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Here's a USFWS explanation, regarding legality of sunflower manipulation for doves:


"""The regs on ducks and doves used to be the same...you couldn't manipulate any crop or natural vegetation for either.

The dove rules changed, after a California wildlife commissioner and his high falutin' buddies got smoked by the USFWS one year for spreading safflower seed on a safflower field ( it was seed several inches thick in places and seed that was stored in a shed and spread across the field later) and bush hogging a bunch of the standing crop down. Not long after that, the Federal regs were changed to allow manipulation of standing crops for hunting doves, but not the addition of additional grain once the seed was removed from the field.

So it has nothing to do with "normal ag practice" when it comes to manipulating standing crops, pertaining to dove hunting. It is not a normal practice to bushhog a crop down..but it is legal.

If you are spreading wheat or other seeds on top of the ground, it must be done as a normal ag planting practice, not a dove hunting practice. Therefore, you have to follow the prescribed ag practices as recommended by your local Cooperative Extension Service. This includes planting dates, rates and methods."""