Dove Hunt for Disabled Is Part of a Fulfilling Day

When dove-hunting season opened last weekend in Maryland, fields were awash in a downpour of rain and tree limbs flailed in the wild winds of Tropical Storm Ernesto, which came on far stronger than anyone expected. Doves don't fly in conditions like that, so Cody Kittleman phoned his troops about 9 a.m. to announce a postponement.

For the first time in years, the big sunflower field next to his farmhouse in Howard County did not ring with shots at noon on Sept. 1 to herald the start of another gunning season.

It was a disappointment for those who regard opening day at Kittleman's as a rite of passage, signaling the onset of another glorious autumn. But it was only a short delay, and by late the next afternoon we'd all fully recovered.

That Saturday, birds flocked to the soggy field and everyone who could shoot a lick quickly had his 12-bird limit. Then, four days later, Kittleman and a handful of his regular guests gave a little something back to the sport by hosting another fine hunt, this time for the benefit of folks who don't get to go as often as they'd like.

"From now on, I'm going to make this a regular event," Kittleman said at the end of an unusual and highly successful inaugural shoot. "The first Wednesday after opening day, we're putting on a dove hunt for the disabled. There's no reason why we couldn't get 10 or 12 people out here in wheelchairs."

Indeed, it was a memorable day. "Even the weather is cooperating," said Bobby Jones of Annapolis, a West Point graduate who's spent the last 29 years getting around by wheelchair after a motorcycle accident took the use of his legs. "Cool, cloudy, it couldn't be better."

Jones, an engineer by trade, was decked out in camouflage garb and perched on a little rise in the middle of the expansive field of sunflowers, his chair tucked back in waist-high cover as he monitored the comings and goings of fast-flying birds overhead. Doves by the hundreds had fled the field as Kittleman chauffeured his three guests out to their stations at noon on a trailer behind the farm tractor.

Fifty yards to Jones's left, Paul McDowell of Bowie guarded one end of the field from his wheelchair, while a similar distance to the right Bob Tharpe of Laurel was settling in his. All three were injured as youngsters in traffic accidents. All three love to hunt. McDowell and Jones focus mostly on waterfowl, while Tharpe is a keen deer hunter.

Dove hunting is never easy for anyone. Throw in the additional disadvantages of shooting from a wheelchair and it can be downright daunting.

On the other hand, few places have the concentration of birds that Kittleman has. "Over on the Eastern Shore, almost everybody plants a sunflower field for doves," said the bearded, barrel-chested host. "Over here, hardly anyone does, so we get a lot more birds coming to our field."

It didn't take long for doves to come flocking back to the sunflowers, and soon enough shots were echoing from one end of the field to the other. Kittleman put an assistant alongside each gunner to kibitz, then retrieve birds when they fell. Mark Hoke, a top-notch waterfowl and turkey hunting guide from Laurel, sat with Tharpe; Lonnie Weaver of Carroll County stayed with McDowell, and I and my Labrador retriever, Nellie, took up station with Jones in the middle.

And here they came. "Two behind you," I'd hiss to Jones, "three out front." It was no easy job for him to swivel in the chair, mount the gun and get a proper swing on a bird before it zoomed out of range, and the challenge only seemed greater when he admitted it was his first time in a dove field. Goose and duck hunting are his regular favorites, he said, where the action is a little slower and the flight paths a bit more predictable.

But it wasn't long before he got the hang of it, and Nellie and I hopped to it, tracking down fallen birds hither and yon. The doves came in waves, just as you want them to, three here, five there, and occasionally a phalanx of 20 or 25 soaring in all at once.

The average dove hunter is said to take nine shots for every bird he downs, so it's not a sport for the noise- or cost-averse. There was beating and banging aplenty over the next two hours and hundreds of empty shells littered the ground when it was over, but everyone got his limit, and judging by the wide smiles, everyone had a ball, even the assistants.

"I'd much rather do this than guide," said Hoke as we collected spent shells and tossed them in a bucket. "These guys appreciate it so much more." His next mission, he said, is to organize a group of youngsters to go with him on National Youth Waterfowl Day, Nov. 4, when hunters 15 and younger get to hunt with guidance -- but no competition -- from their elders.

Meantime, Kittleman says he'll be working to make next year's dove hunt for the disabled bigger and better, a noble aspiration. He's a lucky man to have a great place to hunt, and luckier still to be able and willing to share it with those less lucky than he.