I have been wanting to make this thread for the last 6 years. It finally came together this past weekend for me. As many of you know, I own a ranch in Lampasas county. Very fortunate to have grown up hunting the ranch. Blessed is an understatement.
Hunting the same ranch your whole life you get to see special things. big deer, small deer, midget deer, Young deer and old deer. The deer I am writing about is an old deer. Very old in fact. Especially when you consider he lived on an off my low fence ranch for the past 12 years. Low fence ranches are nice in some instances and horrible in others. I can count endless amounts of big young deer that were never seen again. That is the life of a lowfencer... Then there is the opposite problem. A deer that is not super desirable that wont seem to die.
Introducing Criss Cross. As of this season, he is the ripe old age of at least 12. In low fence terms and just about any other terms, he is ancient. This would be awesome if he was a giant passing his genes around, but he just simply was not that. But he is no slouch either..
He showed up on the radar when he was about 3 or 4 in 2006. I have trail cam photos starting back in 2006. He is a super narrow deer that has a lopsided rack. Left beam always went up, and right beam always wrapped around lower. So they looked like they would eventually cross. He also has always had a red tent to his fur. So super easy to spot.
Trail Cam 2006-
In comes the Antler restrictions.. This is probably another reason he was able to make it this long. He has never really been outside the 13 inch mark. One year he was probably right at 13 inches. but not close enough to risk. This year he is probably closer to 10. So with him not being a monster, and antler restrictions limiting me to 1 buck, he seemed to have free reign on the ranch. At first I always saw him. Seemed to follow me around the ranch as if he knew he was off limits.
Trail Cam pic from 2008-
about 4 years ago, I finally made the switch over to MLD permits so that I could effectively manage the place better. That is when he must have got a memo letting him know that he was enemy #1. That is when he decided to play cat and mouse with us. I put several people on this deer to kill him. He just never would show up when we were there. If there ever was a deer who had figured us out, this is him. He would be on trail cam every day, then not when we would get in the blind. We tried Drop offs, walk in from East, walk in from West, walk in from South, get in blind in the middle of the night, stay all day etc... He just knew when we were there.
Trail Cam from 2013-
Last year I set my son up on a hill to watch what he was doing. I had my dad drop me off on the ranger. Son text me that CC was up on the hill behind me with about 6 other bucks. hour later feeder fires and all 6 bucks come in except CC. He just stayed up there and feed. this was after 6 strait days on Covert cam morning and evening.
I spent the last 2 previous years trying to get my youngest boy to shoot him since they are the same age. We never even laid an eyeball on him.
Trail Cam from 2014-
Trail Cam from This year.
Fast forward to Sat... I got a call from my buddy who was at the ranch that one of my feeders had not been going off and that the Ranger threw a drive belt. So I took off on Sat afternoon to fix ranger. Once I fixed it I had just enough time to Shower, throw out some tailgate corn and get in the tripod at the feeder that has not been going off. What the heck, I was already out there so why not. Weather was awesome so I knew it would be a good sit. This is the same tripod as I killed 1 Eye out of last month. It has turned into a hotspot...
Without any more ramblings, here he is in all his Not so Glory. He was a legend on my place. I have to admit I was very torn on shooting him as well as a little sad when it was done.. But never fear, his 5 year old son is now on the clock.. Lets hope it does not take another 7 years to kill him..
Here is the Next one on the List... -Criss Cross JR...
Here is the Video As well. The Video is very long as I was just really jazzed about this deer. Sorry for being long winded but it was a great hunt. Probably my best deer I have run an arrow through..
Hunting the same ranch your whole life you get to see special things. big deer, small deer, midget deer, Young deer and old deer. The deer I am writing about is an old deer. Very old in fact. Especially when you consider he lived on an off my low fence ranch for the past 12 years. Low fence ranches are nice in some instances and horrible in others. I can count endless amounts of big young deer that were never seen again. That is the life of a lowfencer... Then there is the opposite problem. A deer that is not super desirable that wont seem to die.
Introducing Criss Cross. As of this season, he is the ripe old age of at least 12. In low fence terms and just about any other terms, he is ancient. This would be awesome if he was a giant passing his genes around, but he just simply was not that. But he is no slouch either..
He showed up on the radar when he was about 3 or 4 in 2006. I have trail cam photos starting back in 2006. He is a super narrow deer that has a lopsided rack. Left beam always went up, and right beam always wrapped around lower. So they looked like they would eventually cross. He also has always had a red tent to his fur. So super easy to spot.
Trail Cam 2006-
In comes the Antler restrictions.. This is probably another reason he was able to make it this long. He has never really been outside the 13 inch mark. One year he was probably right at 13 inches. but not close enough to risk. This year he is probably closer to 10. So with him not being a monster, and antler restrictions limiting me to 1 buck, he seemed to have free reign on the ranch. At first I always saw him. Seemed to follow me around the ranch as if he knew he was off limits.
Trail Cam pic from 2008-
about 4 years ago, I finally made the switch over to MLD permits so that I could effectively manage the place better. That is when he must have got a memo letting him know that he was enemy #1. That is when he decided to play cat and mouse with us. I put several people on this deer to kill him. He just never would show up when we were there. If there ever was a deer who had figured us out, this is him. He would be on trail cam every day, then not when we would get in the blind. We tried Drop offs, walk in from East, walk in from West, walk in from South, get in blind in the middle of the night, stay all day etc... He just knew when we were there.
Trail Cam from 2013-
Last year I set my son up on a hill to watch what he was doing. I had my dad drop me off on the ranger. Son text me that CC was up on the hill behind me with about 6 other bucks. hour later feeder fires and all 6 bucks come in except CC. He just stayed up there and feed. this was after 6 strait days on Covert cam morning and evening.
I spent the last 2 previous years trying to get my youngest boy to shoot him since they are the same age. We never even laid an eyeball on him.
Trail Cam from 2014-
Trail Cam from This year.
Fast forward to Sat... I got a call from my buddy who was at the ranch that one of my feeders had not been going off and that the Ranger threw a drive belt. So I took off on Sat afternoon to fix ranger. Once I fixed it I had just enough time to Shower, throw out some tailgate corn and get in the tripod at the feeder that has not been going off. What the heck, I was already out there so why not. Weather was awesome so I knew it would be a good sit. This is the same tripod as I killed 1 Eye out of last month. It has turned into a hotspot...
Without any more ramblings, here he is in all his Not so Glory. He was a legend on my place. I have to admit I was very torn on shooting him as well as a little sad when it was done.. But never fear, his 5 year old son is now on the clock.. Lets hope it does not take another 7 years to kill him..
Here is the Next one on the List... -Criss Cross JR...
Here is the Video As well. The Video is very long as I was just really jazzed about this deer. Sorry for being long winded but it was a great hunt. Probably my best deer I have run an arrow through..
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