2025 Texas Hunt

[Eric M]

I'm here in Texas, about to head to the first ranch I will be hunting, which is NE of Dallas. The ranch belongs to the sister of my High School buddy and her husband. It is a really nice place, with rolling hills, ponds, brush and trees. Last year I shot a nice sized hog and two beavers (one was huge). My buddy, Dave and I will both be using 16" AR15s chambered in our .24 Varminter cartridge. I loaded both 55 grain NBTs and 70 grain NBTs. Both are extremely effective on the wild hogs and beavers.

After we finish hunting this ranch, we will head South to the Temple, TX area and target more hogs and also Whitetail deer. There are a bunch of marauding raccoons, too. We are going to try for some small management bucks, both spikes and a 6 point that is of legal size.

I'll update this thread as the hunt plays out.
Here are some gamecam pictures of what we are after.

 

[Bullseye69]

Good luck.
Looks like a good time.
Are the beaver in a pond or like a flooded river area?
I have wanted to hunt TX but just haven't got there.

 

[KevinG]

We lived just outside of Temple(and our son was born there) in the early 1980's........at Lake Belton.

Pretty country.

Kevin

 

[Ingwe]

I just got back from my fall Texas hunt(s). I had scheduled 3 hunts back to back, first for hogs, then a couple nights predator calling in west Texas then a meat hunt near Waco. Weather was good and everything went off without a hitch. Hope yours goes as well!

 

[Eric M]

Good luck.
Looks like a good time.
Are the beaver in a pond or like a flooded river area?
I have wanted to hunt TX but just haven't got there.

They are in ponds on the property. However, there is a river nearby that feeds replacements after they are "removed".

 

[Eric M]

Big hog down! We spotted him with my thermal scanner at the feeder a few hundred yards away. We did a sneak and got within 100 yards. Using a tree as a rest, my buddy gave me the first shot, with his shot immediately afterwards. The 70 grain NBTs dropped it in his tracks. It was literally a "thump" "thump" with the bullet hits. We'll get him weighed tomorrow. I'm definitely keeping this blocky skull!

More to come!

 

[Eric M]

After the shot investigation of video and the hog shows that my first shot hit in-between his eyes, entered the skull and almost exited. It broke the skull in the exit location, but did not exit. My buddy, Dave's shot, hit a little back and high. The 70 grain Nosler BT still liquefied its insides. Everything performed extremely well!

Let me also add information on the AR15s we used. Both of them have billet upper/lower/handguards made by a company here in the Boise, Idaho area called Founding Father's Armory (link included). I spoke with the owner, Alex and came up with the perfect sized AR for the type of hunting I do in Texas every year. Using our own .24 Varminter 16" barrels, coupled with his compact handguards, they were both made for easily manageable, lightweight rifles for use in both open areas in North Texas and the thick brush in the South. Both rifles were suppressed with Otter Creek Polonium-K suppressors, which kept the compact feature in place. I urge you to take a look at the Founding Father's Armory products. Alex makes great products at a reasonable price and he can ship to your FFL for serialized goods, or to you directly for non-serialized products.

 

[Eric M]

Last night was a bust, but we are heading South today for more hunting.

 

[Ingwe]

After the shot investigation of video and the hog shows that my first shot hit in-between his eyes, entered the skull and almost exited. It broke the skull in the exit location, but did not exit. My buddy, Dave's shot, hit a little back and high. The 70 grain Nosler BT still liquefied its insides. Everything performed extremely well!

This is some good stuff! I'm prompted to put up a couple pics of my Texas hunt last week....An evening with the .22 mag, and an evening with the .223 plus a little close up of some cutters....

 

[Kenbro]

Nice going , Eric,
Is your sight night vision or thermal?
Will you use the same rifle/ bullet combo for any deer you take?
Thanks, Ken.

 

[Eric M]

It is a thermal optic by AGM (Varmint LRF Varmint). I used this set-up for deer yesterday afternoon and it worked great, even with temps in the mid-60s. I brought a Leupold scope to swap to, but we planned to hunt for hogs right after cleaning the deer, so I left it on the rifle. Unfortunately, thick fog ruined that plan. Thermals are useless in thick fog.

 

[Eric M]

This is some good stuff! I'm prompted to put up a couple pics of my Texas hunt last week....An evening with the .22 mag, and an evening with the .223 plus a little close up of some cutters....

Nice job! We have not seen any groups of hogs yet, but we'll see.

 

[Eric M]

Day Four of my Texas hunt had me driving South near Temple, TX for deer and more hog hunting. We had hoped to be in the stand by 3:00PM, but leaving late and traffic through Dallas/Plano had us climbing the stand at 4:15PM.

Shoot time ended at 5:58PM, so we had a decent amount of time during the prime late afternoon/evening hours. I was still using my AR15 in .24 Varminter with the 70 grain Nosler Ballistic Tips, topped with my AGM Varmint LRF Thermal. Even though I was shooting during the day, the temps were still cool enough for spotting and shooting properly.

After a short while, we were watching squirrels run around the feeder for about 40 minutes, when a buck started working its way through the brush towards us. It did not go to the feeder. Instead, he hung out on the edges of the brush, staying partially hidden behind the Scrub Oak, nibbling on acorns. As it moved into an open spot, Dave told me to take the shot. He was 80 yards away and we were up in the stand about 20 feet. I found the deer in my crosshairs, picked the spot and fired. On impact, the buck collapsed immediately, kick a few times from nerves firing off and died.

Dave got down the stand first and walked right to the buck. He wanted to see the unique rack this 8-Point had. I caught up to him and was very happy with his body size and the funky antlers he was sporting.

I won't bore you with the skinning and cleaning details, but he was a very healthy and clean buck. While tagging it, I took a much better look at the rack and it sank in how really cool this guy was.

Rain and thick fog killed any nighttime hunting chances, as well as this morning. If things clear up, we will be targeting tree squirrels today with .22 rimfires. It will be a blast!

 

[Ingwe]

More Texas stuff from last week for you. After my hog hunt I wanted to take my CZ457 .22 mag out after some fox.....and a couple raccoons thrown in on the second night before rain called a halt. Fun Times!

 

[Bullseye69]

Day Four of my Texas hunt had me driving South near Temple, TX for deer and more hog hunting. We had hoped to be in the stand by 3:00PM, but leaving late and traffic through Dallas/Plano had us climbing the stand at 4:15PM.

Shoot time ended at 5:58PM, so we had a decent amount of time during the prime late afternoon/evening hours. I was still using my AR15 in .24 Varminter with the 70 grain Nosler Ballistic Tips, topped with my AGM Varmint LRF Thermal. Even though I was shooting during the day, the temps were still cool enough for spotting and shooting properly.

After a short while, we were watching squirrels run around the feeder for about 40 minutes, when a buck started working its way through the brush towards us. It did not go to the feeder. Instead, he hung out on the edges of the brush, staying partially hidden behind the Scrub Oak, nibbling on acorns. As it moved into an open spot, Dave told me to take the shot. He was 80 yards away and we were up in the stand about 20 feet. I found the deer in my crosshairs, picked the spot and fired. On impact, the buck collapsed immediately, kick a few times from nerves firing off and died.

Dave got down the stand first and walked right to the buck. He wanted to see the unique rack this 8-Point had. I caught up to him and was very happy with his body size and the funky antlers he was sporting.

I won't bore you with the skinning and cleaning details, but he was a very healthy and clean buck. While tagging it, I took a much better look at the rack and it sank in how really cool this guy was.

Rain and thick fog killed any nighttime hunting chances, as well as this morning. If things clear up, we will be targeting tree squirrels today with .22 rimfires. It will be a blast!

That is a unique rack. Good job!

 

[Eric M]

The end is here! I'm sitting in a motel room near the DFW airport and head back to Idaho in the morning. Here's the last of the hunt information.

Let me start with the tree squirrels! I'll just say that I should have stuck with the plan and grabbed one of Dave's 10/22s. Instead, I grabbed his suppressed handgun chambered in .22LR. I got some great shot opportunities, but I realized after the hunt that the pistol was over a foot high at 15 feet!! Needless to say, I got skunked!

I did spend one more afternoon in the treestand, hoping for a decent sized spike to come out. Unfortunately, I only encountered does, so I did not take a shot.

However, after a morning/early afternoon of howling winds, Dave hopped in the same stand the following evening.
Dave took out this bobcat with his .223 chambered AR and Hornady 55 grain VMax factory ammunition. He has a take out all predators rule on his ranch, especially bobcats, as they take down a lot of fawns.

Monday morning we took care of some ranch business, then headed South and dropped my deer meat off at the Westphalia Meat Market for processing into summer and smoked sausage. After that, Dave and I dropped by Capitol Armory to take care of a gun transfer.

I pulled out of the Cedar Park late in the afternoon, but only made it back up to the Temple area to sleep. Today, I drove up to the airport area. Although I had a blast! I'll have more thoughts on this hunt once I get home.

 

[Old Hickory]

That was quite some hunting, Eric! I was born in Texas and lived there off and on. On the Tex-Mex border I was staying in Laredo and working in Zapata, south of Laredo. I saw varmints every day along the highway and every inch of land was posted no hunting.

And while living in Baytown, we saw very few varmints of the four legged kind except for the gators near our home.

 

[MTPaul]

Thanks for taking us along on your trip to the Lone Star State! By the looks of your success, I would imagine that another trip down south will be forthcoming at some point. For those of us in the far north, we can only wait patiently for the warmer weather to eventually arrive, although with the warmer temps of late (40s and 50s) it sure doesn't jive with mid-December.

For example, last year at this same time the snow drifts covered the nearby fence posts holding up the snow fence. The only snow is now found in the far-off mountains with nothing but bare ground around the homestead.