The beginning of September is an exciting time for some hunting as dove and teal season opens up in Iowa. 

Department of Natural Resources Conservation Officer Jeremy King says that the season is now open for those wanting to hunt doves or teal. King says people should be aware that the teal shooting time is different from any other waterfowl duck seasons. He states the shooting hours are from sunrise to sunset. 

“The reason we made it so that sunrise is so that it’s easier to identify those ducks and you can see the wing patches and bodies, silhouettes a little bit better. We’re in those low light conditions a half hour before sunrise. It gets really hard, especially for a novice duck hunter, to identify a blue peel on the wing when flying by. And obviously our goal is to make sure that nobody accidentally harvests the wrong species of duck out there doing this.”

Kings tells Raccoon Valley Radio that Guthrie County has a ton of sunflower plots which are good places to hunt for doves which are located at Bays Branch, Beaver Lake and near Dunbar Slough. 

“All those are managed by the DNR and they go in and plant sunflowers and then mow them down and the doves really get to those where they can get to those seeds. They really get to those fields also. And a lot of people enjoy a lot of good hunting out there for them.” 

The teal only season runs from today to September  16th with a daily limit of 6 birds harvested and the dove season runs from today  through November 29th and the limit is 15 birds.