Opening day in Illinois: Dove harvest at area public sites and select Downstate ones, some surprises

Field 4 on opening day of Illinois’ dove season at Matthiessen State Park. | Dale Bowman

Here are harvest numbers on opening day of Illinois’ dove season at area public sites and some Downstate ones, there’s some surprises.

Here are the dove harvest numbers from opening day on Wednesday, Sept. 1, at area public sites and some Downstate Illinois ones, too.

The most unusual mumbers came from Shabbona Lake State Recreation Area, where you have to go back to 2002 for numbers like that. Iroquois County State Wildlife Area lived up to the promise of its fields and deservedly takes the top spot. They had 10 limits out of their 33 hunters.

I would add the caveat that I think some of the numbers might be skewed slightly at some sites because of self reporting in the field, instead of hunters returning to the office or draw spot to report their take.

Site: doves harvested, hunters, dph

Iroquois County SWA: 319, 33, 9.7

Shabbona SRA: 389, 47, 8.3

Des Plaines State Fish and Wildlife Area: 460, 61, 7.5

Matthiessen State Park: 563, 82, 6.9

Green River SWA: 593, 98, 6.1

Jim Edgar/Panther Creek SFWA: 621, 122, 5.1

Silver Springs SFWA: 260, 70, 3.7

Kankakee River SP: 1, 14, 0.1

Chain O’Lakes SP: 0, 11, 0

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