Akaskan sees first super-sized Texas critter ...

[Greybeard]

' Been huntin' mostly Northeast Texas for the last couple of years with a Buddy who grew up in Alaska. During that time, we've heard comments out of him such as "I've got more meat off of a FISH than there is on these Texas deer."

Well, yesterday we took him out to West Texas for a little quail hunting. At one point while navigating through the mesquite trees, he suddenly yelled, "There's a deer!" and jogged over toward me for a better look just before it vanished in the distance. At which point he stopped and realized. "That was not a deer, that was a rabbit!" Holding his hand about 4' feet off the gound, he said, it's EARS must have been THIS tall. And was somewhat embarrassed when we re-welcomed him to Tejas - and jackrabbit country!

He wound up shooting a couple of them and decided they were not worth it when I told him the meat was pretty tough - and he learned they were rather heavy to carry, especially two of 'em.

Maybe now he'll back off some about the size of the Central Texas deer.

 

[Art Eatman]

Take him down into the brush country west of SanAntone and south of US 90. Introduce him to some of the rattlesnakes down there. It's no BS they can grow to seven feet in length, and be thick enough that it takes two hands to encircle the thick part of the body...

Heck, some of those critters don't need fangs or poison; they can bust a leg when they strike!

Art

 

[walking arsenal]

can you eat snake?

 

[dfaugh]

Yum

Roasted Rattle snake---tastes kinda like chicken.

 

[DigMe]

thick enough that it takes two hands to encircle the thick part of the body...

Especially when it has a small child digesting in it's stomach.

brad cook

 

[Smoke]

can you eat snake?

You can, I have, won't do it again.

Roasted Rattle snake---tastes kinda like chicken.

Kinda like a chicken that died of old age and was not found for a week before it was plucked and cooked.

If I come upon a snake as Art described, I will not attempt to circle it's girth with my hands until I have shot it 10 times with a .20ga and run over it a few times with my truck.

Smoke - don't like big snakes.

 

[musher]

Ahem, ya'll ought to not get into these Alaska-Texas discussions.

The Arctic (or tundra) hare occurs primarily in north western Alaska. The arctic hare ranges in size from 6-12 lbs and aggregates in groups of up to 300 individuals. Arctic hares have large claws on all four feet that allow them to scrape away ice and snow to get to food. They also have specially adapted front teeth that are longer and shaped differently than other hares and rabbits. In the winter they sometimes feed on meat as well as twigs and grasses found under the snow.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

Quote:
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Smoke - don't like big snakes.
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A long time ago, my company was sent to look for a VC base camp. The area was second-growth jungle -- you had to force and hack your way through it. I finally got a call from one of my platoon leaders, and when I reached his postion he was in an eroded gully. At the lip of the gully was solid jungle, but with a "tunnel" leading through the brush -- a game trail.

That looked promising, so we investigated, crawling on hands and knees. About a hundred yards down the trail, my point man came crawling back He didn't say "'scuse me, Captain," or "kiss my foot," he just shouldered me out of the way and kept going. A couple of seconds later, another man did the same thing. I could hear a third man crawling toward me from some distance away, and it occurred to me that when we went in, there were only TWO Americans ahead of me.

I drew my .45, and started cautiously forward. Behind me, I could hear the point man talking to the platoon leader, "Sna...sna...sna." He just couldn't seem to get it out.

Just as I stuck my head around a bend in the trail, he managed, "Sna... sna...sna...SNAKE!"

Well, he didn't have to tell ME. I could SEE the Sna...sna...sna ...SNAKE!" eyeball to eyeball -- and his eyeballs were MUCH bigger than mine.

By the time I came flying backward out of the trail, the whole platoon was gathered in the gully. The slide on my .45 was locked back, my magazine pouch was empty, and I don't remember reloading at all. The snake was a python, about 18 feet long, and he must have cleared an acre of brush as he was dying.

For months after that, if the troops wanted to needle me, one of them would mutter "G..g...g..gimme a g..g..gadam g.g.g.g.grenade, g..g..gadam it!"

 

[Matt G]

I've hunted several places in Texas where a 110 lb buck was about as big as you got, and it wasn't at all unusual to find a fully-matured 95lb buck.

But then I've seen some big ones. Coming out of Alpine after hunting in Terlingua for mule deer, I had to lock up my brakes to miss hitting a mulie buck that had fat swinging from him as he waddled across the road. At a guess, I'd put his on-the-hoof weight upward of 250 lb, if not closer to 300 lbs.

Up in the Red River valley around Clay and Montague Counties, when the rains are right and the pecans and oaks are dropping nuts 'til you can't see the dirt on the ground, you can find whitetail bucks that go above 200 lbs. I've seen 'em, and helped heft 'em into a pickup (though I never dropped one that big-- most of mine up there went from 125 to 175 lbs).

Down in Uvalde County a few years back, I shot the biggest biggest deer I've ever gotten, and he was a nice 200 lb buck. Unusually large for that small-deer area, but it was noted that a local rancher that had imported some large whitetails (for improving his local genetics stock) from Kansas (of all places) had just lost 5 of 'em when his high fence washed out at a creek crossing. Hmm. (Well, when you fence a wild thing, you can't complain when it gets out.)

 

[sturmruger]

A couple of years ago I moved from NW Wisconsin to SE Iowa. In my opinion WI has some of the best whitetail hunting in the whole US. We have lots of big deer and very healthy population. I was blown away when I moved to IA the size of the deer down there was very impressive. It not uncommon at all for deer to be 300+ lbs.

 

[El Tejon]

Driving at night on the backroads from Austin to Kerrville, I have never grown panicky over hitting a Texas-sized deer (medium sized dogs to me), but my heart has skipped a beat in encountering a Texas-sized rabbit.

Someone tell me what they are doing in the middle of the road anyway. Meetings? Conference calls? What?

I always wanted to taste Texas venison. Wonder if it tastes different because of their diet (not as much soybeans, apples, corn and other veggies).

 

[Seventhsword]

yeah, the rabbits are pretty big here as well as the rattlers.