# Favorite Crop for Doves (other than sunflowers)



## ducfanatic

Okay, guys. I wanna know your favorite crop for doves other than sunflowers because I think they are #1 in my book. This is my list in this order

1) Wheat
2) Peanuts
3) Dove Proso Millet
4) Browntop Millet
5) Corn
6) Grain Sorghum 

What's yours?


----------



## JohnnyD

-Buckwheat:  I've had several excellent hunts over just buckwheat.  It matures quickly and can grow on a rock.

-Browntop millet: Similar to buckwheat in that it matures quickly and can grow in poor soil.  Drops a lot of seed.

-Johnson Grass:  No one ever mentions it, but up here the stuff grows naturally and takes over many fields in the summer.  One of the best hunts I ever had was over a large mowed and tilled field that had been full of almost nothing but Johnson Grass.  Didn't pay a dime for seed.  I wouldn't plant it, but if it comes up naturally it's a great option.

-White Proso Millet: Similar to browntop.  Matures quickly and produces a lot of seed.  The main difference being the seed does not mature uniformly. It will drop seed throughout the fall at different times.  Good for dove, better for quail and turkey.

-Corn: Harvest leaves a lot of seed on the ground.  Lots of seed usually means lots of birds.


----------



## Lukikus2

Corn by far the best (rows bush hogged for hogs)
Sorgham second
Browntop Millet third


----------



## Dead Eye Eddy

One of the best non-sunflower, non-corn shoots I ever had was over a grown up field that my buddy Ed bushhogged the week before the season that year.  He was going to plant wheat, but found out that it was too early to legally plant wheat and hunt over it, so he waited.  I drove by the field on Labor Day afternoon after wasting the entire morning at Wilson Shoals.  The lines were full of doves.  I called Ed, and we shot until dark.  If we could shoot better, we'd both have limitted.  We went back several more times that week and got shooting everytime until the landowner asked us to only shoot evenings because he worked nights and we were ruining his sleep.  I couldn't shoot evenings, so that screwed that up.


----------



## Sam H

#1. Sunflower
#2.Grain sorghum
#3.Brown top millet

Nice variety and the quail /turkey also love it...raccons like the corn to much and also raid nest


----------



## maker4life

Corn or peanuts


----------



## countryplayboy

Chicken Scratch and Salty Peanut Splits!


----------



## BRIAN1

I have hunted millet, corn ,and peanuts with about the same sucess on all of them. It really depends on timing. The fresher the field the better. I have seen birds tearing up a corn field and then dissappear in a couple of days with corn still on the ground. The best shoot I have had was on millet though.


----------



## easbell

benne/sesame


----------



## Nimrod71

Peanuts.  Back in the old days that is all we ever shot on.  Now by the time peanuts are combined the season is closed except for Thanksgiving weekend.  Those were great days, afternoon shoots only.  I ask a gamewarden one day why we only shot in the afternoon and he told me back in the beginning hunters shot all day long and they nearly killed off all the doves.  Now we are shooting doves all day and we don't have enough to make a good hunt here any longer.  To Me peanuts are the best.


----------



## alantaylor

*Watermelon*

Best shoots I have ever had were over mowed watermelon fields.


----------



## wareagl487

alantaylor said:


> Best shoots I have ever had were over mowed watermelon fields.



Had someone else mention that to me also.  

Brown top millet was the best I can remember.


----------



## Souhternhunter17

Ive had the best shoots of my life over millet but this is my list: 
1. Sunflowers- ( but can be a pain to grow)
2. Peanuts
3.Corn
4. Browntop millet


----------



## Foster

Rotted or mowed Cantaloupes are some of the best I have seen.  

The truth is good smooth clean dirt, plenty of seed, and GOOD TIMING is more important than the type of seed.


----------



## Eugene Stinson

Souhternhunter17 said:


> Ive had the best shoots of my life over millet but this is my list:
> 1. Sunflowers- ( but can be a pain to grow)
> 2. Peanuts
> 3.Corn
> 4. Browntop millet



ditto


----------



## strick 9

Watermelon.  The smell was awful, but best shoot I ever had over 20 years.


----------



## steve f

I think location is more important than a particular crop.  I've shot a couple of places that planted different crops every year, including soy beans, corn and millet, and they always had dove regardless of what was there.  I've shot other places that just didn't attract many birds in spite of having sunflower seed and corn scattered over many acres (grown and bush hogged, not baited).  I've seen a lot of dove on watermelon fields and peanut fields, and I've seen them flock into fields where the grass has been cut to feed on grass seed.


----------



## GABASSMAN

By far hunting a harrowed melon field was insane.  im talking we saw over 2000 birds that afternoon.

2nd- corn/sunflower mix
3rd- freshly mowed field with a few plowed strips


----------



## Beagler

Anyone ever hunt over a field of pumpkins, after reading about good hunting over melons, it seems like a pumpkin field would be good.


----------



## Hardwoods

GABASSMAN said:


> By far hunting a harrowed melon field was insane.  im talking we saw over 2000 birds that afternoon.
> 
> 2nd- corn/sunflower mix
> 3rd- freshly mowed field with a few plowed strips



With cracked corn and sunflower seeds thrown out.


----------



## brmurray

sunflowers, dove proso, brown top, and sogrum.  9 years and running......

We also have erected a powerline and installed a few decoys to help them feel more at home!


----------

