i could not agree more with the views of godfather and eland slayer,

Eland,
I don't see how you're helping hunting. You're helping well healed hunters take easy trophies and making a buck in the process. However Texas loses at least 20,000 hunters a year. Tell me how HF is helping hunting especially when the day of reckoning draws closer and closer?

I hear yah but I know of one place in Iowa that buys deer trucks them in and charges $20K for a 2 day hunt and they are THRIVING

Its 1,500acres HF but when you kill a 180" deer for every 40ac under HF thats not much of a hunt.

I didnt deer hunt for much of my teens because it just simply cost to much money. It seems to me that in Texas hutning you are either born into it or buy your way in which is sad because I know plenty of people that would like to go out and deer hunt but they are not going to shell out $5k for a hunt but would like to get their feet wet.

The main reason for hunter numbers declining is cost of land access and lack of mentoring.

and only one of those I can help with.

Elandslayer however i do think you have a good idea about taking people out and showing them ranches, information is the best weapon against ignorance.

You just need to provide the information in a neutral way, and I wouldnt start the tour with breeder pens where deer are fence 1ac or less pens being artificlially inseminated.

That turns people off QUICK!!!

you continue to spew "facts" that you can't or won't support. We all know that the number of hunters in the US is declining.

But consider this: while number of hunters declined about 10% from 1996 to 2006, the number of fishermen declined about 15%.

So perhaps there are larger issues than high fences. The demographics of the US population are changing. More urban, less rural, etc. If high fence hunting were the evil that is killing hunting, why is fishing participation declining even faster?

It obvious to everyone here that you are just seeking attention and not trying to help.

Please go away. You mommy needs to control your time on the computer.

Define ironic - you bash TX hunting...leases, feeders, ect. You have no use for guides unless they are certified PH's...and preach how great africa is and how its the only true hunting? You have already expressed your disdain for HF's, yet you want to be thanked for making us aware of a bill, that would end up in a conservative supreme court Agrueing state vs federal rights.

As far has hunting goes...it has not been about 100% providing meat for decades..its about getting out and enjoying the world off the pavement...how one enjoys it is their choice.

so if your solution to fixing the numbers of hunters has any thing to do with taking landowners rights away them your no different then the freeloaders of America.

I just threw out a number, 6k. Its large enough to make a canned high fence hunt slightly more difficult. (and yes i know how large of an area that is. I've frequented 3k acre ranches in west texas. I currently hunt a TINY piece of property that belongs to my inlaws....660acres)

The fact is, if you are hunting behind a high fence, it is a canned hunt. YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT IS THERE, AND WHERE TO FIND IT.

I understand that some people are in a business to make money, and thats fine. If you want some CEO's from Dallas or Houston to come out and play hunter on your high fence game ranch thats been STOCKED with trophys, good for you. But thats not hunting. Sorry, its not and wont ever be....

Dont try and put lipstick on a pig.

I'm not saying high fence operations are bad for hunting (or bad at all). They cant be, because they dont offer hunting. If you want to just shoot a trophy, a HF game ranch is for you.

I disagree with that statement of you know where to find them and exactly where they are.

A lot of big bucks are taken in Texas HF and LF very early in the season due to they are stll patternable...early nov. And those bucks disappear and are not seen until late winter.

I know places that use helo's for game counts, even with helo's deer disappear and resurface a year later,

As far as the stocking I'm not a fan of breeder deer... you will find that most HF's are native genetics

You continue to make irrational/idiotic posts.....

The places you are referring to in your above post are what we call "put & take".....where places are stocked mostly with trophy animals that get shot within a few months. Typically those places are nowhere near 6,000 acres.

THESE ARE NOT THE NORM!! The vast majority of high fenced places DO NOT do this!! Why is this so difficult for people to understand?.....I guess because most of the ones you see advertising in magazines and on the internet do this.

On a place that is a couple thousand acres with adequate cover.....yes, you will know what kind of quality to expect on the animals.....but you will have no better idea of where to find a particular animal than you would on a normal low-fenced place.

Many Whitetail deer are not hard to pattern on low fenced land. This past year, I hunted a 1,300 acre low fenced place in Mason County for the season. I knew this one particular 9 pointer that I saw almost everytime I hunted this area. I wanted something better, but I decided that if I didn't have a chance at anything better, then I would take him at the end of the season. Well.....that is exactly what happened. I missed an opportunity at a larger buck (never presented a shot).....so the 2nd to last day of season, I went to that area and guess who showed up?? YEP!!....Mr. 9 pointer.... So, I shot him. All this was dealing with completely free-ranging deer.....no high fences around.

Ok, i've not bashed you in any way, but apparently you're an internet tough guy.

Lets get to the real issue here. Are you having problems selling HF hunts? Or are you just trying to sell some with these posts? I'm sorry some tv show on animal planet bashed your cash cow, CANNED HIGH FENCE PET HUNTS.

But i wouldnt worry, they're plenty of lazy/wealthy people that want to shake a food bag and shoot the trophys that come running. Your cash flow shouldnt be hurt too bad.

All BS aside, were it not for high fence properties many animals endangered or even non existent in their native country, thrive in high fences. The irony is that the people who want to save these animals will ultimately destroy them. As soon as these species cease to have a monetary value, ranchers and breeders will move on to something else.

When the value of domestic livestock surpasses exotics and native wild species, it's all over.

You are obviously incapable of logical/rational thought, so I will no longer try to argue my point with you.

....My "cash cow"?? HAHA!! That's a good one!! This is a side business.....and I have a full-time job as well.

I am an honest person, and will not try to mislead potential customers in any way. As of right now, I represent around a half dozen hunting operations.....2 of these offer "put & take" type hunts (or "shoots", whatever you want to call them). I am honest and tell people upfront. Some people are okay with it, some are not. Either position is fine with me, everyone is welcome to their opinion. My other ranches are large properties with breeding herds of animals.....and these offer legitimate HUNTS, not just "shoots".

Like I said, both activities have their place.....it all boils down to personal preference. I don't look down on people for having an opinion, even when it is DRASTICALLY different from my own.

However, when people come on to a public forum and start spewing copious amounts of bullsh*t.....talking about "shaking feed bags" and "shooting pets" and "anything under 6k acres is canned" (all your own words).....I do tend to get PISSED OFF and I feel obligated to present the facts, so that people reading this forum do not get mislead in the wrong direction.

Here is the bottom line:

High fences, just like any tool, can be used properly and can also be abused. A hammer can be used to drive a nail, or it can be used to murder someone.....that does not make the hammer a "murder weapon". Just as a high fence does not constitute a "canned hunt". Sure there are places that use high fences to provide "canned hunts".....but these are an extreme minority compared to the places that use high fences as a management tool, both for native and exotic game. End of story.....

If you insist on ignoring this above fact, then you obviously do not have much (if any) experience on the subject.

I'm off to lunch.....yall have fun while I'm gone

Wade, I like the idea of taking people out to look at these operations but it seems to me that peoples minds are already made up. If I try to show anyone the realities behind the HF I'll just be accused of having an ulterior motive ($$$$$) and dismissed.

I have the same set of whitetail deer in my residential neighborhood every day. I can pop one of the "free range/fair chase" deer any time I want. Last weekend I hunted my butt off for an Axis doe behind the 600 acre HF and came up empty. The deer didn't cooperate. None of that matters to someone who's mind is already made up.

I will make the offer, though. For anyone interested in looking over HF operations I'll take them to what I have (time and gas permitting, of course". I even have access to a 40-acre "canned" operation and am willing to show the bad with the good.

Have you ever been in the south Texas brush country? There is no way that anyone on any ranch of reasonable size knows EXACTLY what is there and where to find it. Research from the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute at A&M Kingsville says that even helicopter surveys count about half the deer.

Every year we see deer from the ground that were not seen in the aerial survey, and we never see other bucks that were seen in the survey. And mature bucks are taken every year that have never been seen before.

Thats all i need to know. Of course you support it, you have a vested intrest in it.....

Like i said before, different strokes for different folks. I really couldnt care less about HF operations. But thats not hunting.

HF/LF, just got into hunting a couple years ago, only really get to go out on opening weekend as I have a friend who invites me out, and sometimes in the spring/summer for rabbits/coyotes and so forth. Paid for one other hog hunt(100 acres HF) was rather turned off by the prices on that.

Big deal is, there have got to be a lot of people like me that just want to get out there, enjoy the woods, watch the animals and bring something home for the family/friends/grill and some good BS stories to lie about. We don't care about points, or score or this or that, but the pricing of the industry for those who do are keeping someone like me from developing more into it, and I really, really want to know so much more. I am just not going to spend the money for a kill/hunt weekend at some advertised ranch with the prices they charge. Trying to get my friends together to pay up to get a lease(then deal with all those headaches while you have a lease and the different personalities and so forth)

Don't have any friends who have hunted the park lands, so I am very hesitant but pushing the wife to get a 4x4(go to coast to fish a lot, would like to go further then where my Jetta can go), so I might try to get out there more.

After awhile though, it just becomes too much of a hassle and too much of an expense for what you can get out of it.

See, that's just it. We can't have an honest debate without being accused of being biased.... unlike our noble opponents. Yes, I make money from hunting. I've been extremely blessed to get paid to do something I truly enjoy. I honestly don't care whether I sell any hunts on THF or not. The fact is a very small minority of my hunts come from here. I also do this as a part-time business so income is less of a consideration. I have no reason to do anything but present the facts as I see them. The same as anyone else.

Last year I took on a property as a favor for a friend. The place is a 40-acre HF that an elderly man put behind his house several years ago. His plan was to enjoy the deer and to play with their diet to see if he could produce a healthier animal. He also wanted to harvest enough meat to feed his family. Over the years he took a few deer and collected sheds. He was very careful to make sure they didn't get tame and it had never been commercially hunted. Well, deer doing what deer do, he is now way overpopulated. The deer are healthy; some of the fattest I've seen but he can't afford $1200 a month in feed. He didn't want to open the gate and turn them loose but trapping and transporting was not feasable. That left harvesting. I didn't personally approve of such a small piece of property but I understood his problem and decided to help.

I started doing surveys and counted nearly 200 deer in that tiny enclosure. The section had one blind setup and one fenceline that could be viably hunted. We set to work and the first couple of hunts were exactly what the critics think they looked like. Take a shot, wait 20 minutes, take another shot. That business lasted for a very short time before the deer adapted. After that it was one of the hardest places I've ever hunted. The deer had enough cover to totally disappear so the blind and fenceline became nearly unusable. We also tried to spot and stalk but the cover was so thick that any deer you saw were mere flashes of hooves, hair and antlers in the brush. They were the toughest "harvests" I've ever been on. I'll also add that I put great effort into making sure any clients were totally aware of where and what we were hunting. If anyone disapproved we used a different property.

My point is the sport and difficulty of the hunt have nothing to do with the heighth of the fence.

40 acres HF? I would think someones morals would come into play here. Letting the deer go would have been better than actually "hunting" these deer. I guess he can afford to pay the feed bill now.

Opening the gate would have been my preference as well, however, there's nothing immoral about it. Those deer have a better diet than their "free range" counterparts, they have regular access to water and more protection than average. They certainly fare better than the free range deer in my neighborhood or the dozens that meet their end on a car bumper every year.

Let me also refer back to my previous post. These deer were harder than Hades to hunt. I've been on many, many low-fence and no-fence hunts that were easier.

The heighth of the fence has little bearing on the sport of the hunt.

I am sure it is a hard hunt, when you can see the danger coming just run to the other side, and repeat, etc.

I'm not against people HF hunting, but these small ones do make me mad and are a joke.

I'm sorry sir but only a complete idiot would buy the #@*%# you are selling in those last 2 paragraphs. You high fence guys are becoming like corrupt politicians-you think if you say something loud enough and often enough people might actually believe it's true.

Why the ???? I'm only telling the truth based on my experience.

Have you seen the place I speak of? Have you walked it, hunted it? Do you have any evidence other than your prejudice?

Feel free to question my intelligence, hunting skill or judgment but don't question my integrity!!! I've earned better.

So which is it that gets the blame according to you..the landowner who HF's or the hunter who chooses to hunt the HF? Pretty sure the landowner is not holding the hunter hostage or making him pay to hunt there.

Both. It takes two to tango. My personal opinion is that the "hunters" have created the market,thus, are the main culprit. In fact,if the owners of these HF operations just said "Hey I am just exploiting a market" instead of trying to sell that shooting deer from a herd in a 40 acre pen was harder than low-fence hunting I could respect that a lot more.

For what it's worth here's a short list of the fields I hunt:

40 acre HF - Kimble County
1100 acre HF - Kerr County
1100 acre HF - Kerr County
1100 acre HF - Bandera County
1200 acre HF - Kerr County
1300 acre HF - Kerr County
1400 acre LF - Llano County
1800 acre HF - Kerr County
2000 acre HF - Kerr County
3500 acre HF - Kerr and Real Counties
14000 acre LF - Edwards County

Nalgas, if I hadn't experience it I wouldn't have believed it either. That little piece of scrub is extremely difficult to hunt.