My son just drew this hunt. Any advice about the area? We’re hunting la sel del ray unit. We have a 6.5 creedmoor but I think it’s too small. Would a 7 PRC or 300. Win Mag be adequate for deer and nilgai? Thanks

Congrats this is a great hunt !!!

My son used a 30/06 last year to shoot his Nilgai @ 90 yards at Del Rey. Depending on the area you choose to hunt North / South it can be easy walking or difficult.
The South side you can access fairly deep by foot or Bike on grown over gravel road. We set a stand on that side only to have other hunters set up 60 yards away from our blind (which we had left an Orange vest hanging on it clearly visible if they would have walked another 50 yards), so we picked up and concentrated on the Northwest side. We put a ground Blind out on the tree line 800 yards from the parking area on the Northwest side. It was a tough walk in as the entire area looked like a bomb range from the hog rootings. We saw Whitetails, Nilgai, Hogs and Turkeys.
There is no assistance or interaction with any Refuge personnel. It is truly a DIY hunt. We did have a state game Warden check us at the parking area, but that was it. We had a game cart that I wrapped the quartered Nilgai up in a tarp and strapped to it to haul it out. The hog rootings made it a slow packout.
I know that 2 other hunters used a & 7 PRC and a 300 Norma to take animals with

The creedmoor is a bit on the light side. I killed two nilgai at the teniente with a 300 mag and 200 grain a frame bullets. Stone dead in their tracks. Nilgai fill up coolers fast!

i put my boys in for this drawing every year. just waiting for them to pull our ticket. i have a heavy 3006 with 180grn partitions would be the rifle we would take. don't need that much for the whitetail, but if the nialgi show i wouldn't want to hit one with anything less than a well constructed and .30cal or pretty darn close.

a friend of my brothers' shot a nialgi on one of the drawings down there on east lake last year, he shot his with a .3006. sounded like it did fine.

i'm always curious to see how it goes and of course see some pics! anything to help me be better prepared if i get the chance to go with my kids.

out of curiosity how long have you been putting in for it? i thikn this was our third year.

We had 2 points when we dre it so I believe this was our third year. Taking the .338 mag down there. Not sure a whitetail will be left after it

My son shot his at 90 yards with 30/06 Federal Fusion 165 grain. It went thru both shoulder blades and hung up in the hide on other side. It dropped where it stood and kicked 3-4 times and it was done.
I read all the story's on how they run forever and are hard to kill and when he shot, I actually Looked the direction it was facing to try to get a good mark on where it was heading and there was nothing. I looked back where it was standing to see the last few kicks.
Now if your kid is a sharp shooter and is going to be taking 400-500 yard shots you may need something a lil bigger. My son can shoot, but off a Bog Pod he was not going to shoot over 250.

We drew with 3 points

cool to hear. we actually got drawn on a state park this year for a doe permit and it ended up crossing with another something i couldnt' miss so we didn't get to go. i didn't accept the permit though so hopefully it got redrawn and someone else got to use it. we for sure would have gone and enjoyed it but as it was just a doe i guess we didn't lose out to bad.

my boys are 13yo, they have about 5 hunting seasons to their credit including this year. my mom n dad have a small place in deep south tex that they get to hunt on. they've seldom shot beyond 100yds but they usually tag their deer. I don't think i'd even have them try as something beyond maybe 150yds. and at that only because the rifle knows no difference. if they can hit them at 100 they probably hit them at 150 too.

they typically shoot a .243. that my brother hand loads with 100grn nosler partitions and have a collection of mature bodied stx bucks to their credit. rifle does well on 150-200lbs deer. nilgai though i dunno. i think it'd take more. i've been having them shoot the .3006 some each year jsut to be prepared for the day but they've not hunted with it. its a bull barel heavy rifle, so that should help. they've shot it well enough that i don't think we'd have trouble hitting the mark at 100yds or less. i think this year was our 3rd year....so we will have 3pts going into next year. hopefully our number is coming.

appreciate the feedback. always like to hear other folks experiences and such.

i guess yall just hiked in and looked for active trails and sign and set up a pop up blind and waited? that's kinda what my brother's group did. they were a group of 4, they were exotic draw only so they couldn't shoot the whitetail. they did see some though. a couple nice bucks. of their group 3 of four guys took shots on nilgai....2 of three collected one. their shot opps were closer though. 100yds or less. my brother shot at two different ones but his shots were 300yds or more and not ideally set up. he wasn't able to find that he hit them. he was shooting 300wby.

i couldn't tell you why but i've always wanted a .338 win mag. don't know what i'd do with one. as long as its a controlled expansion bullet i'd think it won't rip a whitetail too badly. i have a cousin who has a 300RUM....shoots blazing fast and he does not shoot controlled expansion bullets so it makes a mess of everything he shoots.

luckily for me, the two have also grown up quite a bit and are pretty strong. so if we get lucky enough to go and bag one or two i should have some good muscle to help get them out.