Texas dove hunting is different from anywhere I've been on dove hunts. Some of those places include Central California, Western New York, and the incredible Entre Rios province of Argentina. I made my first dove hunt in Texas in early October just south of Breckenridge, Texas. I'll explain the Texas difference in a little bit. The original plan was to hunt near Albany, Texas but plans changed the morning of our hunt.
This whole deal was a last-minute kind of thing. My friend Jeff called me on a Friday and said he had a guy who he knew who asked him to go dove hunting with him. Jeff asked if he could bring a friend who was a hunting nut and his other friend said that would be fine. He said to meet him at the DK gas station in Albany on Sunday morning at 615 a.m. As Albany is about 3 hours and 15 minutes from my house, I agreed to make hotel reservations in Albany for me and Jeff so we could go on Sunday evening and have a less stressful time Monday morning. Otherwise, we'd have to leave at 245 a.m. Sunday night. No bueno. So, I went online to book the hotel. Let me say this—Albany is a rural town a good way from anywhere and there were two options: one was the RV Park and Inn and the other was the Hereford Hotel. Online reviews recommended the Hereford, said it was clean, and was right next door to the Goodnight Steakhouse which online reviewers raved about. No brainer. Two rooms were booked. 700 p.m. arrival estimated and, come Sunday afternoon at 345 p.m. Jeff picked me up, we loaded up my gear, and off we went.
We arrived at the Hereford Hotel at 7 p.m. and went to the office which was closed. Checked my email and discovered that the hotel had sent a code with which to unlock the electronic lock on the door to my room. Jeff got a separate code for his room. To be frank, the Hereford Hotel rooms are pretty old but very clean. The hotel is built not like a hotel, not like a motel but rather it looks essentially like an old-time bunkhouse but each room has its own bathroom. Very basic and no chance my wife would ever stay there but fine for our overnight sleeping purposes. We dumped our gear into our rooms and proceeded to the Goodnight Steakhouse next door where I had made a reservation.
The Goodnight Steakhouse is named in honor of Charles Goodnight, famed rancher for whom the Goodnight-Loving Trail is named. The Steakhouse has several dining areas and a nice bar. The overall place is very rustic and rural Texas at its finest. The hostess was a demure young blonde girl who greeted us and asked if we'd like a particular table as several were open. I asked for a specific booth but was informed that Jerry B. had reserved it and he was a regular. So, we took the table just across from the booth. There, our exceptional experience began. On the way to our table, I learned that our hostess was just 16 years old and a sophomore (10th grade) in the local high school. Mature and poised, it was a pleasure to meet the future.
Within a couple of minutes of being seated, a beautiful young lady named Abby met us and took our cocktail order. She had a beautiful smile and very engaging personality. When she brought our drinks, I asked her if she lived locally and she said yes. I asked her if she was an Albany native and she said she had come from Alabama to live with her dad and to take up barrel racing. The big rodeo belt buckle she wore proudly proclaimed her as a champion barrel racer. Of course, this led to further conversation including my asking if what I'd heard about barrel racing girls was true. She said no, that there was a lot of exaggeration about how crazy barrel racers were and, in fact, to be good, you have to work very hard at the sport. She told us that she worked at the Steakhouse but her real job was training horses for barrel racing and that she generally had three horses in active training status year around. A very charming and interesting young lady!
About the time we were finishing our conversation with Abby, Jerry B. and his wife showed up and took the booth I'd originally wanted. As I'd been told that Jerry B. had the booth reserved, I spoke across the aisle between the booth and our table and said, "You must be Jerry B." He was surprised that I knew his name but was very pleasant. I got up and shook his hand and was introduced to his wife. They were just the nicest people. They asked what we were doing in Albany and where we were from. I told them we were there for a dove hunt the next morning and that we were from Dallas. He didn't ask what outfit we were hunting with but took out a pen and had a piece of paper on which he wrote a guy's name and phone number and said if you want the best in the business of anything hunting in that area to call him and tell him Jerry B. sent you. A little bit more small talk and we each went back about our business.
At that point, Abby brought us a tower of onion rings and various sauces as an appetizer. Jeff and I each ordered steaks and potatoes and while munching on onion rings and enjoying our cocktails, did a little planning for how the morning should go, what time we needed to go to the DK gas station to get essential coffee and so on.
Abby brought our steaks, along with Goodnight's cowboy butter which she highly recommended. I had ordered an 8-ounce filet cooked medium, along with mashed potatoes. Jeff ordered a NY strip and potatoes. I can tell you that my filet was the single best piece of beef I'd had in ten years. It was perfect, tender, juicy, and loaded with flavor, all of these things were enhanced by the delicious cowboy butter. We ordered an additional cocktail each and really enjoyed our dinners.
While we were eating, a family came in and took the big booth next to Jerry B. and his wife. Husband, wife, wife's young lady friend and two children, a boy of 5, and a little girl who turned out to be 10 but was very small. The girl was dressed in a pink sparkly outfit, cowboy hat and pink boots. I could tell this was a very unusual special child. The dad took her to the restrooms and coming back, the little girl ran ahead of him, and as she passed by me, waved. I stood up and spoke to the dad, telling him how lucky he was to have such a nice family and hoped he appreciated how blessed he was. He acknowledged all of that and, as a good old Texas boy, he thanked me for my kindness and it was all yessir, no sir just as such interactions in Texas should be. He asked me if I'd like to meet his family and of course, I said yes. Each one of them was just lovely and likable. Turns out the little girl was a record setter. She was the smallest premature baby born at a Dallas Baylor hospital. Less than a pound and birth and spend nearly nine months in the neonatal intensive care unit but obviously survived. She has a number of challenges but just was precious. She apparently liked me as she asked me to pick her up. I will keep the family and children's names confidential because I didn't ask them if I could tell about them in a public way. Jeff took a picture of us as a group and I've included that below.
The family shortly got packed up and left. Jeff and I had a very early wake up and departure time and both of us needed to get to bed so I paid up, thanked Abby for her excellent service and we walked back to the bunkhouse. I had already texted my wife who said she was going to bed early and not to call after 930 p.m. It was already 10 p.m. so I got situated in my room, brushed my teeth and read for a while before falling asleep.
I was shocked out of sleep at 225 a.m. by my phone going off at a very loud volume. I fumbled around for the nightstand light, got it on, and answered the call. I cannot go into the exact details of what was going on but the long story short is that the call was from a brother who is a physician and he was calling me about our mutual friend who was out of the country with a life threatening condition, he had a detailed report of scans, blood tests, medical findings, and so forth but they were in a language he was unfamiliar with as they originated in a hospital far, far away. I had him send me the files and used ChatGPT to both translate to English and offer medical analysis of the findings and tests in the report. Not sure why my buddy couldn't do this but by 330 a.m. I had the job done, the translated files returned, and awaited his call back to discuss what, if anything, we needed to do. Again, the multi-day situation that followed turned out ok but our mutual friend cannot fly for a couple of weeks which none of us like as the treatment that he might need is likely not available until he can return to the US. That said, I spent the rest of that initial middle of the night crisis wide awake but in a state of stupefaction that comes with sleep interruption. Finally, 600 a.m. rolled around, I knocked on Jeff's door and said let's go a few minutes early to get coffee. We loaded all of our gear into his SUV as we would not be returning to the bunkhouse and then proceeded to the DK gas station for emergency caffeine. DK was about 3 minutes away (Albany is a very small town) and thankfully, they were already open and fresh hot coffee was had.
At 630 a.m. we met our guide and awaited our third guy's arrival. He showed a minute or so later and, although we thought we were hunting in the immediate Albany area, our guide said we had a change of plans and would be heading to the Breckenridge area as that would be a better venue. Breckenridge has a population of over 5,000 people so has correspondingly more amenities, including hotels, although it's a pretty basic rural Texas town. While Breckenridge is a bit of backtracking toward Dallas, and we could have stayed in perhaps nicer facilities, the fact is that if we had, we'd have missed the interactions at the Goodnight Steakhouse which, quite frankly, were priceless. The funny thing is, it would be very unlikely if we went back, that the experience we'd had would be duplicated. It might be nice but I think we were gifted our special evening by Providence.
About 30-40 minutes later, we arrived at our hunting venue which consisted of several hundred acres of harvested sunflower fields down the middle of which were utility towers carrying multiple power lines from somewhere to somewhere. This is where I learned that Texas dove hunting, at least as told to us by our guide, was completely different from anything I'd experienced previously. I'm used to doves being very skittish, having great vision, and if they see you or you move from some kind of concealment, they're gone. Not so said our guide. You just stand under the power lines in the middle of a field with zero concealment and they'll come to you. They like to sit on the wires so they'll fly right to you. They don't care if they can see you. I have to say that even in Argentina where the roosting doves can number in the tens of thousands and present constant high-volume shooting opportunities, when they see you, they dart and swoop away as quickly as possible. In California, dove hunting in vineyards and adjacent to fruit orchards, the doves are super skittish and you have just split seconds when they fly to shoot. Same thing in Western New York.
We split up and walked under the power lines to the ends and middle of our fields. We waited as the sun rose. And waited. I saw a single dove flying at least 200 yards away from me. About 30 minutes after the sun came up, I heard three rapid shots. That was our hunting buddy who was at least 500 plus yards away from me toward the far end of our venue. I was frankly bored and as it was near 8:00 a.m. I decided to walk the perimeter of our hunting area as it was tree line and I thought that if any doves were roosting in the trees, it might lead to something. By 8:30, I flushed one dove from the field in front of me, took the shot and watched exactly where my bird fell. I went to pick it up and, despite having a clear line of sight to my bird, could not find it in the thick brush that the harvested sunflower stalks presented. I kept up my walk, saw my partners and the guide hundreds of yards away when probably five or six shots rang out. As everyone was in the power line corridor, I thought perhaps there was something to what our guide had said and I headed that way. It proved to be a futile walk. When I got back to the power line area, there was exactly zero action. So, I decided to sit for a while. I found myself to be very tired despite the fact that the hunting experience is usually energizing and exciting. Moments of chaos interrupted by extended periods of calm—usually. I was just having extended periods of calm.
For the next two hours, we all patiently waited. During that time, we did in fact have a few flights of doves, usually, four or five at a time but certainly not anything resembling a flock leaving the roost to feed and water. By 10:00 a.m. we agreed we were done. Our total bird count for four people was 13 doves retrieved. By consensus, we agreed we'd shot four more but could not find them in the thick brush. So, 17 doves harvested by four hunters, which included our guide. I had four, three of which were retrieved. We cleaned and packed up the dove breasts and I gave mine to the guy who had invited Jeff and I to this hunt. We loaded up, shook hands all around and Jeff and I headed back to Dallas and home. Got to my house around 2:00 p.m. utterly pooped out. Jeff headed to his house.
What is my assessment of this event? I can tell a quick story that summarizes what the Albany and Breckenridge experiences were all about. Years ago, when I was an excellent golfer, I was a member of Stonebriar Country Club in Frisco, Texas. I invited a very good friend of mine, Ed Rodgers (late of Houston and now in Heaven) to play a round of golf and then have lunch at the club. Ed was probably 10 or 15 years older than me at the time and retired. I was anything but retired. We got underway. Ed was, at best, a very mediocre golfer. However, he always had the best and newest golf technology as he was convinced he just had to find the right equipment and his game would take off. I recall he had, at the time, the newest oversized titanium clubs with high-tech graphite shafts. These were sure to be the solution! As it turned out, Ed sucked and I was on fire, birdieing two of the first three holes. At the fourth tee, Ed said he was going to just stay in the cart and watch me as I was on a tear and he'd just enjoy seeing someone play the game as it could be. I said, "C'mon, Ed. You can't just sit in the cart and watch." To which he replied, "Jon, it's not the golf that matters. It's the fellowship." While I pondered that wisdom, I proceeded to shoot one of the best rounds ever, coming in after playing the Club Course (very difficult championship venue) with a score of 68, four under par. We had lunch and I recounted every shot on every hole, even though Ed had watched it all happen.
His lesson on the value of "the fellowship" took me a few years to truly appreciated but, at the end of the day, it's not the hunting and shooting but the fellowship. And that extends to the random acquaintances you make along the way that wouldn't have happened without the hunting agenda to drive you to new locations, new experiences, new people. So, despite (or because of) the strange series of events associated with my first Texas dove hunt, in summary it was fantastic, no sleep notwithstanding.
I can't wait for the next adventure in hunting to see what unexpected twists and turns it will gift me with. Stay tuned.