Lampasas cull
I hunt a 350 acre ranch in Lampasas. It is family land and I have several cousins and other relatives that hunt there. I am telling you all this because it makes it very hard to manage the deer there because everyone seems to have a different philosophy on managing the place. My brother and I are of the opinion to let them get 4-5 years old and grow to their full potential unless they are obviosly culls. Our ranch borders Krivoman's ranch and we have seen some great improvement in the deer over the past 8-10 years. I hunted opening weekend and passed on a great looking 11 point. He was obviously a young buck but geeez he was nice! The first pic is a trail cam pic of him. This buck was under my feeder for over an hour and was such a pig that he did not even run when the feeder went off. He sat there and let the corn fall all over him and continued eating. I wonder if he might be deaf. Anyway, I did not shoot anything opening weekend. I had a chance to go back last weekend and passed on this same buck twice. He was in the feeder for 45min to an hour both times. I am not going to lie it was hard passing on him as he would easily be my largest deer ever taken. I am very scared that one of my family will shoot this buck, they are all rifle hunters. I can only hope he gets smarter and stays in my area for the remainder of the season. The last evening I hunted I had several does pass down wind of me and they knew something was not right but they did not blow they just did not come in to the feeder. A few minutes after they left three bucks approached and a spike went right in without checking the wind. He started eating immediatly and I was hoping the other two eights would follow but they did not. They checked down wind and decided they did not like what they smelled either. They did not blow they just trotted off. I was semi-relieved that they did not blow but still skeptical as to whether I would have anything else come in. The spike fed for about 15 minutes then decided he was finished and left the feeder pen. He met up with a small 8 outside the pen and they started sparing. I was enjoying watching those two when I noticed movement coming in from my right. Two more eights were headed into the feeder and they did not check the wind. I noticed one was kinda limping. The other buck was a young eight that needs at least two more years. The limping deer we will call "single jingle" (you will find out why latrer). Well I had seen Single jingle on trail cam and my brother and I decided he was a cull. I decided to take him. He offered me a quartering shot at 10 yds and I smoked him. He ran about 150 yds and I watched as he crashed in an open field. I am glad I saw him fall because I made a semi-high shot and he only bled for about the first 30 yds and then it was very hard to trail. While cleaning this buck we found that he had an old injury on a hind leg and that he only had one testicle (single jingle). This was the first deer that I shot up there in 6 years. I really hope that noone gets to the 11 point and maybe I will see him again next season.
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