My family and I are getting ready to move from GA to TX. She has family there in the East Texas area. I lived in TX in my very early youth and now that I'm retired intend to devote my time to my one true love...hunting. The problem is....I don't have anywere to hunt down there and I'm not very familure with the area. Any help or suggestions would be very appreciated.

aroundtheblock:

I live just north of Dallas. There are three hunting arrangements that I'm aware of: (1) hunt public land, (2) lease private land, or (3) make a friendly arrangement with a landowner to hunt their land for free. Leases can be fairly expensive -- maybe $1500/year for each of four hunters on a 320 acre plot of ground. This is just a ballpark figure. The public hunting on the 2000 acre Caddo National Grassland is pretty poor in my estimation. Too many hunters. Other public hunting areas may be better. There is a large area east of Dallas which may comprise about 28,000 acres: maybe this is better hunting. Given that expensive leases are pretty common, I don't know what the chances would be for you to work out a deal to hunt for free, unless you have some personal connection with a landowner.

I think you should wait until you have made your move to Texas and then try to figure out the hunting situation then. Depending on your traveling interests, there may be hunting opportunities over the boarder in Louisianna, Arkansas, and/or Oklahoma that you wish to investigate also.

Jeeze, sounds pretty rough >.< I've never heard of leasing land before. It's paying landowners to hunt their property?

That sounds pretty harsh to me too. Up here, I approach the landowners either in their fields or at home for permission and I've only been turned down once (because his son hunts the section)

Guess that kinda puts things in perspective for me.

Around, I am in the same position. We live in San Diego Ca. and my wife is from Pittsburg Tx. which is about an hour and a half east of Dallas. Man I fell in love with that area! Her entire family is in Pittsburg with the exception of her sister in E. Dallas, she wants to move there but I told her I was'nt leaving San Diego to live in Dallas, I want to live in the country. So, it looks like it'll be one of the little towns a half hour outside of Dallas. The internet is a powerful tool, go to google.com and type in "east texas deer leases" or "east texas deer hunting" I found a organization that has leases for 475.00-700.00 a year at least thats what they say. I guess there is lots of land owned by paper companies that lease to hunters, also you say your wifes family is there, my wife has three brothers and many cousins and nephews so I'm counting on rubbing elbows with the right guys and getting some inside info. Good luck!

Metro