welder is a neat place. It's where I did my graduate research. They do a lot of good wildlife research there.

"Our nation’s continued prosperity hinges on our ability to solve environmental problems and sustain the natural resources on which we all depend.” John McCain November 22, 1996
"I recognize the right and duty of this generation to develop and use our natural resources, but I do not recognize the right to waste them, or to rob by wasteful use, the generations that come after us."
- Theodore Roosevelt, speech, Washington, D.C., 1900

Near Sommerville Lake on a stock pond...

Had a cottonmouth, drop from a tree 50 yards out and start swimming to the boat, we thought "no way" a snake was trying to attack from 50 yards out.

He kept coming until he was 5 feet away and me and 2 buddies broke every rod we had trying to keep him away, he entered and was knocked out of the boat 3 times before my buddy used the paddle on him...

#2 I was playing golf and was attacked by a hawk on hole 15, 16, and 17.

the 4some in front of us had to quit - the same hawk made 2 of them bleed, we were lucky I guess, kind of cool actually

We were running a trotline in the brazos and had a decent sized yellowcat on down the line. We ease on down the line and get the net ready. We get about 10 feet away and notice the fish isn't hooked through the mouth, he was foul hooked on his back. We get closer and the barb isn't even under his skin, just the very tip of the hook is under the skin. He wasn't flopping around at all, and any kind of flop and he would have been off. My best guess that somehow the hook hit a nerve of some kind that paralyzed the fish keeping it from moving.

Nothing too amazing...

During deer season about 5 years back I was sitting in the deer stand in front of about 35 acres we had just cleared to plant pines. They had just gotten through clearing everything and there was a large tree(about 3ft wide) that had been cut down about 15 yards in front of me. There had been dove flying in and landing on the other side of this tree for a while. Must have been about 15 of them or so and all of a sudden I see a Red Tail Hawk flying off far to my left. He starts flying in my direction and gets literally about 1-2 ft. off the ground is just gliding over to where the tree is. Once he got to where the tree was he slowed down and landed right where the dove where. The dove took off and the hawk just sat there for about 5 minutes and then he took off with one in his talons. The really cool thing was that there was no way for the Hawk to see the dove until he went over the tree.

The very first time I went hunting with my dad (that I was going to be the one shooting) I was about 8 I guess. We were leaning against this tree when all of sudden we hear a bunch of leaves rustling what sounded about 5 ft behind us. We turned around and there was a very large Bobcat (although it could have just seemed large because I had never seen one before). Well, we forgot about hunting and just started watching him. He eventually got within about 3 ft of us before he saw us. When he saw us I think both me and the Bobcat had an OH SH*T!!!! look on our faces. Well the Bobcat just sort of slowly meandered off in a different direction. Really beautiful creature in my opinion.

Ahhh, thought of a hunting related one

My freshman year at A&M, I was hunting on a buddy's ranch near Burnet. At about 7:30 a.m., I popped a doe pretty hard with my .308 at about 125 yards. I wait a while, and since I was about 1 week removed from having a cast removed for a broken leg, I wasn't getting anywhere fast.

Anyway, I grab my rifle and start hobbling in that direction. This deer hasn't moved in over 20 minutes (I noticed no breathing, and the eyes were open). When I am about 20 yards away, it suddenly comes back to life and jumps over a dirt pile that was behind it. At this point it is over a berm and I can't see it, but my buddy who is about 550 yards away can. Running on 3 legs (opposite front leg useless) it sorta clears a fence, and collapsed on the other side. It managed to get into a treeline about 20 yards on the other side of the fence.

Me, my dad, buddy and his uncle all meet up at the spot I shot the deer. We found bits of shoulder, literally a 3 inch chunk of rib, lung tissue, and lots of lung blood. On the other side of the fence we found about the easiest blood trail I have ever seen, with very large pools of blood. About 80 yards from the fence, the deer had cut back into a patch of trees. The was a semi clear area with some underbrush about 6 feet in diameter that literally had blood everywhere (on the ground, on shrubs, up to 3 feet up in a tree). Then absolutely nothing. No deer, no tracks, nothing. The area around this patch of trees is basically an overgrazed pasture with nothing more than about 6" high (literally mostly dirt-NO cover) for close to 500 yards around it. All this occurred within 20-30 minutes of when my buddy saw it jump over the fence.

It's the only deer I have ever lost. That was 13 years ago and still bugs me to this day. We still refer it it as the alien abduction deer.

it ran out of blood. no trail...

I've posted this before, but...

gf and I were enjoying a glass of wine and a beautiful South Texas sunset on the back porch of the ranch house Friday evening when out of the corner of my eye I see what appeared to be a snake slowly moving UNDER THE CHAIR SHE WAS SITTING IN. The light was dim, but I could tell it was a big snake. At first glance, it looked like a Western Diamondback, but in the back of my mind I was hoping it was just a rat snake. I told her to stand up slowly and walk towards me. (If I had told her I believe a freak-sized WD rattlesnake [the most dangerous snake in North America] was under her, I figured she'd lose it) So she walks over to where I'm standing.
I then tell her I think a snake is over there on the corner of the porch where she was sitting so I pull my car around and shine the headlights where I think it is. Sure enough, it's the biggest rattler I've ever seen anywhere. I ran to the shed, grabbed a machete, coaxed her head out, and gave it a good whack.

I didn't get to appreciate the sheer size of the serpent until I held it up. She must have weighed 50 pounds, had 16 buttons on her rattler, was as big around as my calf, and her head was the size of my fist. I estimated her length to be somewhere around 6'5" - 6'6". (I'm ~ 6'4"
with
shoes).

Needless to say, I didn't sleep much that night and was still trembling the next morning. I ended up taking her to the taxidermy where she'll be skinned and mounted.


























[This message has been edited by highwayman (edited 9/5/2008 3:23p).]

I was diving on the wreck of the HMCS Columbia outside of Quadra Island, BC a few years back when a pod of 22 orcas came tooling through.

Most amazing thing I've ever seen in my life. There were two babies, about 6-8 feet long each, and the rest were adults. The biggest bull was ~30 feet long with a 5 foot dorsal fin. I could feel them pinging me with their sonar.

One time I shot a doe from 75 yards out, with a 25-06, shot perfectly......

Drops dead at impact - doesn't move at all - instead of waiting 15 minutes, I go ahead and start walking over to it. I get within 2 feet and the dam thing jumps straight up and starts running into the woods, abosolutly scared the hell out of me.

Found one drop of blood (no blood where it whad fallen, no blood anywhere - 50 yeards out I found a single drop - that's it.) I searched for 5 hours - nothing....

Still bothers me to this day

Did I just scare the deer and make it faint?

Or was it some crazy shot that didn't leave blood? I am still confused.....

finally thought of one....

If pigs line themselves up, I will sometimes shoot 2 in one shot. One day a group of mostly white pigs showed up and I shot behind the ear of the close one which was lined up perfectly with the one behind it. The close one lay dead while the second one, with a bloody red face, spun very quickly several times and layed down. I put my sights on its head and waited to see if it would try to get up. The moment I decided it was dead and lifted my gun, the hog ran off. I trailed it for about a hundred yards through heavy brush and the blood trail (which was pretty slim) ended.

My best guess is that the bullet barely grazed him but the splatter on his face from the other pig scared him so much that he went into a dizzying spin. When the dizziness wore off, he just ran away, barely scratched by the bullet.

We are fishing off of Costa Rica around Bat Island. We had already caught and released a number of sailfish when a 25 ft whale shark comes up behind the boat and starts to follow and we troll. (we moving slow with down riggers). for 20 minutes the fish won't leave. Finally, we said screw the fishing, grabbedthe mask and snorkles and jumped in. We swam with the shark for 10-15 minutes before it dove off into the blue. I don't know what made it what to follow the boat.

A couple years ago I was driving down 35 from Dallas to Austin, and came to a standstill north of Hillsboro (huge surprise, I know). This traffic jam eventually turned into a parking lot, and after about 30 minutes of not moving an inch and sitting on my hood I decided to find an alternate route.

A couple miles to the East, I could see a line of cars driving down a dirt road and I assumed if I could get over there I would be home free. I pulled out into the grass and down to the fenceline and rambled a couple miles looking for an opening while everyone on the highway stared at me like I was an idiot (which I am)


Finally came to a bridge and stopped to look around cuz the fence had stopped. A Hispanic guy on the highway saw what I was doing and apparently thought it was a good idea, cuz he walked down and joined me as I made my way off into the weeds on foot. It looked like a good place to drive through but I wanted to make sure I wouldn't get stuck anywhere.

After a couple minutes of walking through the brush and trying to have a silent signing conversation with the guy (spoke no English), I came to a stop and looked down. To my great joy, there was a rattler that had to have been at between 2 or 3 feet long right between my feet. I was wearing flipflops and shorts, and immediately started sweating. I tried to get the guy's attention, but I was too freaked out to say anything and didn't know Spanish for "snake" so I just took off sprinting back to my truck and hopped in. That guy must have thought I was out of my mind.


Not a great story, I know, but that was the day I learned how much I hate snakes

One morning about 7 years ago I was hunting out at my grandparents place near Tarpley, Texas. I was sitting in my usuall spot on the ground on the edge of the brush and mountain laurel. It was still pitch dark, no moon, and cloudy, when I had walked out there to my spot so I couldnt see a thing. Sitting there in the dark I was hearing something on the ground next to me. I didnt pay any attention to it( I just thought it was a field mouse or something.) Finally when I could finally start to see I looked down next to my side and not 2 feet away from me cuddled up in the blanket I'd brought along was a grown cottontail. It was a really cold morning so I guess he didnt give a crap that my scent was on it.

Another time I was dove hunting on a cousins place outside of Bigfoot, Texas. It was late evening and the dove had quit flying. But the jackrabbits were beginning to come out. I was younger then so I told my dad I wanted to shoot one that was standing about 20 feet from where I was at. He said thats to easy, so he threw a rock to get it to start running. It ran about 30 yards and stopped. So my dad threw another rock to where it would run. He began to run horizontally in front of me so I took aim and shot. Being 10 years old, I was still getting used to leading the animal when your shooting a shotgun. I missed and the pellots hit the dirt about 5 yards behind the running jackrabbit. It ran a little ways and stopped. I watched it for a minute and was raising my gun to shoot again when suddenly the rabbit fell on its side and began to flop around on the ground. This went on for a bit then it was still. We walked over and the jackrabbit was stonecold dead. Looking over the thing we couldnt find one spot where a pellot had hit. We even went as far as skinning it and we still found nothing. Our conclusion was that it had a heartattack. I had always heard stories about that but I never believed them until this happened.

I was hiking in NE New Mexico along a ridge. I was sitting on a rock outcropping when a bighorn ewe walked out. They were not known to be in the area. She walked toward me, stopping about 10 yards away. She made a half circle around me, stopping for grass and water in the rock. She then stopped and stared at me. Having been there for several minutes, I began talking to her, half expecting her to talk back. I then got up, made a half circle around her, 10 yards away, before heading down the ridge. She was never concerned about my presence for those 15 minutes.

Sitting in a high lift with my brother one morning while it was still dark and the entire sky literally lit up for several seconds and turned dark again. Found out later that a gas line ruptured and the light from the explosion was like someone throwing on a light switch.

Running the IC in San Antonio Bay and saw a wave of water jump up out of the flats. Turns out it was a pod of dolphins running a school of mullet toward the bank, balling them up, and ripping right through them. Cool stuff.

Thought of a couple more....

The very first time I shot a shotgun I was 6 yrs old. It was a .410 and I guess/ assume I didn't have it firmly against my shoulder. My brother, who was two years older than me, had already shot a can several times and didn't phase him. Well my dad asked me if I wanted to shoot. And of course, trying to prove myself I said yes. My dad put a Keystone Light can against the base of this pine tree and told me to try and shoot it. I can remember barely being able to hold it up, firing, and then literally flying threw the air and landing on my back. The wind was knocked out of me and I had the typical "what the hell" look on my face. My dad goes and looks at the can because I obviously didn't hit it good, but there was one BB directly through the middle of the can. No other BB's or signs of being shot at.

On the snake stories..... My dad told me this story.

When he was a kid he and his family went on vacation to the Frio River. A rattlesnake and wondered it's way into camp one night and my dad grabbed a gig and gigged it a couple of times in the head. He thought it was dead and threw it off into the the woods. The next day he was taking down the tent and while he was rolling up the tent... sure enough there was that rattlesnake.

Edit: Inebriated typing.

[This message has been edited by dannyag07 (edited 9/6/2008 12:59p).]

Found a decent size flounder that choked on a fish that was too big for its mouth

Saw a hummingbird repeatedly attack a hawk. It was like watching a fighter jet dog fight with a cessna. very entertaining.

dannyags story reminded me of this one

When I was about 5 years old my family was camping at Huntsville state park. At about 11 pm one night my dad chopped off a copperheads head that was in our camp. He chunked the head into the woods and through the snake off to the side of the camp rode. The next day me and my brother are sitting by the side of the road when a 8 or 9 year old kid is riding on his bike when all of a sudden he jumps off his bike starts screaming and runs the other direction leaving his bike behind. About 5 seconds later me and my brother are over there looking at what could have happened. We see the body of the dead snake and scream our discovery to the kid...at the time it was VERY funny

------------------------

I'd rather be lucky than good.

More like weird human behavior but here it goes anyway:

1. When I was a teenager my idiot brother-in-law had killed about a 5' rattler that was coming out of the drain of the local (we only had one) car wash. he brought it over to show it off. My mom & one sister were at the grocery store so he decided he would play a trick on them. He coiled it up near the route they would have to take between the carport and front door. They come home and never see it. He leave it for a couple of hours while he & my dad have some beers and shoot the sh*t. Later, he was going to his truck to get some smokes and sees the snake out of the corner of his eye and ends up jumping about 10' in the air and dropping his beer. What an idiot.

2. Same B-I-L about 2 years later. We are down at the lake fishing. He finds some crazy looking bugs ( I always just called them blister bugs but maybe they are assassin bugs) on a willow tree and is making fun of them because they are getting it on. He decides to get a closer look and puts his face about 2" from the bugs. Me & my sister were a few feet away and we actually saw a little squirt of some fluid come out of the ass of one of the bugs and go right in my B-I-L's eye. He did a halfass backflip right into the lake and started splashing water in his eye. What an idiot.

[This message has been edited by FSGuide (edited 9/6/2008 10:42p).]

My biggest bass to date on a lure is about 8.5 lbs.

One day several years ago my girlfriend (now wife) and I were fishing on lake Palestine during the spring hybrid striper run. During a lull in the action I eased over to the bank looking for a place to take a leak. I noticed a huge bass against the bank. This bass was easily 10-12lbs and was laying calmly in the shallows with her tail toward the bank just sitting there in about a foot of water. As my boat moved past from the momentum of the trolling motor, I put my net in the water and scooped her up. She immediately came to life and began thrashing about. She was by far the largest bass I had ever held in my hands. She had huge growths that looked like warts on her eyes. She was obviously blind. By looking at her, her blindness had not affected her ability to get fat and maybe had improved her ability to survive. She never fell for any flashiness. I admired her for a few minutes and released her. She was as healthy as she could be. That is the biggest bass I have ever caught.

[This message has been edited by swampstander (edited 9/7/2008 12:18a).]

TTT

One of my favorite outdoors board threads.

bdb85,

My BIL, brother and myself also saw the Aurora Bourelias that morning. The news said that it was very very rare for it to dip this far south. Our ranch is outside of Abilene

Several years ago, my daughter and I were hunting in my blind. We had two red foxes come out trying to catch some mice in and old brush pile. One would crouch down several yards away from the pile while the other one would try to scare a mouse out of the pile toward the one that was crouched. Once they caught one, they would switch places. This went on for about 45 minutes when they finally left. I have never seen two of them team up like that in order to catch a meal.

BTW, I saw two horny toads last weekend while we were putting in our food plots. I thought that they were extinct.

Saw a heron swoop down in the flats near POC and grab a swimming rattlesnake out of the water, kill it, and eat it.

Got dive bombed by a falcon in colorado. There was a little bird up in the tree above and behind us, and we here this whooshing sound from above, and look up in time to see the falcon flash down just feet overhead at an incredible speed and zoom back up into the air hundreds of yards above us again....

I got up early one morning near Almont, CO. I went down to Spring Creek from the campsite to take a leak in the brush by the stream. I did my business, then washed my hands and face in the stream. As I stood up from washing up, I glanced upstream to watch a young black bear do the exact same thing about 30 yards away upstream on the opposite bank. We just stared at eachother for a few seconds, then I decided that the others needed to see the bear, and I started trying to yell "Bear!" without spooking the bear. Eventually, they others at camp figured out where I was and what I was yelling, but when they came running up to see, they spooked it and it ran off up the hillside.

[This message has been edited by MouthBQ98 (edited 5/5/2009 3:24p).]

Three years after this post originated and most of the same slackers are still around.

Several years back I caught a pelican on a topwater at Brown & Root Flats. Luckily had a buddy with me and we were able to release it virtually unscathed.

[This message has been edited by SanAntoneAg (edited 5/5/2009 3:48p).]

This is a great thread.

Next time some city slicker or animal rights jerk asks you why you hunt, have them read this thread.

When I was a kid, I caught a red snapper out of Clear Creek. About 3 miles north of Friendswood.

Several years back I was turkey hunting during the spring. I woke up a little late and therefore didn't make it to my tree before fly-down (mistake #2). As I was gathering my gear, I decided to not take my video camera (mistake #2) but did grab my still camera. As I approached my tree I gave a few soft yelps and setup my decoy. I sat down at my tree, pulled my calls out of my vest and waited all of 30 seconds (mistake #3) when I remembered my camera was under my coveralls. I raised my right elbow to unzip my coveralls and I hear PUTT, PUTT, PUTT right behind me from very close range. I froze, with my hand on my coveralls zipper and my elbow still in the air. I very, very slowly turned my head to the right and saw 3 jakes at 15 yds. Almost simultaneous with me seeing the jakes, I hear a booming gobble in front of me. I very, very slowly turn my head back to the left, with my elbow still in the air, to see a strutter at about 60 yards. Typically, I raise my gun when a strutting tom turns away from me, but in this case, I had the jakes behind me to deal with. To shorten the story, I will skip a bunch of details and fast forward to the good stuff.

As the tom approached my decoy and made a few strutting passes he positioned himself right behind my decoy. He pushed his chest against my decoy and the telescoping pole gave way and my decoy dropped to the ground. Now, in turkey terms, this is the equivalent of saying "Come and jump me now!" The tom immediately jumped on tom of my decoy and started stomping on it. After a few minutes he started mating it. While this was going on, all I could think of was a) stupid, stupid, stupid... both me and the tom. Had I had my video camera I would have something the decoy company would definitely buy. Had I got my still camera out, I would prove to doubters what really happened.

Well, I let the tom finish his business and then BOOM. 20 lbs., 9.5 in. beard with 1 in. spurs. What a hunt!

This is a great thread. Thanks Matt for bringing it to the top.

In the mid 80’s while driving down a county road adjacent to the ranch the wife and I saw an odd looking animal ahead of us off to the side of the road. Upon closer inspection it was a red-tailed hawk that had grabbed a bull snake. Well the snake must have been five or six feet long and it grabbed back and had the hawk in full constriction mode. I found a broken branch to poke at the snake to try get him to let go and was successful. Then the **** snake started chasing me with his mouth wide open. He was plenty mad! Well he finally stopped after maybe twenty yards and I went back to check on the hawk thinking that he would be very glad for having saved his life.

He’d had enough time to get a little air so when I walked up to him he quickly spread his wings, laid on his back reaching for me with his talons and made a poor attempt at a screech. I was thinking, “Great! the snake didn’t get me only to have my eyes gouged out by this ungrateful hawk”. After a few more minutes he caught his breath and hopped up on a nearby fence post still breathing pretty hard with his tongue hanging out.

I kid you not, as we drove away that hawk took off and flew just ahead of the car about ten feet off the ground for a half a mile or so as if to say thank you.

Thanks for bumping this thread

About the coolest thing I've seen was a badger being badgered by two coyotes down in Roma. I got one of the coyotes but missed the other one. Nobody believed that I saw that badger.

I also saw an albino skunk in Fredericksburg, Texas. 2 other witnesses with that encounter.

I had a nice tarpon get eaten by a world class hammerhead at Boca Grande Pass in Fl.

On the same trip I was fishing a green light off of the end of the dock catching snook. Suddenly a large dark shape comes rising up from the darkness. A manatee head appears and he heads straight for the light. He mouths it for a second and pushes it while I reach down and pet his back. After that he just sank slowly back down into the depths.

This weekend I was fishing Yegua creek at Lake Sommerville and I watched an otter cruise up and down the creek all morning eating white bass. I didn't know there were any in the area. I think he wanted the fish flopping on my stringer because he never strayed very far from me.

One afternoon on my uncle's ranch I saw two 150+ B&C bucks fighting through a the high fence for several minutes.

About 10 years ago a few of us went duck hunting on lake Falcon on the border. As we were wading around setting up our decoy spread on public land in the dark morning, one of the guys starts yelling "oh sh*t" over and over again. We shine our lights over to him and he is all tangled up in a big gill net (he topped his waders, but luckily it wasn't that cold). We finished the spread and got all camoed up, and right at daybreak, sure enough, 3 mexicans in a boat came cruising into the spread to retrieve their illegal net. They were confused when the ducks started bouncing off of their boat, and nervous when they saw us holding guns standing there watching them break the law.

Story #2: I was 13 and hunting Auodad (not cougars, actual auodad) in Fluvanna, TX near Post. We were on top of a plateau glassing down into a canyon watching some sheep drink from a watering hole about 6-700 yards away. We saw a coyote come up and take a drink from the tank, capturing the sheep's (and our)attention. All of a sudden, all hell broke loose. 5 or 6 other coyotes had circled downwind of the sheep, and the chase was on. They ended up taking down a kid auodad after a 50 yard chase. It's bellowing is still engrained in my head. Oh, and I shot a huge ram that day, which was just gravy.

Last story: A few years ago, we were fishing for rainbows in alaska during early june before the salmon run. The day started with fishing in the Brooks river in Katmai nat'l park (The one with the picturesque waterfalls where the bears fish for salmon). I'd been giving my uncle hell for keeping his waterproof camera not only zipped in his pocket, but inside a ziplock bag as well. Sure enough, about 150 yards into our downstream wade, a huge 1200+ lb. bear walks out into the river, and crosses about 20 feet infront of my uncle. He never even acknowledged our presence. Of course, this wasn't captured on film because when a huge boar bear is 20 feet away, your fingers stop working and my uncle couldn't get the camera out of the ziplock bag.
The day ended up with the coolest trout fishing experience I've ever had. The sun came out and it warmed up considerably, and a caddis fly hatch started occuring (on a different river).There were so many caddis flies in the air and on the blades of grass on shore, that huge, 20 inch+ rainbows were shimmying up onto shore to get them. Really amazing!

Great thread- I could read this stuff all day!

Maybe not that unusual (some of the good ole boys at the bait shop acted like it happens every day), but to a kid from west Texas, it was a new experience.

My wife and son have been visiting her folks in Arlington since last week, so I've been on a fishing binge. Last Tuesday, I was out chasing reds and trout in the bayou fishing live shrimp under a popping cork. After no luck at my honey holes, I moved up to the north end near where the freshwater feeds in.

First cast right around dusk and I pop it a couple times and the cork immediately sinks, I set the hook and I'm into something big... or so I thought... I cranked like crazy and and it felt like a fish at first, but then the line never moves again so I get the boat a little closer and give the line some slack and the bobber floats up in the same place a few times. I figure I got thrown into a submerged tree and I pole the boat over there to free the hook. The line never moves until I'm right on top of the bobber, and then it screams off 20 yards or so at 100 mph. I start reeling again and this time I feel the head shakes and I know I've got him. I fight this massive beast for about 20 minutes and then all of the sudden the fight stops. I'm sure I've been thrown into another tree. I crank and yank like crazy, but the line doesn't move an inch.

I head over there to try to free it but the line moves not and it's still hung. When I've reeled up almost to the end, I grab the line (15# braid w/ 20# mono leader) and start pulling. It lifts a bit but sinks slowly when I release it a couple times in a row just like the waterlogged branch I'm sure I'm hung up in.

I'd like to get my tackle back so I slowly pull the line by hand until I'm under the cork and holding the last 6-8in of leader. As the "log" surfaces, I'm already reaching to grab the hook with my other hand to free it when the "log" shakes its big, flat, scaley, toothy-arse reptilian head and snaps my line like it had been 2# test all along.

This was my first close-encounter with a gator since moving to FL and I almost lost a hand for $3 worth of tackle. I learned a lesson or 2 though, and it was a cool outdoor experience that I won't forget.

Fishing on Lake texoma one morning, and notice lots of shad around the cliffs at Eisenhower. All of the sudden, they just start churning against the shore. They did that for about 30 minutes, and tens of thousands just stranded themselves on the rocks. My dad and I went around and gathered some up to keep/freeze for chum bait at some later point. With our hands alone we were able to get 2 5 gallon buckets full.

Damnedest thing...

When I was about 11 or 12, we were camping in Fort Davis on a ranch. I was exploring, climbing mountains, etc when I saw an owl out hunting. It swooped down to catch a field mouse, made an error and smacked the ground pretty hard. The mouse got away and the owl had a damaged wing. I chased it for a couple miles. It would half fly/half run trying to get away from me. Eventually it gave up and turned around to fight/get eaten. I took my time and got the owl to get onto my arm. I carried it all the way back to our campsite. My grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins were amazed. This owl was pretty good sized and had HUGE bright yellow eyes. We let the rancher know about it and he called some people at the state park. They drove out and were also in disbelief that I had managed to tame a wild bird enough to carry around on my arm and took the owl to go rehabilitate it. I will never forget that experience...