Hunting around Ft. Hood

I am new to the area and trying to figure out the best areas to hunt. Not a huge fan of the guided hunts. Wondering if anyone has any luck doing the unguided hunts around the area? Also if anyone knows a good spot to hog hunt I would love some information.

SapperTitan is the man to ask around Ft. Hood I believe.

Ft. Hood would be good if you can get on it. I hear it's hassle to hunt on it. Your best bet would be to find a lease. Which is also easier said than done.

I used to hunt Ft Hood years ago. You would have to be there about 2 hours before the trucks went out in the morning and afternoon. It was a draw system back then. If you got drawn you went out if not you were out of luck till the next hunt.

Yeah I can get my license no problem just trying to find someone that knows what they are doing since the rules on post are 10 times more strict then the last post I hunted. Leases are too expensive.

I'd like to know about Ft Hood myself. As a retired Navy Chief I can hunt it but I don't know if it is worth my time. All i want is does or spikes and maybe a hog. Meat is all I hunt for these days.

I talked to a game warden the other day while I was fishing and said there are some nice bucks. Luckily there are a few months before opening day.

yep, there are some decent deer around Ft. Hood, especially now that they have tightened the reins on how it's hunted. We used to ride dirt bikes all over the place back in the 60s, 70s, 80s, until they shut it down. Saw some decent deer back then riding dirt bikes and jumping them out of the brush when very few people even knew anything about management of the herd. I have a friend that used to do nothing but public hunting and hit Ft. Hood a number of times but that's likely been 10-15 years ago now, but he took a couple of pretty nice 8-10 point mature deer (guessing in the 110-130 class) and a number of does. Used to be check in at HQ a couple hours before daylight, they would take you out and put you in a stand, then come back and pick you up. Not sure what the rules are now.

they haven't tightened much bc there have been about 30 illegal deer killed on guided hunts. Tons of poaching on the NE and NW borders around gatesville. There are some great deer but they are hard to hunt. A 186 or something like that was killed 2 yrs ago that's the record for ft hood. Also if you plan to hunt unguided for the love of God scout now and get your sets up so you do t screw things up for other people right before season starts.

Sapper I take it you hunt the area?

gave up hunting unguided bc too many idiots and poachers where I wanted to hunt so now I just do guided.

How hard is it to do the guided hunts? Is it usually packed trying to get a hunt? The reason I liked the unguided was because I don't have to hope some is there with an open stand.

It's a mad frenzy at 4 pm Thursday of people calling Telatrac trying to get logged in for guided hunting. I've had to call over 50 times before trying to get through. Any hunting on Hood is a pain but it can be worth it. Search my posts and you can see the 10 point I killed last year.

Anywhere else around here to hunt like WMA's? Don't have money for a lease

are you rifle or bow? some of the area Army Corp of Engineer lakes allow archery hunting, Georgetown and Granger that I'm aware of. I think they allow shotgun hunting for dove and ducks too. I am not sure whether there is anything on lake Belton or not.

stillhouse lake has a corps of engineer area where you can hunt small game and pigs with archery or shotgun

I am both, sorry not used to having this much trouble figuring out where to go to hunt.

TPWD has public hunting areas, think you put in for a draw system but they also have some stand-by slots often available too. I think there's another forum area farther down that is for discussing the public hunting areas.

Thanks, just figured hunting in Texas would be a lot easier.

its pretty easy ... just not cheap

I see lots of deer on Ft Hood when I was varmint hunting at night. Mainly up around North Ft Hood in the limited range areas. To bad those areas are guided or you could probably have good luck on spot and stalk type hunts. So I mostly hunt pigs off post now.

FLAhunter I sent you a PM

Lots of info on texasbowhunter.com under public tab

Seems like the guides at Ft. Hood are always the ones that shoot the big deer there. I always thought that was interesting.

completely untrue. I know multiple guides who haven't killed a deer in over 5 yrs. they are more prone to let young and mid age deer walk and their areas are usually shot out in the first couple weeks by idiots shooting illegal deer or young deer that barely make 13 inches. There are a few guides who killed good deer last year but more were killed by guided hunters. Also ft hood record was killed by a non guide in a non guided bow only area. Everyone on a guided hunt has a chance of possibly seeing a mature deer but most don't give it time and shoot the first thing they see with antlers it's really pretty sad.

I used to hunt for antlers a lot but when I'm hunting public land it always seems like the big mature bucks are shot already and the rest get shot before they mature. I will say the big bucks I have seen shot at other posts is in the archery only areas because most people do not like to bow hunt for some reason. But I won't know if that's the case for a few more months.

Lots of bow hunters on Ft Hood. Now is the time to get out and scout and set up sets bc if you wait a few more months you will be setting up within throwing distance of someone else and thats not cool. I found a honey hole 2 yrs ago and started feeding in July never seen another person out there and had cameras on trails to see if anyone was in the area, went to check on things 2 weeks before season and there were all of a sudden tracks and stands all over. Screwed my whole season. I would get there an hour or more before light and then right at light people would drive through revving engines sounded like they were mud slinging.

Yeah that has happened to me on afternoon hunts on other post. I like to slip way off the grid even if it requires me to walk a good distance. I guess ill give it a try no matter what. Hopefully my schedule works out where I can hunt the afternoons during the week.

only issue with that is you may scout an area and then it will be closed weeks or months at a time where you can't hunt at all due to training

Yeah I always try and have a few different spots when hunting on military post

Got to on Ft Hood. There are a lot of units and a lot of training not to mention the units that secure land and never even use it bc they want it just incase they need it. Last year the 40s were closed a lot during bow and general season bc 1CAV does their gunnery out there. They have multiple BDEs so they are out there a lot.

Yeah I m still trying to learn the areas and where would be the best places