Rob's Pope & Young

This has to be one of the greatest Bow Hunting moments in my entire life. First and foremost I have to give thanks to the “Old Man Upstairs” (Thank You!) and my lease partners, Mitch Krivokucha (Mitch), Bruce Letbetter (Bruce), Shawn Kennedy (Shawn) & Richard Hehs (Richard). Without them, I don’t believe my first Pope & Young animal would have the same meaning.

Left to Right: (Bruce, Richard & Mitch) enjoying a few Monster Buck videos in camp. We had a power pole, that's about it. A 2 room shack, cots, rattlesnakes and pack rats for company LOL!

The Area59 Campfire burns brightly with this crew. We nicknamed our hunting lease Area59 simply because our property line sits right off Highway 59, just east of Laredo and just inside the Border Patrol check station. The brush in this region has a large percentage of illegal aliens working northward hence the name "Area 59"...aliens out there somewhere! :) The Badlands of South Texas. I slept with a loaded pistol every night here. The few nights alone out here really make you realize, the west is still alive and well with a modern twist.

On to the hunt……This hunt takes place deep in the brush country region of South Texas. The Golden Triangle region is well known for record class whitetail bordering the Texas – Mexico border. This region is ranching country, a rough region well known for illegal activity related to the drug barons south of the Mexican border. Not an area to take lightly and the risk of confrontation in the brush runs very high year round. The country side consists predominately of working ranches, 10 – 40,000+ acres big and larger. Large expanses of private land, no development for thousands of miles. The few towns scattered throughout the region are small and extremely isolated. Medical care can literally take hours to get to. Rattlesnake bites, mountain lions, feral hogs, javelina and nasty spiders keep you on your guard here. Time literally stands still in this country.

Thorny brush species dominate the South Texas Brush Country. Mesquite, acacia, prickly pear, lotebush, granjeno, white-brush, Texas ebony and wild olive form dense, almost impenetrable thickets. The South Texas Brush Country is well known for producing trophy-class white-tailed deer. It is undoubtedly the most biologically diverse habitat in Texas, as tropical, grassland and desert species all inhabit this thorny shrub land in ecological harmony. To be continued...........