Future of High fence hunts and experiences in Texas....

[UnckleBob]

new episode up. this one pulled me a little outside my wheelhouse and i enjoyed it for that exact reason.

Brian's got a background a lot of you will recognize. tons of backcountry time, sheep hunting, all the remote stuff. But he also works in the exotic hunting business down in Texas. We got into what's actually going on in Texas on the exotic wildlife front, which was eye opening on its own. The intriguing part is where it is all headed. Brian is adamant texas is gonna become a serious destination, competitive with south africa. big claim, but he makes a real case for it.

like anything in this corner of our world there is some controversy baked in

I am enjoying the podcast. I am trying to decide between a Nilgai hunt or an Aoudad hunt. The Nilgai hunt feels like a safari style hunt and the Aoudad hunts seem very challenging. Both hunts will be on very large ranches and feeders are not part of the experience.

I have children in my house. They are my number 1 priority. Until they go off to college, just about every weekend is spoken for. I like the fact I don't have to worry about a season.

 

[Cynoscion]

Nilgai taste WAY better!

 

[Hunt eat repeat]

I think the prices would have to change considerably in Texas for that to happen. I went to South Africa and killed 7 species and shipped them home for the cost of a mature kudu bull in Texas.

 

[jmez]

A surprising number of African hunts are high fence. Often very large blocks, but high fenced none the less. A very common and “affordable” hunt type in S. Africa as I understand it.

A lot of the animals taken on these hunts are also purchased at auctions and turned loose into the fences.

 

[HunterGatherer]

High fence is gross. I don’t care what spin you put on it. Why even bother going out to the farm to shoot it ? Just have the owner kill it for you and door dash can bring it to your taxidermist.

 

[WRO]

Only Steers and Queers come from Texas..

If you want to screw up a good thing in hunting get a Texan and a Utard involved.

Some people like prostitutes.

I'll stop now..

 

[Tick]

Only Steers and Queers come from Texas..

If you want to screw up a good thing in hunting get a Texan and a Utard involved.

Some people like prostitutes.

I'll stop now..

You stopped too late to hide your ignorance.

 

[yfarm]

Come hunt south Texas thornbrush either low or high fence and you will come to understand a high fence is meaningless to fair chase on any property over several hundred acres. The brush is virtually impenetrable to a human. The deer and nilgai just vanish within 10 feet. You hunt land with little vertical rise so spotting animals more than a couple of hundred yards is a non issue. There are operations in Texas as well as other states where you hunt in a barnyard in essence, if that is what you want you can find it but don’t assume all high fence falls in that category. I am in agreement with Cliff Gray that the chest thumpers are obnoxious, see it in the hunting and fishing community here.

 

[B Harrison]

new episode up. this one pulled me a little outside my wheelhouse and i enjoyed it for that exact reason.

Brian's got a background a lot of you will recognize. tons of backcountry time, sheep hunting, all the remote stuff. But he also works in the exotic hunting business down in Texas. We got into what's actually going on in Texas on the exotic wildlife front, which was eye opening on its own. The intriguing part is where it is all headed. Brian is adamant texas is gonna become a serious destination, competitive with south africa. big claim, but he makes a real case for it.

like anything in this corner of our world there is some controversy baked in

People with more money than grit will pay for it every time, as a guide, I’m just glad people get to make a living doing what we all love to do.
No hate, I just have the bank role to chase heads…
My boss probably drops 40k a year on “hunting”
His dad and uncle have killed everything that can be bought.
The mounts are crazy, good business to be in too, exotic mounts….


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[WRO]

You stopped too late to hide your ignorance.

You don’t like prostitutes?

 

[Ozarkansas]

Come hunt south Texas thornbrush either low or high fence and you will come to understand a high fence is meaningless to fair chase on any property over several hundred acres. The brush is virtually impenetrable to a human. The deer and nilgai just vanish within 10 feet. You hunt land with little vertical rise so spotting animals more than a couple of hundred yards is a non issue. There are operations in Texas as well as other states where you hunt in a barnyard in essence, if that is what you want you can find it but don’t assume all high fence falls in that category. I am in agreement with Cliff Gray that the chest thumpers are obnoxious, see it in the hunting and fishing community here.

I hunted south Texas this past winter and found the brush much easier to move through than I’d expected, at least compared to central Texas cedars or even several-year-old Ozark or Cascade clear cuts. I didn’t have any issue moving through it quietly.

That being said, some of the best hunters I’ve known have come from Texas, the state certainly gets painted with too broad of a brush.

 

[D_Dubya]

I hunted south Texas this past winter and found the brush much easier to move through than I’d expected, at least compared to central Texas cedars or even several-year-old Ozark or Cascade clear cuts. I didn’t have any issue moving through it quietly.

That being said, some of the best hunters I’ve known have come from Texas, the state certainly gets painted with too broad of a brush.

A lot of variety even in South Texas, the King Ranch country and coastal bend is fairly open, go towards Laredo and it can get so thick you can barely move through it with chaps and a machete if the ranch hasn’t been cleared or sprayed in a while.

 

[Mike D Texas]

No matter how hard you try to make Texas high fence “Hunting” hunting it’ll never ever be the same “Hunting” as it is on open public grounds. I’ve been to Texas, I’ve experienced this type of hunting and it isn’t the same, never will be. Let’s just call it what it is.

Oh, and I’ll never go high fence hunting in Texas ever again. It’s not for me.

I’m not sure what your experience was, but there are high fence ranches in Texas that are huge. I hunted on in 2014 that was 122,000 acres; that’s 190 square miles.

If you had a poor experience, that’s unfortunate. But there is plenty of privately owned land mass in Texas that exceeds 100k acres. Unfortunately there are some unscrupulous people that high fence and stock very small parcels as well.

 

[MuleyFever]

There are definitely massive high fence properties that can make the hunting experience authentic. There is still a stink on them that many people don't like though. Properties like that can be heavily managed so that you have very high buck numbers and above average age and size. They can still be hard to kill but people are buying access to that environment that you can't get outside the fence. To each their own.

 

[BigHog]

Worth pointing out that you can hunt these animals 'free range' in a couple places. The feral populations of exotics in south Texas is massive. I've killed wild axis and aoudad on public land and see a variety of exotic deer on my property from time to time.

 

[Bamban]

No matter how hard you try to make Texas high fence “Hunting” hunting it’ll never ever be the same “Hunting” as it is on open public grounds. I’ve been to Texas, I’ve experienced this type of hunting and it isn’t the same, never will be. Let’s just call it what it is.

Oh, and I’ll never go high fence hunting in Texas ever again. It’s not for me.

I always refer to it as harvesting.

 

[Bamban]

Come hunt south Texas thornbrush either low or high fence and you will come to understand a high fence is meaningless to fair chase on any property over several hundred acres. The brush is virtually impenetrable to a human. The deer and nilgai just vanish within 10 feet.

Ditto!

Track a deer into the thorny rattle infested brush of SoTex on fours you'll find out quickly what @yfarm is talking about. Yes, I've killed many rattlers there during deer season. Around the ranch house, crossing the senderos, and a couple too slow to move with with bulging belly - rabbit.

 

[CHWine]

I hunted Cape Buffalo in South Africa. It was my fourth visit there after taking various plains game on the other hunts. The buffalo hunt was high fence. The 'enclosure' we were hunting had a perimeter fence that was 47 MILES long. Once inside we never saw the fence again. The operators did an aerial count the previous year and counted something like 120 animals. In four days of hunting we saw about 6 buffalo the entire time. Yes I got one, and its one of my prized possessions. On the way back to Jo-berg airport, we drove past many properties that had 12 strand electric fences about 8 feet hugh. Canned lion hunts said my PH buddy. The average enclosure for these is about 300 acres.

 

[Livedog]

Adding “woo woo” to my technical terms list.

I enjoy your podcasts Cliff. Will give this one a listen. First thing that comes to my mind when high fence is mentioned is the lack of satisfaction I would anticipate. Shooting/killing vs hunting. I don’t even want to sit in someone else’s deer stand.

At the same time, they’ve radio collared whitetail in high fence locations that hunters had no idea were there. So there’s that I guess.

 

[JFK]

I’ll never hunt high fence. Just not for me.

The “it’s gotta be on public land” crowd is laughable. Yes, generally speaking, it’s harder to kill animals on public and it does add to the sense of accomplishment. If I had the means I’d buy a landowner tag every year and wouldn’t feel bad about it for one second.