We Have a Ranch Again - New Ranch - Follow Along

[Chad C]

Hey, at least y’all are getting to enjoy it. Progress will come with time. Good luck out there.


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[cehorn]

Not a big update but things have been moving and some good stuff work and hunting related. Overall still working more than playing but we are getting caught up for now. I'll start with the work.

As far as what we have done personally, we now have 6 rifle blinds set up which has been chore and 2 other bow only setups so 8 total places to hunt. Not bad for a little over a month's work only working weekends. Here is a blind we call The View and the second pic showing what it looks like from the stand should explain the name.



The dozer crew has been tearing it up the past few weeks. I have been horrible about taking pics of their progress because we are so busy but below are a few pics of their work. They have cut most of the perimeter roads and should finish that this week. It is pretty impressive seeing the terrain and slopes they have been able to traverse and make passible. Some of the roads are a little scary on a side by side even after being cut so I'm not sure how those guys do it when it is raw. They have also cut roads throughout so we can get everywhere we want to go with ease along with clearing a couple of stand sites. And they have leveled our pad site for the cabin/barndo build. That is the main area I have dropped the ball on taking pics. Anyway, the first pic below is a road they cut so y'all can see the quality as there was nothing their before and the next 2 pics are a zoomed out view of some of the drop offs they are clearing and making passible.




The electric pole didn't get set by Thanksgiving but we are hoping we get an electric pole/meter set in the next week or 2. Comanche Electric has said that will happen. We had the well guy out a week ago and he said he would likely be out in a month. He is estimating it will be 300' deep. So the hope is to have electricity and water by the end of the year. Then we can put the generators up and stop hauling water but neither of those have been too bad. I think electric is a sure thing and water is 50/50. Once we have electric and water we are hoping to get somebody started on the cabin. We are still taking bids which is a slower process than we had hoped. But that process is moving as well.

Now that the work has been discussed, we have had some time to get some hunting in. Overall we have shot 3 pigs (more of those to go down very soon) and a couple of deer.

My youngest son got on the board first and has been on the board the most often. He has been hard after his first non-spike buck since the beginning of the season. We have seen a few but they were either too small or too big (I'm a believer in working your way up as a kid). 2 weeks ago he shot a pig as the first kill on the new place (first pic). Then last Monday night he shot another pig. Then on Tuesday morning he was able to get his first buck! He is still smiling and it was a great buck. Not too big and not too small. I scored it at 113".




My wife also got into the act 2 weeks ago shooting a pig for her fist kill on the new place.


And finally last weekend my oldest stepson was able to get his first non-spike buck as well. Being a guide is tough, lol. But it is in many ways more rewarding than getting your own deer.


Depending on youth hunts and some other stuff it may be a month before I can get back down there again but I'll hopefully take some pics that I have missed of the cabin site and roads. As I mentioned, hopefully I'll also be able to take pics of the well and electric progress. That's it for now, thanks again for following along.

[Tomkat70]

Congrats on the new place, that is beautiful country out there

[Pin Oak DXT]

Congrats on the new place. It looks like it’s already a rewarding experience.


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[bowhunterhelm]

Beautiful property, congrats!

[PittBoss]

Outstanding…congrats!

[bowfishin fool]

Gorgeous country, thanks for taking us along


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[DUKFVR]

Congrats on getting a good start on the new ranch!

[cehorn]

Congrats on getting a good start on the new ranch!

Thanks. It is definitely going a lot faster than the first one. It is amazing how many lessons learned there are. We didn't know much when we got our place in Uvalde. I feel like we have done in less than 2 months what took us 10 years to get accomplished before. It also helps have the free labor of 4 teenage boys....

[cehorn]

The progress continues so I wanted to give a quick update.

The dozer crew continues to rock along. They built us a road to our cabin site (1st pic) from caliche on the place. The road is amazing but it is even better that the material came from our ranch! They also finished clearing the perimeter/property lines (2nd pic) and a ton more. They should be finished in a week or 2 as they just have a couple of interior roads to clear and some clearing around a couple of deer stands.




We still don't have electricity but they have been out there and dropped off the poles so that should happen very soon if not this week.

Progress has also started on the cabin build. The forms are set, Wednesday our plumbers came out and got it roughed in and by Friday the concrete crew had all the steel in. Concrete is scheduled for Jan 11. The building has been ordered and should be here in the next month so hopefully by the end of February we will have a shell at least. We are still looking for a framer for the inside so hopefully that doesn't stall but I anticipate a huge slow down on that front.



All of that is exciting but it is hunting season as well. My dad, myself and my oldest son went down on Monday afternoon to hunt until Thursday or later of last week. Monday night I shot 2 pigs (my first kills on the new place), Wednesday morning I shot another and then Wednesday night I shot a 4th pig (more on Wednesday night to come).




On the way to the stand Wednesday evening I rounded a corner and saw a pig take off in the brush. As I approached where she was I saw 4-5 babies on the side of the road. I'm not sure why I decided to do it, maybe I was inspired by the Boaris threads, but I hopped out and tried to catch one. I'll be ****ed if my fat butt didn't catch one. I really had no plan or thinking ahead since I didn't think I could catch one but it looks like we now have a pet sow named Lucky (more on that to come). She still had a little piece of the umbilical cord so I'm guessing she was maybe a week old. We have been feeding her powdered milk from the feed store and today she made it home to meet the rest of the pets and is doing well. i'm still not sure how this will work out but 1 day at a time I guess...



After catching the piglet, there was no plan so there definitely wasn't a name. The kids and wife via text all had suggestions but nothing was finalized. Since my oldest son had already shot a buck he was after turkeys and pigs. He had seen turkey several mornings but never closed the deal. Since I hadn't seen anything on camera in a while that interested me I decided to sit with him and try to help him out and film. As luck would have it (and spark naming the piglet Lucky), we ended up triple dipping 'em Thursday morning.

About 6:45 I could see deer in front of us and could make out the 2 little 8's that were always at that stand. A little before 7 I scanned again expecting the same deer and noticed one of the deer looked bigger than last time. It was still pretty dark but I was able to make out an older deer with 10 points and a wide rack. The race was on between enough light to shoot and film and the feeder going off at "7:15". I kept looking at my watch and asking my son if he had enough light to film with multiple no's. I looked at my watch at 7:10 and said we have 5 min to get it done...and then the feeder went off at 7:11 and deer scattered everywhere. A few choice words later, they started coming back in. He showed back up again in another shooting lane. I still couldn't completely make out his rack but confirmed he was older and wide so I let my 7 mag bark while my son filmed it. It was pretty awesome to share that with him.

But, the reason we were hunting there was to get him his first turkey. A little after 8 I saw a turkey cross the shooting lane in front of us and woke my son up and told him to get ready. Soon after, the group that we were expecting came in. After about 5 minutes of switching from 1 turkey to another as they moved around he finally made a good shot on 1 at about 20 yards. As soon as he shot all of the other turkeys took off except 2 who decided to torture my sons turkey. It was funny at first but after about 10 minutes I had enough and decided to make another memory with my son filming and dropped 1 of the 2 turkey hammering away at my son's dead turkey. It is a hunt we will remember for A LONG TIME!! All on video. Anyway, here are a few pics.





It will probably be February before I can get back up there and hopefully at that time I'll be able to post a few pics of electric poles and a slab!! Thanks again for following along.

[Big pig]

Y’all have come a long way in a short time!

Water wells took forever for me to schedule the drilling. But Steve Harris out of Comanche was Great about getting them hooked up. Mine were also 300’+

Is your portion (500 acres+) fenced apart from the other 900 acres

Sure love the views over there.

BTW. Gonna be a lot colder than uvalde!
14 degrees here yesterday and down to 18 this morning!!!

BP

[Chew]

This is awesome. Great progress. I hope everything works out with the well

[cehorn]

Y’all have come a long way in a short time!

Water wells took forever for me to schedule the drilling. But Steve Harris out of Comanche was Great about getting them hooked up. Mine were also 300’+

Is your portion (500 acres+) fenced apart from the other 900 acres

Sure love the views over there.

BTW. Gonna be a lot colder than uvalde!
14 degrees here yesterday and down to 18 this morning!!!

BP

Thanks. Yeah, we have done a lot including sacrificing many hunts to finish work, etc. We need to check back in with the well guy but I'm thinking and hoping it happens this month from what he said when we met. I don't think we will have any issues hitting water as there are several springs on the place so water should be there.

At this time our portion isn't fenced from the other 900 acres. We may buy a little more of the 900 acres in the next year or 2 so we are waiting on fencing until we have the final layout. I'm ready to get a fence up and get a wildlife exemption. It has been an adjustment hunting with cows again after 20+ years of not having to worry about them.

The views are amazing. I have told several people that the property doesn't even have to have animals to make it worth all the work and going out there. It is a beautiful property!!

Yeah, we have already noticed the temp difference. All the kids got a lot warmer stuff to wear hunting for Christmas. I'll trade the colder weather for mosquitos in December any time though.

[Double C]

Supercool!

Really want to see how this little sow turns out! Will you have to spay it?

[cehorn]

Supercool!

Really want to see how this little sow turns out! Will you have to spay it?

Like I have stated, there really isn't or wasn't a plan. With that said from the Boaris thread I'm thinking I'll have to get her fixed and have her teeth/tusks taken care of at a minimum. I'll probably start a separate thread today or tomorrow on her to follow along. So far she is a cool little animal, loud as heck when she is hungry but cool. The dogs are adjusting one at a time so it looks like she is here to stay. We have an old chicken coop that she will likely stay in once she gets bigger and it gets warm enough for her to be outside.

I know I probably need a plan but for now it is 1 day at a time with Lucky