, you have to follow the prescribed ag practices as recommended by, in our case, the Mississippi Cooperative Extension Service. This includes planting dates, rates and methods.

[BR549]

Plant Milo/Sorghum. Broadcast at 20-25lbs/acre. About 3 weeks before season start bushogging and discing strips throughout the field every 5-7 days. Total cost: 8 bags of milo @ about $20/bag and diesel fuel for tractor.

plus the 60 dollar or so fertilizer cost per acre to raise it! Cheapest way out is to have a clean field and scatter wheat about 3 weeks ahead of season and hope it don't rain on it. You only suppose to put it out once legaly but as everyone well know most do more than that. Most any other type of grown crop the cost of fertilizer is goning to drive the cost up till it's pretty expensive. Milo and or millett both need about 60 units of Nitrogen to produce. At 300 bucks a ton for fertilizer that can get expensive in a hurry!

[TODO]

Bird seed is not a crop. You dont plant bird seed. That makes it illegal. Same as spreading milo, rice or corn in August. Not a normal ag practice. August is within prescribed planting time for wheat, thus its legal if spread evenly on prepared ground at recomended planting rate.

[Double R 2]

clean-disked and combine-run wheat, up to 2 bushels per acre. I like Jamac's suggestion, too, if you can pull it off.