Yep, and it's the last weekend of November so mosquitoes and snakes and alligators should be gone. We went a couple of years ago and I shot a buck, but that's all we saw. Any advice on where to start scouting? Thank y'all.
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Nope. It can be in the 40s and still have active mosquitos. Bring portable tripods and prepare to sit above the cloud. Contact Johnny or Issac for scouting options. -
Not hunting Sabine NF? Sacreligious! Heathen.
Good luck MrSH. I hope to see the LDPs.Comment
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Oh, no, I'll be at SNF the first two weeks, then, Eden for a meat hunt, then Aransas, four weekends+, all back to back. And, back to SNF, ifn i didn't get my buck in the beginning.Originally posted by Briar Friar View PostComment
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They will all be there, the mosquitos won't be horrible, but they will be there. The gators and snake will be around but not moving as much.Originally posted by SabineHunter View Post
By November the rut is long over, the areas I knew to have good bucks and or good places to hunt are closed, for the rifle season.
I have told many people, if you have hunted out there and concluded there are no big bucks or hardly any deer. Just take one of those whooping crane tours. The boat runs along the eastern shoreline, along the Inercoastal. Get one of their spotting scopes and start watching the marshy area back towards the tree line, but keep your eyes open on the rest of the area. You will typically see a lot of nice bucks.
To get an idea of how good your chances of seeing big buck are while hunting. Realise on that whooping crane tour, you are a good 800 yards or so from where the deer typically hang out. When they see the boat from that range they take off running. There are boats going up and down the intercoastal all day and night long. But that whooping crane boat, will have them running. That whole area you can see from that boat, is closed during rifle season. It just gives you a idea of what is really out there.
I have taken that whooping crane tour twice, because my grandmother was a big bird watcher. The whole tour, I was looking at deer while everyone else was looking for big birds.
When you do a rifle hunt on that place, what you will see, won't look anything like what you saw on the whooping crane tour. What you will typically see in November are much smaller young bucks, does, pigs, coyotes and gators. The pig population out there is pretty high, but not over run with them, thanks to the gators.
If you find some scrub oaks covered with acorns, hunt over those, you likely will have some doe and young bucks grazing on the acorns. But also look for signs of deer activity around those oaks.
Actually the oaks they seem to prefer to graze on are the really short bushy oaks that are only a couple feet high and very dense, and covered with acorns. If you find areas with a decent amount of those oaks, you will likely find some deer.
The last time we went down there, I set up in one of my short tripods, just off of one of the main roads. I had a thin line of trees between me and the road. So most likely anyone driving the road would not have seen me. I was only 50 yards from the road. I often had seven doe grazing in the open within 70 yards of me. The deer were actually visible from the road. I am pretty sure nobody that drove by ever saw the group of does I was watching for a couple hours. At one point, I had a young buck show up and graze with the does, but they naturally did not him grazing with them.
On our last trip down there my buddy kept seeing pigs. I never saw a single pig, or I would have tried to blast it. The last two or three trips down there we rifle hunted. I did not see a single pig on any of those trips, only lots of doe and a few small young bucks. I saw multiple gators and a couple of coyotes. I know where there are water holes, that always have gators in them. I have thought about trying to hunt over a gators water hole, to see if anything would show up. I figure most of the critters in the area, know if you drink from that water hole, you will likely wind up dinner. So I have not hunted over any of those small water holes. I did hunt over one water hole that only had a small amount of water, mostly mud and did have a pig show up and take a mud bath.
My buddy on those trips, usually heard pigs and on a few occasions, had a group of younger pigs zip through the area he was hunting. I think that's all he saw.
There are likely big bucks in the rifle hunting area, during November and December, but they will be very hard to find. The areas we knew to have nice bucks, were all in the area, that gets closed for the rifle season. We rifle hunted out there three times, saw deer, pigs and gators. But nothing like when we bow hunted out there. We bow hunted that place since about 1986, we hunted it many times a year from about 1986 through about 1996. Then we did not hunt that place near as often, and eventually they started selling hunt permits for two or three day hunts. That's when we did the rifle hunts. We had wanted to rifle hunt that place for years. Back in the 80s and 90s there was a drawing for the rifle hunt, but only a very few people ever got to do that deal. So when they started selling rifle hunts out there, we bought permits and went on three different occasions. Both in November and December.
I could have easily of shot a doe or small buck, but really wanted a decent buck or a pig, did not see either on any of the rifle hunts we did down there. The October bow hunts we did down there, were a lot more fun, the areas we hunted, we saw multiple nice bucks and numerous pigs. But all of the areas we saw the nicer bucks and the pigs, are closed for rifle season. So the three times we rifle hunted down there, we had to try and find places in the rifle only area to hunt. We tried multiple different places, but never found anything like the places we used to bow hunt. But I know there were guys, back in the 80s and early 90s, that used to hunt some of the areas within a mile or so of the front gate. Those areas are very think, with big oak trees. Some of the older regulars, used to hunt that area, and every year would kill at least one nice buck. Those areas are in the rifle hunting area. So there should be some good bucks in those dense oaks near the front gate. I don't know how far from the road those guys were hunting.
I those older guys who used to kill the nice bucks every year, I used to know the areas where they hunted. I never tried to hunt their areas, guys would get pretty mad if you did so. Then everyone used marker tape, to mark their hunt area, to keep other people out. Then they would also use marker tape to throw others off. The areas, where those guys hunted, was heavily flagged, with tape. So we did not take a chance on hiking up in that brush, to check it out. We really had no idea how many guys were up in there hunting and where they were. So we stayed out of those areas, never went up in there to see what those areas look like. But for many years since the early 90s, you would hardly see anyone hunt those areas. We could have gone up in there and looked around, I have wanted to for years. I wanted to know what it looked like up in those dense oaks, but we never did, in later years.
If I ever get to go back, I am going to try and remember to check out those dense oaks, that those guys used to hunt every year.
Since you live in the area, you could go out there and scout the place often, before the seasons start. You don't have much time to scout this year. But in the future, if you want to hunt that place, I would get out there and scout it in September before they shut it down for the hunting. There may be gaps between the hunts, where they open the refuge back up. If they do, I would use those times to scout. Just make sure you stick to the rifle only areas, with your scouting.Comment
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Riflebowpistol, wow, that is some great information. I will use it and report back here. Thank you.Comment
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Well, it's go day. I scouted yesterday and found a good spot for my tri pod. My wife is sick and couldn't make it. I'll update this thread as I go along.Comment
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Good luck to you. It's been 40 years since I've been there
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Good luck!Comment
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Good Luck Sir!!!Comment
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Good luck!
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Good luck. Hopefully it’s not too soggy there. I thought about trying to get a standby tag, but have too much other stuff going on. Might try for the 3rd hunt if they have any.
I saw a few decent bucks on 3rd rifle last year, but didn’t get a shot. Ended up with 2 does and a pig.
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Pm sent sotxagComment
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If you have Ice Water in your veins you can wade through the marshes to island motts , deer do hang out there - very low pressure for SoMe reason ;-)Comment
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Not right now you can't, they have all of that area shut down because of the whooping cranes. The good areas are closed for rifle hunting.Originally posted by Bucknaked View PostComment
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