Father Son Hunt at MC Ranch

What a great weekend Justin and I had. A client of mine, Scott Heiman, invited Justin down to his 2,000 acre ranch near Bandera, TX for Justin to shoot his first buck since he shot his first doe last year. This is a managed deer/wild game ranch (http://www.texastrophyranch.com/) and they have some bucks that are called “cull bucks” which are male deer that they want taken out of the population to better the herd. So we headed down with bags and guns packed on Friday, January 2nd and staying until Sunday, January 4th. It was a terrific drive through parts of the hill country. Justin even put his new DS game down long enough to enjoy the view. We got there mid afternoon and after a tour of the main lodge we had a snack and watched some college football while Justin played some pool. Justin wasn’t the only boy there. Scott had his 2 boys and 2 other gentlemen had their sons there too. The ages ranged from 7 to 15 years old. It was decided that Justin and I would sit in the “Tom’s blind” that evening hunt. We weren’t sure what to expect when he dropped us off at 4:30. At 5:00 the corn feeder went off and it was like the dinner bell had gone off. Not 10 minutes later we had 20 deer feeding in front of the blind from 30 yards to 80 yards away. Then this big bodied deer stepped out. I told Justin that was his deer. One shot and he was down. Not the best placement shot in the world but it got him down. We walked up to the buck and it was the biggest deer I have ever seen up close. The first thing that Justin did was say “God, please take this deer meat up to heaven so you can give it to those people who don’t have enough to eat.” I told Justin that this was our place as sportsman to do that in honor of God. He agreed that we would get it processed and used accordingly.
There was some mistaking the deer as a cull buck as two of his points were broken off at the base and he looked like a 6 pointer rather than an 8 pointer with 2 tips broken off. I thought to myself “well, I guess this is going to hit the pocket book” since a deer like this would normally be a “management buck” and cost about $3,000 to shoot out here. Luckily Scott being the greatest host ever drove up and said “Hey, no problem, there was no way to tell and this is Justin’s first buck let’s go take pictures and celebrate.” I had to agree that it was going to be mounted, which I would have been crazy not to get this monster mounted. Talking momma into it coming into the house would be another story. After going and help track a doe that one of the boys shot with a bow and arrow, we headed back to camp to clean the deers and eat supper. All the other boys are either relatives or close friends there was a lot of horse play and partying going on until LATE. So late that Justin and I opted to sleep in the next morning instead of hunting. We got some good rest and then helped with some of the ranch chores like repair and fill feeders. That evening we got to sit in “Ryan’s Blind”. Nothing came in until right at dark and it was too hard for Justin to see. We did get to see a Sika buck and doe no more than 20 feet away from us. We returned to camp for some good supper.

Then a really exciting part of our trip was about to begin. This ranch has a deer breeding operation on it and that night we helped with dividing up some yearling bucks into 2 pens. The process was real hands on and I mean “Hands On”. Justin had to stay in the room with a window right behind us as the deer would come through a chute to have their tags checked to see what pen they would go into. Even though these bucks are raised behind a fence doesn’t mean they aren’t wild, so incase one of them got out of control and out of the chute Justin would be out of harm’s way. I guess they figured I was big enough I could take a good butt whipping by a deer. Along the way there were also 2 doe in there that had to go to a 3rd pen. Well one of these does was born there and bottle feed so she was actually used to being touched by humans. While she was in the chute, Justin got to come out of the room and pet her. Hopefully Justin got something out of this that we don’t just shoot wild animals but we as hunters are the protectors and overseers of these animals. We still got to bed at a decent hour that night. We got up at 5am on Sunday to a cold front that was just blowing in. The wind picked up to about 30mph and it was cold. Justin and I got assigned the “Boat House Blind” which is actually a room off part of the boat house they have there on their lake. Scott spread about 2 bags of corn out only 30 yards in front of us. As the sun was coming up you could make out the images of several deer. After the sun was fully up, there were over 30 deer eating in front of us. We sat there and watched the deer (between the laps of Mario Cart on the DS) mingle back and forth and try running each other off their corn pile. We got to see some of the prettiest and biggest deer ever. There were a couple of “Trophy Bucks” there that any hunter would love to have on their wall. It was great just getting the opportunity to see them. After an hour there were just a few deer there and no “cull bucks”. I told Justin that Mr. Scott needs some does taken to help keep the population of the herd balanced. I pointed to the one he should shoot. He looked at me and said “Daddy, I want you to shoot so you can have a deer of your own”. After several minutes of conversation it was clear that Justin wasn’t going to shoot so I took the shot. We loaded her up and headed back to camp for some breakfast. As we drove away from the blind, I thought how great it was that I could spend time with my son and new friends out in God’s country with God’s creatures. I planned on taking a bunch of pictures but I was in awe most of the time there and forgot to pick up the camera. I did however capture the picture of Justin with his first buck and that smile tells the whole story.

There were many other stories like how Justin spilled an entire bottle of Chocolate Milk in the front interior of my truck and we had to pull over on I-35 for 10 minutes trying to clean it up. Luckily I had a roll of paper towels in the dog box that is in the back of my truck. Then there was the one were the older boys were getting a little irritated with Justin and he comes from the playroom to me and says”Daddy, the boys are lying to me. They said that the pool stick got up and walked away. I don’t believe them.” I could go on and on……