Lone Star Trail
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Lone Star Trail
TPWD Withdraws Mountain Lion Rule and Ranch Real Estate
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Last week TPWD withdrew their proposed mandatory mountain lion harvesting reporting rule because of landowner and hunter backlash. This is a small victory for Texans. Brian Clark with RanchPro Real Estate discusses ranch sales and screwworm impact on wildlife economy. Dayton flips the script and interviews Nathan this week on House Rules.
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Welcome to Lone Star Trail, a new outdoor show aimed at bringing you hunting and fishing updates and compelling stories from around Texas and right here at home. Get ready to join us down the trail. Now, here's your host, Nathan Smith.
SPEAKER_02Hello, friends, and welcome to another edition of the Lone Star Trail. I'm your host, Nathan Smith. Glad you could join us and be here with us today. We want to invite you to like us on Facebook. Uh, you can follow us on TikTok, on Twitter. We got a lot of outlets, uh, and of course you can always email us at Lone Starrtrailradio at gmail.com. Today we'll be talking with Brian Clark. He's with Ranch Pro Real Estate. I'm sure you've heard of Ranch Pro Real Estate. They're a great sponsor of the program. And uh today Brian's gonna talk with us. We're gonna talk about real estate, uh the sheep market and industry, uh, predator abatement control, and uh and just to kind of get an idea of what's going on this time of year as we get into late spring, early summer, uh, when it comes to concerns about the screw worm as it relates to livestock and wildlife. And so we're just gonna visit with Brian a little bit about all the things he has going on and his expertise. The Texas Parks and Wildlife. Last week we talked about the proposed mandatory harvesting report that they uh were putting out. They withdrew that, and so we're gonna talk a little bit about reasons why they may have done that, as well as another great episode or uh segment of House Rules with Dayton House. Dayton turns the tables on me during a hog hunt. All this and more right after the break. Whether you're looking to buy your next hunting property or have acreage to sell, you need Brian Clark and Ranch Pro Real Estate in your corner. They use the latest in technology to make listings easy for sellers to maximize value. In the market to buy that perfect ranch or hunting getaway, call Ranch Pro Real Estate at 325-642-3630. That's Ranch Pro Real Estate at RanchProRealEstate.com. The land is their life. If you follow the podcast, or if you're new, either way, we talk a lot about trapping. You're going to find that out. Uh, we've got our own predator issues out here in Brown County we try to mitigate, but I want to talk a little bit about Texas Farm Ranch Wildlife Solutions. My good friend Philip Woods out in East Texas, he's an expert when it comes to managing predation on Texas farms and ranches. If you've got trouble with coyotes, with bobcats, with uh beaver, if you've got nuisance predators impacting your bottom line, you need to call my friend Philip Woods, 713-208-3517 is his number. That's 713-208-3517. You can email him at woodscattlecompany at gmail.com. Uh Philip Woods out there in East Texas, he does a great job, but he's statewide. If you got problems in South Texas or the Panhandle, uh Professional Trapping Services, Texas Farm and Ranch Wildlife Solutions, that's who you need to call. You're listening to the Lone Star Trail. We're glad you're here. Now let's get back to the show. Last week we talked about the Texas Parks of Wildlife's proposed rule that would require uh all hunters who harvest a mountain lion to report it to the state. Uh, if that rule had been passed, then if you harvest a mountain lion, you would have to report it via the TPWD digital app. And you have to submit a sample of hair, and there was some other information. Uh, you supposedly you could keep a location private, but the this week a uh that same proposal was withdrawn from consideration by the agency following significant opposition from landowners and hunters and a few ag groups weighed in, but mostly it was hunters and landowners who commented, and the overwhelming majority was in opposition. And so I think Parks and Wildlife kind of got the idea that uh maybe there's more people paying attention than they thought. I think it's a great, great thing that the proposal was withdrawn. And if you took part in commenting, if you found uh time to go on the Parks and Wildlife website and make your comment, thank you for doing that because uh this is an example of of folks stepping up, getting involved, and uh not letting rules just get passed without uh without comment. So not to say this won't come back, and I'm sure it will, but uh the good news is that it is uh for the time being, it has been withdrawn. On the phone, we've got Brian Clark with Ranch Pro Real Estate. You've heard of Ranch Pro Real Estate if you've heard the show, listening to the podcast. Uh Brian, thanks for all you do. Thanks for being a supporter of the show and a friend of the show. We uh appreciate all you do for us at Lone Star Trail. But and I've been wanting to have you on the show for a long time, so I'm I'm thankful we got some time to sit down and and visit.
SPEAKER_03You bet, and it's uh good to be here.
SPEAKER_02Well, I kind of want folks to know a little bit more about uh about you. How long have you been uh in the real estate business?
SPEAKER_03Uh we've been in real estate business for since 2004, so this will be our 26th 22nd year this year.
SPEAKER_02So you might make a career out of it, is what you're saying.
SPEAKER_03Yep, yep. Might might I think we found something we like.
SPEAKER_02And you say we, it's you and your wife really as a as a partnership, right?
SPEAKER_03Correct, yes. Yes, me and my wife. We uh we're a team that she handles different aspects of the real estate stuff, and I do other things as well.
SPEAKER_02You know, it it I don't want to get us too far off track as we start here, but it takes a special uh relationship to make it work at work and at home.
SPEAKER_03And you know, it sure does, it sure does. I'm blessed to have her for sure.
SPEAKER_02That's great. She's a she's an awesome lady. So I want to talk a little bit about uh the real estate market. So with everything going on now in our economy, you know, if you watch the if you watch the global news, the stuff in Iran, and then the stuff in Ukraine, the stuff in Russia, the stuff with China and Taiwan, and and and then you come closer to home with uh the stuff in in Venezuela and then New Mexico, uh there's a lot going on in our world right now that's that's impacting uh our economy, it's impacting you know, inflation, and and uh you know, all of us that drive these constructs are are feeling feeling some pain right now. But but real estate, uh, you know, those things are highly volatile, fuel prices, grocery prices, very volatile. Just in the last full couple five years, um we've seen a a pretty big um some some pretty big changes in some areas. Now you guys specialize in uh in ranch properties, in hunting properties. Uh I mean I'm sure you wouldn't pass up a different kind of property if it was if it was right for you, but you guys are experts and have become experts uh through some trial and error and just um seeing a lot of deals. So I want before we kind of talk about some of those things, I want to talk a little bit with you about the just the general um kind of pulse on on real estate in our we'll we'll call it in our you know five or six county area here. What are what are folks what are folks doing right now uh in terms of sell sales right now? Or are we are we is it a seller's market? Is it a buyer's market? Is it what talk to me about how things are?
SPEAKER_03It's really kind of a buyer's market right now. Uh just because of the mainly because of the cost of living, interest rates are high. It puts a lot of the financing people to where they're just kind of sitting waiting to see what's gonna happen. Our biggest driver right now is uh the 1031 exchange because they've sold another property and they have the cash to put down on another one to save their taxes on that, and that's probably about 80% of our sales right now as 1031 exchanges, uh, just because they were bought out by cash and then they're cash on the next deal.
SPEAKER_02I'm glad you brought up 1031s, and I know enough about 1031s to be dangerous, but if you're listening to this and uh as a as a landowner or uh a potential buyer of a property, if you will, Brian, walk us through a 1031. Um maybe, maybe if you can use without obviously without using names, maybe you can talk about some previous deals that would kind of draw out some of the specifics about a 1031.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so the basics of a 1031 exchange is uh you can sell your property, and instead of the funds coming to you, when we sell your property, it goes into an escrow account with a 1031 company, and they hold them the funds until you get ready to buy your next property. So you sell your property, they put it in the escrow account, and we have 45 days from the day that your property sells to identify up to three properties, and then within 180 days, you have to close on one of those three properties that you identified. Uh, what that does is that you actually never physically touch the money, you use that escrow account to buy the next piece of property, and you won't have to pay any tax on that money. Instead of just taking it in your account and then going and buying the next place, you'd be taxed on the proceeds, but this way it eliminates your taxes.
SPEAKER_02But it's gotta be a dollar-for-dollar exchange match, right?
SPEAKER_03No, it could be anything. So you may have uh, you know, a hundred thousand dollar property that you go and take the ten thirty-one and buy a two hundred thousand dollar property with it. Or you might buy a fifty thousand dollar property with it. Anything that you don't use will be taxed.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_03And then but you could also buy something larger and finance the rest of it or however you want to do it.
SPEAKER_02So there's no capital gains or no, or is it I guess it would be taxes just like income, right?
SPEAKER_03It would Yes, yes, it'll be taxed just like income, so there won't be any uh it won't be considered income because you never received the funds off that. And it cost around about a thousand dollars a transaction to do that to use the escrow companies.
SPEAKER_02So well worth it if you're really if you're if you're if you're getting out of one property and into any kind of property, it's really well worth it.
SPEAKER_03Yes, if you plan on uh you know trading properties or whatever, it's well worth doing that. Uh the only negative downside to that is when you finally cash out your last property, um, you will pay tax on the proceeds at that point because you're not gonna put it back into 1031, but you can just keep rolling, rolling it over from one property to the other. And I've had over the past 20 years be on like the fifth or sixth property, one of my buyers are just keep rolling that money over into 1031 and haven't had to pay tax on it yet.
SPEAKER_02That's certainly an interesting tool if you're looking to grow uh either from a production or hunting standpoint, or if you're just trying to increase wealth overall, it's definitely a good good tool to preserve some of that that that money.
SPEAKER_03It is, it is. And there's other programs through the 1031 exchange that you can actually do improvements to the property that you're purchasing with the money as well. If you want to put up new fences and stuff like that, say you have a million dollars and you buy a place and uh you need to put fences up, but you have it didn't cost you that to purchase a property, you can use uh excess 1031 money for improvements to the property as well.
SPEAKER_02Is that uh I know different states have different laws and different rules, but is that if I buy if I've got a property in Texas and I want to buy something in Oklahoma or Kansas, does that still work typically?
SPEAKER_03You know, I don't know if it works across state lines like that. Um of course my license is only good in the state of Texas, so I've never had any 1031 come from out of state and uh to purchase anything in Texas.
SPEAKER_02Okay. All right. Question we may follow up on later on, but um in our area, it seems like I guess I'll I said five years earlier, but really it's since COVID. Um kind of compare contrast rural property sales and prices per acre before COVID to today. What are what's been the biggest change?
SPEAKER_03Well, before COVID, uh, you know, COVID introduced everybody to finally figuring out the only way to get away from people is to buy land. It's the only way on the face of the earth to get to get distance from people is land, and people figure that out. And since then, you know, values have doubled, if not tripled, in some areas here in central Texas, and it's uh changed the way people think about uh the way they live, which has changed the market dramatically. My buyer pool is different now than it used to be for sure.
SPEAKER_02Whereas before it was there were people trying to run catt more cattle or spending a lot of people.
SPEAKER_03Or the oiling industry was buying a lot of our land here in central Texas. They were just uh taking that money and investing it in land. Um and now the we see a totally different type buyer more uh in the tech world's also becoming a larger buyer in the industry now when before they wasn't really interested in the real estate, the rural properties.
SPEAKER_02That's also kind of opened up some opportunity or I guess some challenges for folks that like I mean it seems like everywhere, every corner you turn, there's somebody claiming to be a land reclamation expert or uh fence builders. I mean, there's a lot of that uh associated type industries that have really kind of boomed in the last five years, it seems like, too.
SPEAKER_03Yes, and uh, you know, that's kind of a nice thing about us being in the industry so long we we keep track of the good contractors, fence builders, and the bad ones too. Um that's just kind of something because there was a lot of new startups um because it was the real estate market was moving so fast people just couldn't keep up, so they started going in businesses for themselves and uh have done really well. Um but uh there is a lot of new new companies out there.
SPEAKER_02We're halfway basically halfway through 2026. What um what do you what do you look to happen the through the end of this year in terms of the the ranch real estate market?
SPEAKER_03Well, I think the the rates are slowly starting to creep down a little bit. If they'll continue to creep down, um I think the market will increase even more. Um 2024 was probably our slowest year we had in 20 years, uh just because of those rate increases and the and everything with the market, but uh now it's picked up quite a bit last quarter of last year was uh a real big game changer it started picking up since then and it's been pretty steady since.
SPEAKER_02What obviously the answer to this question is things do slow down, but what at what point do things start to really slow? What where do rates have to be before um rural properties really start slowing back down again?
SPEAKER_03Well, once uh like on the land side, the rates are usually a lot higher than residential rates that you see advertised, you know, a a good rate on land, uh average good rate's about six and a quarter. It's about average what it's been over the last twenty years, and a good rate where stuff really gets moving. Um, but right now we're seeing you know, ten point one percent on a fixed twenty-year note on land, and now with the values up high as they are in the two, you're paying a lot more interest on the same piece of property as you were five or six years ago if you would have bought it. But uh the rates during COVID got down to four point nine on fixed twenty-year notes on land.
SPEAKER_02Talking about uh size of of properties that you list, uh if you could uh uh kind of pick out your ideal acreage size, what what would that be, you think?
SPEAKER_03Probably the ideal size for that sells the most would be uh somewhere between the 50 and 100 acre range currently. Um that seems to be the kind of what everybody's looking for. That's what the last few months, that's pretty much what's all been moving is the 50 to 100 acre tracks. And the nicer they are, the faster they are to move as far as uh good fencing and good tree cover, water, electricity, things like that. Um you'll find that uh they move a lot faster than ones that need work or don't have that stuff on them already.
SPEAKER_02I want to come back to that, but uh when talking about bigger ranches and maybe more kind of niche or specialized, like your your thousand acre plus high fence uh deals or you know, thousand acre plus uh cattle operations, how often are those moving? How long are they on the market for typically? And and uh kind of walk us through some of that.
SPEAKER_03Well, typically on those larger ranches, I mean, the largest ranch we've ever sold was 47,000 acres. Um, but a good size ranch here is a thousand to three thousand acres. Um it really depends on what that ranch has to offer. When they get that big, they're so unique. Some of them will last, you know, 90 days on the market, some of them take up to two years, depending on the improvements on them. We usually see the more improved properties as far as structures and houses and things, they tend to stay on the market longer than ones that are just a blank slate.
SPEAKER_02Going back to some of those things you mentioned, uh, you know, as a as a seller uh rep, as a listing agent, you've seen everything probably. What uh what are some things that if if you're thinking, if you're a listener's out there thinking about possibly listing their property or or maybe they've inherits inherited some property they want to list eventually, what are we keep it to the top three, what are the top three things that that uh that folks can start doing or think about doing to uh immediately improve that either that I pill or true value of a of a ranch property?
SPEAKER_03Well, really the main items on whenever we come to look at a ranch and what the buyers are wanting right now, because most of them are coming from out of town. They don't know contractors and things, so they would rather pay a premium to have things already built, like new fences, uh make sure you have water and electricity available there, uh, and a bonus is something that has a place to stay the night. Doesn't have to be an elaborate home or anything like that, but uh the type buyers that are buying the real estate now, they're not as I don't know how to say this, but they're not as wanting to do the manual labor. They'd rather pay for it to be done beforehand, and they're paying good money to have it done before we're in. Um but also you know, utilities is is huge because it's getting so expensive to put in electrical. Um last few places we've done it was around uh eight dollars and ninety cents a foot to have electrical brought from.
SPEAKER_05Wow.
SPEAKER_03Which is very costly.
SPEAKER_02What are the some of the average uh fencing rates right now for what's called like a six-fran barbed wire?
SPEAKER_03Uh six-fan barbed wire is ranging from about two dollars and seventy-five cents to three dollars and seventy-five cents. Um that wire's really not that much difference on the sheep and goat side of it. Um it's about a quarter higher a foot on that fence hanging now. And the high fence, uh we're seeing less and less high fences being put up.
SPEAKER_02It's it's interesting to me, you know, um folks like you're describing that buyer's market as as folks who they want to live in in that 50 to 100 acre spot, but uh not necessarily interested in the manual labor aspect of it.
SPEAKER_03Yes. Yeah, it's a different type of people. They want the space and and everything that the land has to offer, but they they uh really would rather have everything done when they get there.
SPEAKER_02I mean, I'm not any different. I'd rather have somebody else do it too.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, me too. Me too, just can't afford it all the time. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02That's the that's the trick, is uh is affording it.
SPEAKER_03But a lot of these people are getting bought out by you know out of staters or something like that, and they're they're getting a premium for the properties that they're selling before they come buy the property here. Um so they're most of all of them are cash currently. And uh don't mind paying for a nice place when they see one.
SPEAKER_02That kind of blows my mind a little bit, especially as you talk to people who just have moved into our area um, you know, from random places. It's just crazy to me that the the the growth there, but we have got a lot of open space still, and you know. We're seeing that uh unfortunately we're seeing that threatened with a lot of the uh transmission line projects that have been proposed. The data center, you know, extremely controversial now. And um the the transmission line thing have been around now for uh a year and and just in the last two months probably have really started kind of throwing the fit and getting uh up in arms about about it, and that's gonna impact rural Texas. Um it's gonna impact a lot of areas of the state.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's uh and and it doesn't seem like you can get away from it. You know, you can look for property that doesn't have wind turbines or solar farms anywhere near them, and uh five or six years later they want to put a transmission line through there. It's just a battle that uh it's just hard to predict where they're what they're gonna do next.
SPEAKER_02Speaking of predictions, um I we're gonna talk about sheep and goats in a in a few minutes, but um I know you keep you're keeping up with the screw worm discussion and the news about the screw worm. And um uh one thing I've as I talk with folks about the screw worm and everybody's talking about cattle, not many people are talking about wildlife populations and uh the effect, the possible effect of the screw worm on deer. I mean, we've got lots you can already buy wormer cubes and tractor supply. I mean, there's already a bunch of products that are either on the market or will be soon that will be effective to treat cattle, but treating deer, as we all know, is a different story altogether. So, um, and that leads to the discussion about uh property value. So do you feel like if if slash when we get a screw worm that property values will be impacted?
SPEAKER_03I really do. I mean, especially in our area here in central Texas, I mean, for years and years, you know, the hunting market just drove drove our area so strongly that uh, you know, if we start losing all of our white tail and other species here to screw worms, which there's no way to even treat all of them. Um it could definitely impact the real estate market here in central Texas for sure. It's just such a driving force. People come here for the wildlife. Um not even even if they're not hunters, they still want this location for the great wildlife that we have.
SPEAKER_02I think we'll still have hogs no matter what.
SPEAKER_03I don't think there's anything that'll we can't get lucky enough to get it get rid of them. I imagine they'll be immune to the screw arms when they get here. Hogs unfortunately. Yep, they probably will won't won't be phased at all for sure. Uh anything you want to get rid of, uh, you know, it it it'll it'll be here forever.
SPEAKER_02And you know, as it start to get warmer, you know, of course everybody's uh getting a little more on edge about the screw worm. And uh there's that's on one side of thing. On the other side of things, there's a there's a conspiracy theory out there that suggests that maybe the screw worm thing has been way overblown. Maybe this is even there's been even mention of uh cartel involvement and pushing the narrative about the about the screw worm due to the the uh that they're making currently on different different things connected to cattle in Mexico. And so there's a lot of unknowns. Um of course the sterile fly situation and the construction of that facility won't be ready for another year and a half, maybe. I mean, there's a lot of moving parts, but uh when it comes to um what local producers can do, you know, there's a lot of options in terms of of livestock uh products.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, the the scary thing is, you know, talking to some of the older timers that actually lived through the screw worms, if it's half as bad as they say it was, that's when everybody's you know fretting about it because uh it could be a serious problem if it's half as bad as they talked that it was, and I'm sure it was. Um we didn't have a lot of deer in this area because of that. I had to reintroduce them. So um it sounds like it's gonna be really labor intensive. Um and people will be getting out of raising livestock just because of inability to be able to check on them daily like they need to be.
SPEAKER_02You know, that's a good point. And Dayton House, who's on this show uh just about every week, talks about the first deer he saw was in I think 67 or 68, but before that there were no deer.
SPEAKER_03Right. Um so back in I read an article that uh Parks and Wildlife in our county here in Brown County where I live, that they uh brought does bred does from the King Ranch in 1958 and released them there, and before that there wasn't any deer here. Um, which has something to do with our good genetics too, I'm sure. But um they wasn't here, and that could have been highly because of the screw worm population.
SPEAKER_02Well, and you think uh that's hard to imagine because you think about how many deer we have right now.
SPEAKER_03You see them every single day, everywhere. Everywhere. Um, and you're talking the coons and everything, you know, you just see all this wildlife and they don't have any protection from it. None uh, which is very concerning to us in the industry that we're in because it could be devastating.
SPEAKER_02Brian Clark, Ranch Pro Real Estate, man. Thanks so much for being here and uh for your time and and enjoyed the visit.
SPEAKER_04You bet I'm glad it didn't be here today.
SPEAKER_02Yep, it just sucks you back in.
SPEAKER_04It does.
SPEAKER_02Brian Clark, Ranch Pro Real Estate, man, thanks so much for being here and uh for your time and and enjoyed the visit.
SPEAKER_04You bet I'm glad it didn't be here today.
SPEAKER_02You're listening to the Lone Star Trail, and it's time once again for House Rules with Dayton House. Dayton is a retired government trapper, a firearms expert, an outdoors enthusiast, and a true Texan. At 76 years old, he's still going strong and enjoys sharing his passion of the outdoors with others.
SPEAKER_05The last time that Nathan and I got together for an interview, we were hunting hogs here at Beattie. That's where we are tonight, and we had to stop during the interview and shoot some hogs. We had watched these what I thought were two deer for 20 minutes perhaps, and we had talked about how to identify a hog or a deer, and you could see under the belly of these, they were in short coastal, and I said, Well, that's got to be deer because you can see under them. And I thought I saw a head raise up, and the hog normally can't do that. And as they got closer, we realized that we were watching two hogs all the time and couldn't tell the difference. So we do make mistakes quite often, and impossible to keep up with what we're doing. We were enjoying the interview, and there we almost let two hogs get away. But it was a a good productive night, and wound up shooting a third hog then a little bit later. I'm gonna change it around tonight. Nathan's always the one doing the interviewing, and I told him that uh he was going to be interviewed tonight. So uh Nathan, glad to have you on my show. This pays real well, I understand. So uh state your full name. Middle name, too. Middle name? Yes.
SPEAKER_02Man, Nathan Eugene.
SPEAKER_05Eugene, all right. Yeah. Oftentimes the only way we know your middle name is when your mama's mad at you at your wedding and your funeral. So you can pick which one of these it is, but uh how old are you?
SPEAKER_02Oh man, uh 38.
SPEAKER_0538. And still enjoying it.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yes. Where do you live? I live in May or outside of May.
SPEAKER_05May, Texas. That's not far from here. We're what, 12 miles from May? 13. 13. Yeah. Some of you may not know where Beattie is. I didn't until my brother moved here. And it's uh 12 or 14 miles west-northwest to Comanche. And this is a coastal field, and we can see cows for a half a mile. I know you're married. Tell me who how long.
SPEAKER_02Kara is her name. We've been married for 12 years this year. Well, good. Here in about a month.
SPEAKER_05Now, have you got plans on a celebration or take her out to eat? Yeah, at least. Or I'll cook something for her. You'll do the dishes then afterwards. You can do the dishes afterward, too. You're a good man. Where'd you all meet? How'd you meet? Well, we met in school.
SPEAKER_02Uh I kind of stopped her at Tarleton. And uh we had a professor, same professor, who knew both of us. And uh anyway, I was supposed to have interviewed for a class her great uncle, who was a Western fiction writer, Elmer Kelton. And uh I was supposed to get in touch with her to get in touch with him for an interview. Well, anyway, in the meantime, he wound up passing away. And so I never uh got in touch with her on that. But then we wound up working together at Farm Bureau a few years later, and that's when we officially met, and then I asked her on a date.
SPEAKER_05Was she attending Tarleton with you at the same time?
SPEAKER_02We were there at the same time. Uh huh. I she's not here tonight, so I can say she graduated a little bit ahead of me.
SPEAKER_05Now I thought you were much older than she was. No, no, she's she's got a couple years on me. Okay. Uh for you that uh don't know Nathan, he looks like he's uh at least uh 20 years older because of his beard. I've been giving him a hard time about not shaving. Now I know y'all have four kids. Tell me Kelton is one of them. That was her maiden name. That's right. So you've named the oldest son Kelton.
SPEAKER_02There's no boys in her family, so yeah, that was that was kind of a tribute to them.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, a good deal. Yes. And what are their ages?
SPEAKER_02Kelton's ten, and we have two girls that are about to be seven twins.
SPEAKER_05And you're a twin. I'm a twin. Now which one is older? McKenna by one minute. One minute. I'm six minutes younger. Okay. McKenna and Sawyer. Those are I had a hard time telling them apart a few years back, but now I can I know them well enough that I can call them by name.
SPEAKER_02Yes. And then Tucker, he he's the bookend, and he'll be a five soon.
SPEAKER_05Oh my goodness.
SPEAKER_02That's why I ask everybody I talk to what do you do with a five-year-old in a a a deer stand or you know, digging hunting or whatever. Because I'm always looking out for ideas for Tucker. Because he's noisy. Typical boy. But he wants to go. Yes. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Uh you need a soundproof room or a deer blind for a five-year-old. Yes. Now, where were y'all, where were you born or where was Kara? She raised up.
SPEAKER_02She grew up there on the place we live on uh outside of May, and then I was raised in Mitchell County. And we grew, my family still grows cotton and cattle out there. Colorado City, close to.
SPEAKER_05So your parents are still alive then?
SPEAKER_02They are, yeah, still there. They still they're busier now than they've ever been. Wow. All right. My dad retired two or three years ago, and he's farming more acres and running more cows, and they're busy. What about your siblings? We've got one sister, and they're also close by. Uh, they're my parents, so they live there, they live there and help with the farm and work there. Okay, good deal.
SPEAKER_05What about Kara's family, siblings?
SPEAKER_02She's got some family close by. Well, she has one sister also, a younger sister who lives close by. She's a school teacher there, May.
SPEAKER_05Oh, okay. Yeah. Well, good. Now on your website of the K A K O X E, it says you have a favorite hobby, a rifle, or like to fish. And tell me about your hobby.
SPEAKER_02Well, I think every every man, you know, needs uh an outlet for something. And uh I got into nighttime hunting because when I got home from work, there was a lot more work to be done at the house. And so I started hunting at night whenever the kids went to bed, and it was a way to relieve some stress and just kind of reconnect. And usually I was by myself, so it was just a good time to be quiet and reflect. My dad always did that on a tractor and uh turn row, and and I have kind of just gotten into nighttime hunting and as just kind of an outlet for kind of a way to release some stress.
SPEAKER_05All right, favorite rifle.
SPEAKER_02Well, on that website, I think I put a 204 Ruger because I think I had just gotten one at close to that time. So I was kind of interested in that round. Um I've never owned one. You know, it's a it's kind of a neck down 223, and it's great for long-range prairie dogs, is kind of what it's for. But I've I've shot a badger with it, I've killed coyotes with it, I've killed big jackrabbits with it, and I've got it in a CZ527 with a heavy barrel, uh-huh, and uh I've got a pretty good scope on it, and so it's accurate. It's it's as accurate as I am, which some days is not very, but I can't blame the rifle or the scope.
SPEAKER_05Years ago I had a 17 center fire. I would say it's marginal on coyotes at 200 yards and beyond. And I got rid of it and went back to a 22250.
SPEAKER_0222250s killed more coyotes than any other round, probably, wouldn't you say?
SPEAKER_05I would think so. Yeah. It's popularity and availability of ammunition.
SPEAKER_02All right, what about fishing? I'm not a great fisherman. I like to fish. I like to catch catfish and in in rivers. That's really what I like to do, but I'm just not very good at it. My ten-year-old's better fisherman than I am. That's the kind of the way I am. I went to I went to Brazil one time with Farm Bureau, and we went to this uh fish farm where they were growing all kinds of different fish and stock stock tanks. They had about 18 different stock tanks. One of them they had these they're called um, I think they're called parakew or something like that, and it's a cousin to the piranha. But they eat them down there. And uh these guys get in the water with them and these waders and go in there with big nets, and I always thought that was the way to fish was with big, great big nets and just drag the drag the tank until you came out with your fish.
SPEAKER_05Okay. Now I've got to tell this on myself, but uh fishing's for the guy that didn't learn to hunt, and golf is for the guy that didn't learn to fish. You might get some feedback from that.
SPEAKER_02I might get some pushback.
SPEAKER_05Yes. Uh what about all this wild critters that you eat and fish? What's your favorite game to eat?
SPEAKER_02Quail's gotta be my favorite. Um, I love quail. Any kind of way, grilled or fried or I like dove. I know you don't like dove, but I man, I love it. And I think part of it growing up, that was the first thing I did with my dad. The first kind of hunting I did was dove hunting and with a breakover 410 single shot shotgun. It belonged to my grandmother that she kept in her car trunk to shoot snakes with. But uh my mom would chicken from growing up as a kid, and I just they were to me it was great.
SPEAKER_05Alright. Mother always just fried them whole, and I never enjoyed dove. All right. Well, there's a rule that you live by. That's a neat saying in that website.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, leave things better than you found them.
SPEAKER_05Leave things better than you found them. I like that. That's a good rule. My rule, perhaps, it changes as I go along. Uh it's easier to get forgiveness than permission.
SPEAKER_02Now, did you learn that as a trapper or was that a marriage thing you learned?
SPEAKER_05A combination, perhaps. Uh who was the old artist, cartoonist, uh but uh he showed two little boys that had the milk pen calf haltered up, and one of them was about to get on him, and underneath it the caption was it's easier to get forgiveness and permission. So I like that. Uh now your radio show airs Saturday morning eight to nine. That's right. And then now it's the Lone Star Trail. It's not always been that, has it? No, I started it last year.
SPEAKER_02Uh well, I mean, in I guess in 24 we started it as the Central Texas out Central Texas Outdoors, I think is what we called it then. And uh uh we kind of changed the name and format. We're now we're on the podcast deal. We got on Apple and Spotify and some other podcast formats.
SPEAKER_05And so originally it was a 30-minute program?
SPEAKER_02It was 30 minutes, yes.
SPEAKER_05Now it's an hour.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05Now how many radio stations air this? We're on five stations right now. And in how many states?
SPEAKER_02Uh two states.
SPEAKER_05What other state?
SPEAKER_02Missouri. We've got two uh two stations in Missouri. Do all of these air at the same time on Saturday? Most of them do on Saturday. There's one station uh in Missouri that airs it on Sunday afternoons, but everybody else is at some time on Saturday.
SPEAKER_05All right now part of yours segment since I've been in it is called House Rules. How did you come up with that?
SPEAKER_02Well, I was I was trying to find a way to trying to find a way to separate when you and I talk and uh as as its own segment. And out of all the feedback I get, everybody tells me you gotta have Dayton back on, you gotta keep Dayton on there. And I agree. Um But I was thinking about some of our conversations like we had had, just like tonight, we're sitting out here in a field, and uh that's kind of what got my mind started on I've got to get some of this recorded.
SPEAKER_05We got something Yeah, I think that's a deer, don't you? But last time I said that it was a hog.
SPEAKER_02Okay, the head, uh it almost looks like a raccoon.
SPEAKER_05We're about 80 yards from where we think the hogs will crawl under a gate, and something's just come out in this coastal field. Nathan asked about my thermal. It's uh a rover brand camera that's mounted on top, R-O-V-I-R, and I've had this about eight years, and it's changed the way I hunt. It has a joystick here that rotates at 360, it'll pan tilt and zoom, and I have all the comforts of home almost besides the TV, and this is black and white, so I guess TV's included in this. But it makes it so much easier to hunt. And hot weather or cold weather, I can leave the pickup running all night long, and the wife pays for the gasoline, I don't have to worry about that, but it it's more enjoyable to sit here in an easy chair and recline when you want to, and I go to sleep when I need to. And we can pan 360 and hopefully see more critters. So that's what we're doing now, and I'm trying to interview Nathan and give him a little feedback. Uh recently you had Dr. Martin from Brownwood. Yes. You interviewed him, and that was one of my favorite shows because I know Mark, and he's uh been a doctor in the Carlisle family four generations now, so they really like him. And he's hunted worldwide, been to Africa several times, New Zealand, I don't know what all countries Russia.
SPEAKER_02Been to Russia?
SPEAKER_05All right, Russia, I was.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_05Let him tell some more stories. I really enjoyed that. One of the other favorite uh interviews that he had was with Mike Bodenschuk. Uh Mike is the past state director of Texas, and when I was trapping, I was under the same program, and he hadn't come into Texas when I was there. So I haven't met Mike. I saw him on a podcast last week, and I've never met him, and but he is more knowledgeable than uh all the other trappers put together, including myself. Uh they told it about me that when I turned 50, I was over the hill, never made it to the top. And I'd say Mike is uh at the top and still there. His mind is exceptionally sharp. He can recall dates and names and Yes. Numbers and I was surprised at his knowledge. And he's had a wider range of opportunities and gone to different countries. And the lady radio telemetry that he's done is amazing. And so I think Mike's a honest and believable character. I I give him a 100% rating.
SPEAKER_02He there's a Fort Worth Star Telegram article that he contributed to, if I'm not mistaken, I think it was that publication, but he was called in to do uh do some forensic work where by which he was supposed to be measuring some injuries on a person they had found in the Trinity River who was deceased. And they called him in to basically, as he tells it in the article and some of the research following, the sheriff had already made up his mind about that it was a uh mountain lion attack. And and so basically he really just wanted Mike to come in and confirm that. Well, the the evidence didn't support what the sheriff had already decided was there, and so anyway, he he didn't appreciate Mike's scientific approach to disproving his theory about the the issue. Uh it turned out it was a homicide, and they had they had a uh criminal they had to track down, and it would have been much simpler for that sheriff to have blamed a mountain lion, but it wasn't a mountain lion. Okay. So yeah, Mike's done a lot of different things, and he's a great uh great source of information.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, his knowledge and expertise is goes way beyond what I ever dreamed of. Mine is local, and I was born and raised in Mills County and gonna die there. I've already got my tombstone at the cemetery and just need a date on it. I would like to do one more hog hunt after I turned 90, but uh that's a few years down the line. Uh back to your experiences now. What was your most rememberable hunt, or what was your favorite hunt that you've gone on? Where were you? What were you doing, and how old were you?
SPEAKER_02Uh I was 13, and it was the first buck I'd shot, and it was my dad and I. It's probably the most memorable. Uh it was still fairly early in the season, and we had uh we'd had a stand and a feeder, and it's I don't know how much money my dad had spent in corn that year and whatever, but uh, we decided to go to an open field and we just kind of set up and um waited, and right as the sun was nearly down, or about to be down, uh this decent size 10-point comes out, and um I remember just shaking. But uh shot him and how far away was he? Oh, I don't know. He was probably uh 110 or 15 yards. He wasn't he was pretty close. Um but there was no feeder or anything, and we didn't have any we weren't in a stand, we were just on the ground, so it was we kind of had we were in the right place at the right time.
SPEAKER_05What rifle were you using?
SPEAKER_02Well, we had carried um we'd carried my grandfather's 30 carbine, M1 carbine.
SPEAKER_05Open sight?
SPEAKER_02Open sight. Well, you did well. Well, I didn't shoot it with that. I shot it with my dad's six millimeter scope on it. And uh that that gun, I don't know, I don't even know what kind of scope it is. I don't think he's ever sighted it in since the day you put it on. And uh it's it's still killed more c hogs and deer and coyots than any other gun. Still in the family then. It's still, yeah, it's still covered in an inch of dirt and dust, probably. But it's uh yeah, that's probably the most memorable until started taking my kids out, and then that's been a pretty good experience, too.
SPEAKER_05I've often said a boy should never sell his first gun or his first car, and I'm not gonna make any predictions about other equipment or wives, but uh Nathan and I are on the same track. Uh uh we married our high school sweetheart almost, and we're gonna die with them, so good deal on that. I've regretted both my gun and my first car. I wished I had them back.
SPEAKER_02What was your first car?
SPEAKER_05Uh 64 Comet. 64 Comet. With four in the floor, and the wife hated it, so I had to get rid of it, and she'd stalled it out at a red light and then burned rubber when she started off.
SPEAKER_02What color was it?
SPEAKER_05Blue.
SPEAKER_02Blue.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I repainted it. Older brother got it, local girl got it in high school, and then later he bought it from her, and it was gold. And then when I got it from him, I had it repainted, and I wished I had that rascal back. It had run.
SPEAKER_02Well, that's all the time we have for this week's episode. Thanks for stopping by. Me and old Hank the Gar Dog will catch you next week at the same time, same place. If you can't join us on a local station, find the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you find podcasts. Also, you can connect with us on Facebook and share your hunting and outdoor photos and stories with us at Lone Star Trail Radio at gmail.com. Until next time for all of us here at the show, so long.
