Hunting - The CigarPass way

[Turk10mm]

So I went to the ranch this weekend for a little R&R. I went with my father-in-law who also enjoys good cigars, and his buddy. We got there on Friday morning after a 5 hour drive to the Texas hillcountry. We set up shop, which of course required a nice gar and a glass of whisky. After getting settled in we sat on the porch most of the evening spotting upwards of 30-40 deer, elk, red deer, red deer/elk hybrids, sika, fallow, etc. My father-in-laws buddy took two doe that night while I relaxed. We had the tunes on, good drinks, and good cigars. The game just get coming, even after shooting two deer.

Saturday morning I stalked a nice gobbler after not having a chance to take a shot on him from the porch. By the time I found him he knew I was there so my shot was roughly 200 yards, standing, on top of an 80ft cliff face, with a moving target on the creek bottom below. I had about 2 seconds to take the shot but missed unfortunately. I didn't want a body shot because that ruins meat so it was a long shot to say the least. Oh well, he'll be there next time I go.

Anyways, that afternoon I was sitting on the porch with a nice HdM, glass of JW blue, my rifle etc and a spike buck walks out to join the other 15-20 deer. I decided to cull him so he didn't procreate. Took him down, cleaned him up and went back to the porch.

All in all, it was a rough hunt. Life doesn't get much better, actually. Here's my deer blind. FYI, the suppressed AR was ready in the event a pig or coyote decided to come up and sniff the gut pile. I don't hunt game with it, just pest control.

hope you guys get some time to hang out in the woods. Its a great way to unwind from the big city.

 

[jfields]

Sounds like fun T. I've always wanted to hunt in South Texas. Looks like you put a nice little spin on it though.

 

[Turk10mm]

the hardest part of the hunt is dragging your kill up the hill to the house.. i'd never actually consider shooting off the back porch hunting, however. But there's really neat places to stalk your prey, and the most gorgeous cliff I've ever seen in Texas to sit on the top of and watch the animals go by, just keep your wits about you because if you are quiet they'll walk right up on you and scare you so bad you could fall off of it.

Sunday morning I went to try and locate my turkey. I was laying on the cliff's edge looking down into the creek bed. The gobblers were in the woods making a racket. So I hear a little noise behind me like someone walking up or shuffling on the rocks. I turn around to see one of these guys about 15 feet behind me. I think we both wet ourselves a bit in that moment of realization.

 

[Devil Doc]

You need to come to Vermont, where we actually hunt. What you're doing is unethical, as far as I'm concered, and gives hunters a bad name. Stalking turkeys is a good way to get shot around here.

Doc.

 

[NASTY]

the hardest part of the hunt is dragging your kill up the hill to the house.. i'd never actually consider shooting off the back porch hunting, however. But there's really neat places to stalk your prey, and the most gorgeous cliff I've ever seen in Texas to sit on the top of and watch the animals go by, just keep your wits about you because if you are quiet they'll walk right up on you and scare you so bad you could fall off of it.

Sunday morning I went to try and locate my turkey. I was laying on the cliff's edge looking down into the creek bed. The gobblers were in the woods making a racket. So I hear a little noise behind me like someone walking up or shuffling on the rocks. I turn around to see one of these guys about 15 feet behind me. I think we both wet ourselves a bit in that moment of realization.

Dude, you killed the Aries zodiac sign!!! What are they going to use to replace it?

 

[Turk10mm]

haha, that's not my kill, just a picture of what walked up on me. i didn't have time to shoot him.

and Doc, I do my fair share of real hunting, I don't need to come to Vermont. I've taken a buck at roughly 550 yards in West Texas that I tracked for the better part of 2 miles in extremely rugged hill country.

What I'm doing is managing game on our property. The biologist said we need to cull 50 white tail from our property. If you call culling for the betterment of the heard unethical then you need to go somewhere with more animals.

If someone shot me while stalking a turkey, they'd be poaching as its our land.

You need to come to Vermont, where we actually hunt. What you're doing is unethical, as far as I'm concered, and gives hunters a bad name. Stalking turkeys is a good way to get shot around here.

Doc.

Here's more information for you http://www.texaswildlifemanagement.com/MLD%20Permits.htm

Its a conservation program that requires the land owners to not only take game but make improvements to help the wildlife flourish. This is what hunting is really about, conservation and improvement so that my kids kids kids still have land and animals to hunt long after I'm gone.

 

[jfields]

Hey T,
I saw the wildlife fence in one of the pictures you posted. Is your land just for private use, or is it a hunting/managed ranch that people pay to go to?

 

[Devil Doc]

Just out of curiosity, how many of those over populated animals that you mention, are indigenous to Texas?

Doc.

 

[Turk10mm]

Hey T,
I saw the wildlife fence in one of the pictures you posted. Is your land just for private use, or is it a hunting/managed ranch that people pay to go to?

Its is a managed property, by us. There is no pay hunting on our property, EVER. We high fenced the property to build our own family sanctuary. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, the animals thrive so well on the property that they overpopulate and require intervention. The coyotes don't do a good enough job of population control and typically only take down the young animals. Other than that, there are very few natural predators. Without being able to take game we'd have a serious problem of overpopulation.

 

[Turk10mm]

Just out of curiosity, how many of those over populated animals that you mention, are indigenous to Texas?

Doc.

indigenous? well all the white tail are. And many of the animals that are considered exotics are now being considered indigenous by the biologists. In fact, many of the animals do better in Texas than they do in their home ecosystems because they aren't poached into extinction and their ecosystem isn't being raped by people who don't care about their wildlife. We have several varieties including Barbary Sheep (aoudad sheep), fallow, red deer, sika, axis, black buck, etc.

We have a very low cull count for the exotics currently. However, we do cull whatever we are told by the biologists to cull. For example the fallow are doing so well that if we don't stay on top of it they'll overpopulate too. The aoudad sheep do better in Texas than they do at home in Africa. Same for most of the exotics. The only animal that doesn't thrive in comparison to their homes is the elk. They also eat a lot and do considerable damage to the ecosystem. However, they're breeding with the red deer and making a very nice elk red deer cross that thrives and does less damage to the ecosystem. Eventually the elk will cross breed themselves out of the property.

Our goal is to provide a home to the widest variety of wildlife possible. Eventually we plan on being able to trap and export some of the exotics back to their home ecosystems to assist in repopulating.


FYI, the deer are the animals we currently consider over populated. We need to take a lot of them this year. The spike buck I shot was a cull kill because of his poor genetics.

 

[Devil Doc]

I'm sure you mean well, but you don't do our cause any good doing what your doing. I once went boar hunting on a game preserve. Shot a big one. 250lbs., but it was like shooting fish in a barrel. I'll never do it again. To me, it was just killing.

Doc.

 

[Turk10mm]

I guess we won't ever agree. Our cause is to have a place to retreat, provide a wildlife habitat, a place to enjoy the outdoors, and fill the freezer with meat when its necessary. This use falls within the definition of "hunting" (below). I will absolutely agree with you that we have a plethora of animals on our property. It is shooting fish in a barrel in some cases. But if you want to hunt you put your boots on and you go find your prey.

If someone wants to swing nuts and talk about who a hunter is or what hunting really is, put your gun down completely. Pick up a large knife and go hunting. Only then can you call yourself a "real" hunter in my opinion. The days of hunting in its primitive sense ended when the bow and arrow where invented.

"Hunting is the practice of pursuing animals for food, recreation, or trade. In modern use, the term refers to regulated and legal hunting, as distinguished from poaching, which is the killing, trapping or capture of animals contrary to law. Hunted animals are referred to as game animals, and are usually large or small mammals, migratory gamebirds, or non-migratory gamebirds.

Hunting can also involve the elimination of vermin as a means of pest control. Hunting advocates claim that hunting can be a necessary[1] component of modern wildlife management, for example to help maintain a population of healthy animals within an environment's ecological carrying capacity when natural checks such as predators are absent.[2] In the United States, wildlife managers are frequently part of hunting regulatory and licensing bodies, where they help to set rules on the number, manner and conditions in which game may be hunted."

 

[Devil Doc]

You're right, we'll never agree, at least not untill I'm dead and gone. I'm almost 30 yrs older than you are. Sportsmen go through 3 phases in their lives: 1. Kill as much game as you can. 2. Kill the biggest game you can. and last, 3. Just be happy to be in the woods. You'll get there, young fella.

Doc.

 

[Macion Grey]

Hey... you could just play Chicken Shoot on the Wii.

 

[gunsandcigars88]

You're right, we'll never agree, at least not untill I'm dead and gone. I'm almost 30 yrs older than you are. Sportsmen go through 3 phases in their lives: 1. Kill as much game as you can. 2. Kill the biggest game you can. and last, 3. Just be happy to be in the woods. You'll get there, young fella.

Doc.

I have to agree with you on this Doc. I think that you should actually hunt your prey and not just choose between the 50 of them standing there. Spending the months before season opens to scout and find your animal you want to take, predicting his routes, the way the weather effects his movements, etc. Just so that when season opens you can work on harvesting him is what hunting is all about. Not waiting for the herd to come to the feeder and choosing which one dies. I am at #3 right now Doc. When I go I am just happy to be alone in the woods for some R&R. I have enough meat in the freezer to last through the year, so I don't need to harvest one this year. So I will just spend my time in the woods relaxing, and watching a few critters.
B

 

[Gawl]

I own lots of firearms but have never actually been hunting. Really want to give it a try as I love deer meat, but trying to find a cheap deer lease around here is nonexistent.

 

[Petthefish]

hey if you got the land, you got the deer why not. I totally dont agree with the high fence the animals should be able to come and go as they please. Cause even through the land is yours the game animals belong to the public and the public should not be stopped from having a chance at shooting them rp

 

[Devil Doc]

I own lots of firearms but have never actually been hunting. Really want to give it a try as I love deer meat, but trying to find a cheap deer lease around here is nonexistent.

Deer lease? A non-resident big game license is less than a $150 here in N. New England and you can pretty much hunt anywhere you damn well please. That's sad. I thought you Texans were about freedom and all that bullshit.

Doc.

 

[Not A Nice Person]

hey if you got the land, you got the deer why not. I totally dont agree with the high fence the animals should be able to come and go as they please. Cause even through the land is yours the game animals belong to the public and the public should not be stopped from having a chance at shooting them rp

Errrrrrm . . . not in Texas, actually. There is no hunting on public lands here, and hunting on private lands not your own is a wonderful way to get your a** shot off.

People buy hunting leases on private ranches in Texas. Some are the kind of hunting talked about above; stalking or sitting in a stand, some are a bit less, aaaah, challenging. None are quite like, oh, say, the Northeast, where deer are basically large horned rats because culling would be too much like shooting Bambi for suburbanites, nor are they like the PNW, where I lived prior to this, with its enormous tracts of mountainous state forest to hunt within.

*shrug*

It is what it is. I'm not a hunter myself, but I like game meat. Some of the larger "game" ranches are actually meat suppliers. A friend of mine in San Antonio is allergic to beef and buys locally harvested buffalo, venison, and elk at a supermarket up there.

~Boar

 

[Gawl]

I own lots of firearms but have never actually been hunting. Really want to give it a try as I love deer meat, but trying to find a cheap deer lease around here is nonexistent.

Deer lease? A non-resident big game license is less than a $150 here in N. New England and you can pretty much hunt anywhere you damn well please. That's sad. I thought you Texans were about freedom and all that bullshit.

Doc.

Honestly we could be Doc, but everyone I know that hunts around here talks about going to a deer lease so that's what I'm going off of. They have offered to cut me in on their lease but its way out of my price range.