Just a half hour after our flight from Buenos Aires landed at Argentina’s Cordoba International Airport, my attitude changed about a once-in-a-lifetime, weeklong dove hunt.
Our host, MGW Outfitters, dispatched a gentleman named Pedro to pick us up for the drive to La Volanta Lodge. Pedro had us wait until another crew of shooters arrived before leaving. Our gang talked about how fun and relaxing the shoot would be, in awe of the heartland on steroids we’d just flown over.
Then team Mossy Oak showed up and changed the tone. One had been dove hunting in Córdoba 16 times, and he was all about the percentages. He showed me his score from a hunt last year: 79 percent, meaning he didn’t miss all that much.
“In my dreams,” I thought. But it was game on.
Some 90 minutes later, Chris Maers, the son of one of the owners, happily met us at La Volanta with a lunch of gnocchi and malbec. Then it was out to a field near Rio Primero where I met my “bird boy” Eric Femenia in a field-side blind he’d stitched together with branches and grass.
He would feed 20-gauge shells into my gun nonstop, his thumb purple-black by the end of each day. His clicker sounded with every bird taken. “Feathers,” he’d chirp. But 79 percent? How about 40 percent my first day ever dove hunting.
Frustration grew, and shots seemed to go wild over the lush green corn, sorghum, and soy fields. They always tell you to look at the bird, not the white bead at the end of the barrel. But for a while, the bead was blinding.
About 15 yards away, one in our group lit a cigar and took a break from the hunt, and I remembered that this week was supposed to be about more than shooting. Hell, I’d never become an Olympic shooter, and really, who cares? I gave Femenia my gun, and we both strolled down to share a smoke.
As with any sport, sometimes you have to look up and take it all in to enjoy the whole of your environment. I can’t count how many times while fishing beautiful places in the Grand Tetons or Shenandoah Valley, I’ve said to myself, “Look up, dumbass,” and see snow-covered peaks or a bald eagle flying by.
Lucky for the sharpshooters and me, MGW Outfitters catered to both Type A and Type B personalities.
Halfway through the week, I chatted with co-founder Junior Maers about his operation, now in its 15th year. It was in 2004 that he joined with Ariel Goldman to open Maers & Goldman. In 2011, they teamed with American John Whiddon, who helped get U.S. hunters to Argentina, in part by donating trips to groups such as Friends of the NRA to auction off in fundraisers.
They host about 1,000 hunters a year at several luxurious lodges. And it’s quite an experience. The staffs at the lodges cook breakfast and dinner, steaks of course, and host cocktail parties. Clothes get washed daily. Everyone is greeted with a heartfelt “buenos días.”
Managing the birds is a big job. While there is a seemingly endless supply of doves, Maers, who has been in the business for over 30 years, said he makes sure not to overhunt fields. To help, he rents several fields from farmers who are eager to keep the bird population down.
He also helps out in the daily lunches served in the field, often a mix of grilled Asado-style chorizo, chicken, steaks, and empanadas all washed down with malbec, Schneider lager, and Coke Zero.
“I’m happy doing it,” he said.
Back in the field later that week, my new friend Antonio from Puerto Rico and I realized we still had dozens of boxes of shells to shoot. Now it got fun, as we got away from the percentages game to just shooting. And along the way, the bead disappeared, and the birds began to fall.
We even became part of the bird boy gossip. One day, Antonio and I picked up a bunch of birds, cleaned them in the field, and, with the OK of the kitchen staff and grill maestro, cooked up dove appetizers American-style: a sliver of green or red pepper in a breast, wrapped in hand-cut bacon.
Apparently, kitchen takeovers are a no-no, and the bird boys were buzzing about it the following day. But La Volanta’s staff, nervously asking to help at first, let us loose, and we dished up appetizers for everyone, making sure there was more than enough for our kitchen hosts.
A table away that night, Junior Maers saluted Antonio and me with a broad smile and a raise of his wine glass. His son Chris added, “Maybe you can stay here.” Like shooting 100 percent, only in my dreams.
Paul Bedard is a senior columnist and author of Washington Secrets.
