PILO ONLY HAS ONE DOVE, but dogs will have more to retrieve in the South Dove Hunting Zone since the Brush Country season will open September 1 and the bag limit has changed to delete the whitewing dove days and standardize the bag limit and shooting hours across the South Zone.
(Photo by John Jefferson)
by John Jefferson
Hunters should be pleased with four of the six recent regulation changes that the TPWD Commission adopted at its late March meeting. The two other reg changes restricted wild turkey hunting.
First, the good news
The early part of the South Dove Zone will open earlier than usual. It ‘ll now open the same day as the dove seasons that opens in the North and Central Zones on September 1. (It previously opened on September 14.) And instead of the special white-winged dove days, the bag limits have been standardized across the South Zone Dove Zone Season.
Although few hunters are affected by it, chachalacas and quail hunting dates have been Aligned at Nov. 1 – February 28.
Good News for deer hunters in 21 southeastern counties, including several in the Hill Country — the Doe Days are being expanded from four to 16 in those southeast counties. Check the new Outdoor Annual (OA) for your counties when it is published August 15.
The deer population has expanded steadily in that area, according to TPWD’s White-tailed Deer Program Leader, Blaise Korzekwa. As expected, more bucks are killed than does each year and the sex ratio remains skewed in these counties, Korzekwa told me. His numbers indicate four does exist for every buck. And the current four-doe days to increase the doe harvest was not reducing that ratio, since the doe days fell on inconvenient hunting days for some hunters.
Those four days included Thanksgiving holidays to provide hunting for kids out of school then, but many families have conflicting plans that limit hunting on those days. Consequently, hunters and landowners requested additional days to hunt and reduce the buck/doe ratio. Adding doe days seemed warranted. The doe bag limit on doe days will remain at two per hunter per season. The change just gives hunters more days in which to hunt those two.
“Sorta” Bad News
Matagorda and Wharton counties will be closed to wild turkey hunting in 2026-2027. Also, counties that formerly had a turkey bag limit of “either sex hunting” will revert to a bag limit of only gobblers and bearded hens. Both changes were prompted by declining turkey populations in the affected counties. Again, check the OA.
AND the Really Scarry News
In talking to Blaise Korzekwa, I mentioned recently seeing that the National Deer Association had quoted him regarding the increasing threat of New World Screwworms in Texas. He confirmed that screwworms had recently been detected in 2025 in Central America, infesting livestock, pets, and some humans, and moved northward rapidly. They have now been confirmed in Mexico only 160 miles from the Rio Grande River border. And summer is their most active breeding period.
Covid 19 disrupted facilities releasing sterile male screwworm flies — the only effective anti-screwworm solution. Sterile fly production facilities are now functioning again and releasing the impotent males, even in South Texas.
Please pray screwworms will be eliminated before reaching Texas. And, by all means, report any sightings!
JJ
May 27-28, 2026
August 19-20, 2026
November 4-5, 2026
