The landowner got a great deal out of the cleanup, his pasture will be a lot more productive. In the long run your area will also be greatly improved for deer hunting.

Care to explain? If its all been cleared how does that make it better?

Sounds like someone is wanting to run off the current hunters so they can lease the hunting rights.

This.
Last year he turns out cows opening week?
This year he moonscapes the place?
Based on the landowner's reaction, you better start looking...

Don't understand this deal. I didn't see any mention of the size of the place but the cost of clearing the brush could run several thousand dollars. Not sure why a lessee would commit that much money without having some type of arrangement with the landowner. Something does not add up. I am wondering if they may be planning on eventually putting the cleared area into cultivation.

Many landowners, especially west, don't even know when deer season is.... Agree with AEB that cost money, bet they knew about that though, unless they have a lonnnng term lease

In my opinion you should shake the mans hand. Property managment comes way before recreational hunting. With the beef prices up and climbing they are clearing the junk out of the way in order to get more good stuff in the ground for the cattle to graze on, one more acre to graze cattle on equals more cattle. Land owner still should have let you know if youre paying for the lease, (aeb) is right that is no cheap clean up job that happens in one afternoon, that takes time.

I agree 100% with what KHH stated about property management, well said.

Timeline:
First came the mesquite (invasive non-native species)
Second came the whitetail (invasive non-native species)
Third came the hunters out of the city (invasive non-native species)

Were does the invasive non-native exotic fit in, cattle? Whitetail are a native game animal to that area.

It was just a joke. Whitetails were introduced to most parts of central and west Texas in the 50s and their population has exploded.

that sucks.

Landowners who lease their property for deer hunting don't even know when deer season is...

Bulldoze a stand... save a cow.

Not sure if I am getting this right. They cleared the land around your hunting area, planted a wheat field that has grown in nicely all in one week?

I am missing something here

Wheat field was already there. Pictures are from different locations

Yep. You got screwed. That guy knows someone who wants to hunt there or just wants the hunters out of the way. Nothing you can really do but maybe move your feeders near any available cover and hope for the best then pack your stuff up at the end of the season. What they have done cannot be undone.

I will try to put some context here briefly. It will probably strengthen the Rancher proponents but that is OK. My point is it was done without LO permission and no heads up to us at all. There is active dialog between hunters (lease manager) and rancher/farmer so it would have been easy to give intentions.

drought in the area - that tank dried up completely and was causing issues with cows getting stuck as all tanks on property were. they fenced them all off. note red line of where he ran fence. just 10ft on the backside of my feed pen. they dug new tanks or expanded tanks in the plowed fields. other tanks were fenced off too. seemed as though they were chalking them up as gone and focusing on tanks in plowed fields. i "thought" they were fencing out the cows. about 1 month ago they started digging that tank out - expanding it as they did the plowed fields so it raised my concern. as i watched, they cleared all the way to field and my blind. they touched nothing behind my pen or blind and stopped where yellow line was. i though they were done. seemed OK. that was last weekend. then this week they came in and cleaned all the way to back fence line. this is not for planting. they have close to 900 acres already. what is a few more going to do? i can see the need to clear up to the tank i guess. he could have easily (in my opinion) fenced out my area by cutting across in front of my pen. wouldn't have been as much area for him but there is plenty. the cows never went back there much before anyway.

as for them wanting us off, rancher maybe. i don't think for a second the landowner does. just last month he invited us all into his house to show us pictures of deer and talk about his upcoming vacations. he has a good relationship with the lease manager.

Maybe he thought he was helping you and is just a little short on the common sense side

So there is the landowner, a rancher, a farmer, a lease manager, and you??....that's a lot of people to deal with on the same property. Sounds like a recipe for disaster from the beginning.

Seems like one more good reason to buy land

wow

is this out of the ordinary? there is farmland, ranch land, and hunting. seems perfectly normal to me. lease manager - for hunting. someone has to coordinate the hunting right? i didn't even mention the gas/oil guys.....

Same thing happening on the ranch I hunt. With the lack of rain, they want those water sucking mesquites gone.