East Texas Opening Day

Hey guys- I am going to be hunting in East Texas Wed-Friday this week, I've never hunted out that way. I was planning on gun hunting and just tagging the deer on Saturday morning. Supposedly in the pines, its kind of a "no say, no tell" system. As long as you are cool about it? Any one hunt in east Texas with advice?

You are correct, but you have to call the game warden and let him know what you are doing first. They do appreciate the call.

Yeah, call the GW and let him know what you are planning to do, That way if a neighbor calls him and says they hear shooting, he will know its you.

Ok cool. I appreciate it fellas, I hardly believed my buddy when he told me that it was cool. Typically, the GW are hard-on's about stretching the rules, but thats awesome. Im gonna try to find the local guy now. Good luck!!

Don't forget to stage a good limit of fish in laundry baskets for Saturdays tournament since you will already have your deer killed and can now fish!

Be sure to film your hunt and post it on Facebook

No way haha! I am a lot of things but one thing I am not is a liar. Its one thing to stretch the rules or bend them a little. But to cheat or break the law.. no shot I would even consider that.

Make sure you tell them where you are hunting as well.

Interesting dialogue. Hope you bag a monster.

its kind of a "no say, no tell" system
Never heard of a system like that. Describe please?

I always use the " have someone drive me around the county roads " method
while I hang my gun out of the window.
Whole lot easier to me.
I also have my best luck at night

Good Luck
Have lots of fun

Oh ! ! !
Almost forgot.
Be sure to bring a gallon of your favorite whiskey to have a nip
every now and then.
This time of year with the windows down with your gun hanging
out it can get pretty chilly, and sipping lots of whiskey can help
ward off the chill

Good Luck once again

Glad I won't be in east Texas this Saturday.

It never fails that after the third weekend of the General Season, East Texas deer hunters will swear all the deer have disappeared.

It does seem that lots of east Texas folk don’t pay much mind to hunting regulations and fences. It seems those are just suggestions.

They do tend to be more active at night, and much easier to spot...them there shinny eyes gives'em away every time!

I have property in East Texas. Been hunting there for 10+ years and never heard of “no say, no tell”.

Good luck with that.

Stay out of Tyler and Angelina counties with that policy, the Eddins brothers don't play!

My property is in Freestone Co. and you've already broken the "no say, no tell" system. Since you are a rookie, we'll let it slide this time. Good advice has been giving already, follow it. I'll add, when you call ahead, make sure to give your license plate# and description of your truck. GW feels safer when he knows what/who he is approaching. Let us know how your hunt goes in the new territory.

WTF

Yes ^ ^
They'll also hold pretty still with the light in their eyes
so you can take a better shot. I find this allows me to
use a smaller firearm like a 22 rifle for precise head
shots, and is much quieter so as not to disturb any
neighbors that might be sleeping at such a late hour.
You have to be considerate of your neighbors and
not startle them late at night ( early early morning)
with a gunshot in front of their house.
Another benefit is that with a quieter firearm you
might have multiple shots if the animals aren't
spooked initially. It really helps if you're needing to
take multiple deer each night

A homemade suppressor works well for this too!

Them Fram suppressors work real nice...real nice.

It's breaking the law as far as I'm concerned, regardless of verbal permission.

Now that is a little harsh I would say, I would call it more "interpreting the law"...

I didn't know the season in East Texas ever closed.

SHHH

Lawless are they that make their wills their law.......William Shakespeare

Yeah you just can’t tag it until Saturday. Common knowledge. I’d also buy your kids and grandparents license regardless of age.

In East Texas, you can just wait until you kill a deer to buy a license. At least that was what I've been told for years.

Heck, it’s east Texas, bring a spotlight too.

^^^^^^

It doesn't (for some).

But there ARE two different seasons:

Deer Season in the hot months (June thru Sept)
Deer Season in the cooler months (Oct thru May).

I was completely unaware of this....when I moved to Deep East Texas 35 yrs. ago.

I continue to hunt only during the 'legal' season....as I was raised to do (Central Texas). Some folks in these parts....think I am crazy for not taking advantage of the rest of the year.

While nearly everything posted so far has been in jest, East Texas has the reputation that it does for good reason.

A LOT of things that wouldn't fly elsewhere are considered 'Birthright' here.

Kinda like trespassing and crossing the fence onto someone else's property
to hunt even though you have as much or more land to hunt at your disposal?

" Yeah, ol' mister so-and-so always let us hunt or fish or do whatever we wanted
to on this land when he owned it. . . "

Heard this one a bunch ^

My next door neighbor has 1 section (644 acres) near Canton and doesn't care who hunts on it. Said it's family land and will never sell it.

It's kind of like the old rules about being gay in the military...don't ask, don't tell.

So people that shoot deer early in East Texas and tag it Saturday are gay?

I’m really out of the loop on this stuff.

It’s all true…..east Texas is a horrible place. If I was y’all, I would stay far, far away.
I wouldn’t even drive through there if it was me.

.22 to the ear while holding a LoneStar beer & pickled sausage.

Probably not....but if you see some dude in a Pink Camo Boonie Hat, well....................

Damn did I enter the bunker

No spot light?

We have a small ranch in east texas. I have seen Game wardens on the county roads several times. Some are so ignorant they don't realiize even a warden could read this.

Good luck this weekend Okie, Hope y'all see a good one.

Will text you if I do any good. Be safe!

Flint.

If you boys think east Texas is the wild west of deer hunting let me introduce you to the entire state of Arkansas

that's what I've been told also. This will be my first year hunting in Arkansas.

You going to run dogs after them or do regular style hunting? At least I think they still use chase dogs there.

I am regular hunter, but I was told by a neighbor down the road that lots of people run dogs around my place.
I hope I can keep calm as I watch dogs run through my fields.

Not really much difference in that and having the the hog
doggers come through your fenced and posted land here
( I go where my dogs go) and having them come through
when you're hunting in another state

Arkansas is where I first learned about what a sound shot was
I had no idea that anybody would ever do that

Please enlighten me, I'm ignorant?

A buddy and I have a place for hog hunting in Panola county. It's not near any public land and not in what you would think of as a deer lease type area. We hunt hogs there year round from stands set up for night hunting and also for camping and sleeping in. I hunt from an old camper. So we are in our stands all night when we are there. What amazes me is almost every night any time of year weekend or week day, there is distant shooting going on at random times during the night. Often it is rapid fire volleys, sometimes single shots, and everything in between. Big pows and little pows. Sometimes it will go on for an hour or two. Pretty much every night I am there and not from one area or direction. My first thought is how the heck can these people afford all that ammo to be shooting every night? And what the heck are they shooting at? Do they every sleep?

According to the ark native that sent rounds nearby
where a friend was sitting in a brush blind, when you
hear a sound and send projectiles toward where you
think the sound was, is a "sound shot"
When asked what the shooter was popping off
shots at, he replied " Yeah, I didn't see much of
anything, but I got a sound shot. . ." ( not verbatim)

Apparently, that's an acceptable practice in some
regions

It's similar to what I heard referred to as a hail mary shot
around here. Hunting some years back with a group one
man asked if I'd seen anything that morning. I said yeah
I'd seen a doe. He says well you didn't hit it? I say no, it
was really too far for a decent shot. He says didn't I take
a hail mary ? I says a what? He says a hail mary. That's
where you just pop a shot or fling an arrow on the chance
something might connect. He says you can't kill an animal
if you don't take a shot.

The difference being that you've actually seen an animal
taking a hail mary, and you haven't actually seen anything
taking a sound shot

I have a place in East Texas and I would advise you to shoot any black panthers you see also. According to everyone I've met since we bought our land, the whole area is overrun with them.

^^^^

I concur. Of all the places Black Panthers supposedly exist in Texas, East Texas is just lousy with them (according to locals).

It would not surprise me to learn that the 'Bigfeet' (if that is the correct Plural rendering) that live here....keep them as pets.

Thanks, now I understand.
Once when I was about 21-22 I took my girlfriend at that time to our place during deer season. I went out before sunrise and she of course stayed in bed. After a few hours, I heard something in the woods, it was her, looking for me. Glad I didn't take a sound shot.

You guys are hard on East Texas. I like East Texas but not a fan of breaking game laws. I met the game warden in Camp county last year on opening weekend. Drove up to my cabin. He checked my license and my buddies. Nice but certainly didn’t seem like someone that would allow what is being talked about here.

I know it can be different for land owners that live locally and know the game warden personally. Maybe they give them some leeway. I doubt that would apply to the OP hunting on someone’s land in East Texas for the first time.

a good bit of the posts are sarcasm, and posted for a joke

the sound shot and hail mary shot business is genuine as
is the trespassing.
pretty much everywhere i've ever hunted where there wasn't
somebody on site all the time (landowner, ranch manager, etc. )
had trespassing. there's places where it was more obvious
than others, but it was there. one place was cut in two by a
state highway, and the landowner lived on one side and we
hunted the other. one time we found where somebody had cut
a piece of fence and was going in and out with jeeps and
ATV's. the landowner knew nothing about it. I've caught
people before that their excuse was more or less the previous
man that had owned the place allowed them free reign to
run willy nilly over the place and shoot and hunt and get
drunk and toss cans and cigarette butts wherever they felt
like it. all that and the "i go wherever my dogs go" hog hunters.

it's all out there, just more obvious and some places
worse than others

should have also added that i was meaning as far as west
of sweetwater/ colorado city to south around freer, north
to the red river, and the louisiana line
i haven't hunted that much in what is considered central Texas

And then you got the guy like the one that lives down the county road from me that gets busted running a co-ck fighting ring at his place. I have met some good people in east Texas including some others that live fairly close or just pass by on the county road but a few make it kind of unpleasant for everyone nearby. The site wouldn't let me post the word for "rooster" so I changed it up.

I'm on the stand now. Maybe I should take one of those sound shots.

You can try what I always call the new-glock-field-test

About 9-9:30-10 AM
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I'm going to get my and wait for this episode of Lonestar law.