Throckmorton, Texas

This evening I find myself surrounded by friends and family, enjoying what I consider one of my favorite traditions. It is Labor Day weekend and that means it is opening day for dove season in Texas. I write this after already limiting out this morning, so now I am simply enjoying the camaraderie and just being outside. Throckmorton provides some of the most spectacular sunsets I have ever seen in Texas. The terrain is rocky and full of cacti and mesquite trees. This is in large contrast with the sky, which looks like an explosion of purple and pink. I find myself lost in the whipping clouds above, wondering how something so simple could be so beautiful. The birds stopped flying for the evening and left me to sit here in peace to pick apart the landscape. At about a two-hundred-yard distance I can make out a couple of young deer, but they are extremely hard to spot at this time in the evening. Their subtle brown coat makes for the perfect camouflage in this West Texas landscape. I watch them as they graze around a feeder, far away but still conscious of our every move. One of my family members shifted and the deer glanced right in our direction. Then in the blink of an eye the two deer were gone and all I was left to see is a couple white tails bobbing up and down through the brush, warning out position to other nearby deer and animals. I listen closely as I hear a dove let out their lonesome "nest call." About ten seconds later I hear from another distant tree the same "coo-OO-oo." Then I suddenly hear the furious flaps of wings behind me as a dove quickly gets up out of the thorny West Texas brush and into the sky. I watch it fly away, just making out some white stripes on the hind of its wings, indicating it is a white-wing. Slowly but surely, the sun creeps down below the rolling hills filled with dove, deer, hogs, and turkey. The evening hunt is over, but we will no doubt remember the beautiful scenery of Throckmorton as we make our way back to DFW tomorrow.