pay attention

lease prices up, no family hunting without paying for every gun, your hunting tradition fades away, guess what you dont need you guns anymore, buy your own land if you get the chance, thats the only option left, just my thoughts but i think they are right on

dont get me wrong their are some good old timers left that understand, but they are few and far in between

"lease prices up" - Only if people are willing to pay higher prices. Land owners would be stupid not to charge market rate for use of their land.

"no family hunting without paying for every gun" - Too many people abuse the "family" rule and suddenly have an awful lot of "family" on the lease that aren't paying for it. A 4-man lease can become a 10-man hunt in a hurry.

"your hunting tradition fades away" - Only if you let it.

"buy your own land if you get the chance" - Totally agree.

"That's the ony option left" - You still have the option to lease plenty of land here in Texas. Maybe not for what you think you should have to pay, but again, if others are willing, why should landowners charge less? Do you just walk around giving your money away? It's the same thing.

Well I'm still paying 350 a year for 2700 acres, year round. 5 hunters total.

I agree totally with buy your own land. Wish I had more and plan to get more but my 32 ac will do for now.

Buy land. Me and my son have been on the same lease for 10 years at 2700 a year add that up.Dont get me wrong land owner is great,But there are rules.

buy land and make sure the mineral rights come with it.

yep and rules change with the prices..our place is going up 2 bucks a acre and reduced to deer season only...no maas!!

good luck on the mineral rights now days.

If you can afford it buy land. The problem with buying is being able to afford enough to actually have a decent place to hunt. My father-in-law bought a little over a 100 acres. We went in and built stands put up feeders and four food plots. We were very hopefull of getting some decent opportunities. We hunted it four years and each and every year we saw fewer and fewer deer. People were coming on his place hunting it. We found candy wrappers etc by all of our stands especially mine since it was in the back away from everything. The folks who lived around it were "good ole country boys" who hunted year around. Agh! And the cost of that 100 acres back then was a little over $1,000 per acre. Try finding that today.

$2700 a year X 10 is only $27,000. Go see what you can afford for $27000.00.

I want to buy 200 acres and am not sure I will ever be able to afford it but to me that will be my minimum and even if I do I will probably still stay on my lease. In reality paying for a lease is a lot cheaper than buying land and for the money you can hunt places that have a lot better opportunities on average. I know there are going to be a few guys respond that have less and enjoy nice success but I think those are the exception.

Exactly, not to mention taxes and upkeep expenses...

one thing to keep in mind is that a purchase of land is for more than just hunting.
if you are just wanting to hunt and want to keep your options open to moving if the hunting gets worse or want to try a new area, then by all means, leasing is probably a better way.

buying land is way more expensive per year compared to leasing, but my annual payments are going toward paying off the note. so while i get to hunt on my place, i am also building equity and long term value.
so, in 20 yrs my place will be paid for and will likely have doubled or tripled what i paid for it initially.
but that lease will have gone up considerably in price and you will not have anything to show for it financially, hopefully, you have some nice deer on the wall

i am not against leases at all, i was just going for the long term investment approach that also allowed me to use the land for recreation and my rules.

My wife & I bite the bullet & bought 205ac 2yrs ago. Taxes are cheap & it's not as hard to get mineral rights as people think. It feels go to know that the dirt below my feet belongs to me.

You can almost forget the mineral rights if they're drillin in the area. I see and am a victom of oil company's takin over land when you don't want them too and there's nothing you can do about it.

hell id pay as much as 5 grand a year for the right lease. Either way you look at its a heck of a lot cheaper than being an owner. For now i dont mind being the renter.

The dirt belongs to the owner. I can't explain it but means something to a man when he can look out over his place & say this belongs to me. I wouldnt give that up for anything. It

I own some and lease a lot.... while I try to take care of all of it, there is a certain amount of pride in what you own.

That said, someday I hope to trade my north central texas land about one acre for 3 west someday...

I own 5 acres and lease 133+/-. I lease for $350 a year and we have had it for around 15 years. The only way we are in jeopardy of losing it is if the owner should pass away. We take very good care of our lease and keep the roads nice and driveable. We are bringing in some rock to fill a few holes and we mow the entire place also. We are lucky and I too want to own about 200 acres someday for basically hunting purposes. I want to high fence and manage my own herd and let it be hunted much like a game ranch, but without all the Monster bucks, lol.

A few of us left. When a deer lease started costing more than 6 months worth of groceries I quit. Still kill a few and I ain't telling you where or how.

I agree but what really sucks is I have had my properties paid off for 5 years and when January (taxes) comes around you realize your just renting it from good ole Uncle Sam

do you feed his stock for him, do you build his fence for him, this is getting where you have to be there year round just to hunt afew months and still pay to hunt, they got us where they want us, and we like it

So, you apparently think people should just let you hunt their land for basically nothing? $350 for a lease is peanuts. He should have to do some work for the land owner at that price.

What are you looking for? Help me out here.

Me personally. I do not have a lease or land of my own. Due to having my own family (wife and 4 kids) to keep me broke most of the time, and when I think I'm not something hapens to let me know I am. I Would love to have soom land but can not afford it. Same with a lease. Right now if it was not for my family (brother-in-laws) having land and letting me hunt on thier land sometimes, I would not have a place to hunt. However, I have paid a very reasonable fee to hunt and to take my son hunting before, thanks to people I now can call firends. Yes, some leases cost way to much, but with the cost of land and maintaining it. I can not and will not down someone for charging what others are willing to pay to hunt on it. They do pay for and to maintain and keep (TAX'S) thier land. I just wish that more lease managers would allow more kids to hunt using paid persons tags or cull deer to further the future of hunting. It would also help if people would offer low cost hunts to youth. They are our/huntings future, so people could aford to get thier kids in the field and not on the streets. I do thank those that do offer such things with all my heart, because they realize the importance of getting our youth in the field hunting.

I hunted a lease for 11 yrs where there was no one allowed at the lease except paying hunters during the season. Off season someone could help you with work.......But if you have a son or daughter or wife they weren't allowed to come spend the weekend at camp with you during the season........and that sux.

You are so right. I was fortunate to inherit the land I was raised on and eventhough I do not live on it when I go home there is nothing like being on your land. As a landowner you also have a responsiblity to the land to take care of it. That cost money so whatever the market will handle is what you will get. The better you maintain the land the better prices you can get. It is called the Free Market. I will never sell my land. Let the kids fight over it is what I say. Oh and there is nothing better than having your daughter and son in law say Dad we want to build a home on the farm and raise our kids there.

Your are exactly right. Land is and investment, I do not think we should fault land owners for using that investment. I lease my land in Indiana for farming, folks in Texas lease for hunting same thing actually.

Not sure how many acres you have, but the 55 my house is on is $800 per year. The other 100 that is ag exempt (wheat production) is about $120 per year.