It’s that time of year where the guns are cleaned and oiled , the war paint is applied, the long johns are pulled-up, the battery-powered socks are turned on as deer hunters flock to their leases in search of that prize-point buck. Coming from Texas and spending part of my life on my grandfather’s ranches, I’m very familiar with this time of year though I was always lucky, as back in my youth, hunting permits where cheap as “landowners and their families enjoyed exempt status and were even issued doe permits, no deer lease required for our family, just some salt and peppered, pan-fried backstrap.

© 2000 Rolando Gomez

Today with a technology consumed busy life I find myself with no time to hunt but enjoy reminiscing about the days of hunting deer, rattlesnake, javelinas (wild South Texas hog), cotton tails, jack rabbits and even cubbies of quail. Though I must admit, when I see todays hunter I think about how my grandfather would quip and snipe at how hunters have evolved from trackers to stalkers as they sit in their deer blinds quietly waiting for that buck they’ve been fattening with feed corn for the past few months. Hunting has become as commercialized as Christmas to the point that todays hunter is better termed a techno hunter, much like fisherman with their sonar detectors for the school of fish.
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