Helicopter Aoudad hunting in Tx

[jomw10]

I doubt you will find landowners willing to let people shoot hogs/aoudad on their property for little or no money. Property is very expensive in Texas and potential liability is just to much just to risk it. And just to be clear, a liability release means nothing, you can still get sued and have to get a lawyer to defend yourself. It is not just about greedy landowners, but liability/dealing with people vs the benefit.

Now, if you are a farmer, you may get into an agreement with someone to come an shoot pigs for a low or no fee. But it's not going to be open for everybody.

 

[HookMeUpII]

Interesting. It seems this only applies to federal lands as it is enforced by the department of interior. DOI does not have jurisdiction over private lands. I guess the new law will help to do the culling, if need be, in Big Bend National Park etc.

Completely uneducated guess but: Sounds like they're looking to efficiently cull the "escapees" while still making sense for the outfitters to continue charging the trophy fee on high-fenced captives.

 

[HookMeUpII]

I doubt you will find landowners willing to let people shoot hogs/aoudad on their property for little or no money. Property is very expensive in Texas and potential liability is just to much just to risk it. And just to be clear, a liability release means nothing, you can still get sued and have to get a lawyer to defend yourself. It is not just about greedy landowners, but liability/dealing with people vs the benefit.

Now, if you are a farmer, you may get into an agreement with someone to come an shoot pigs for a low or no fee. But it's not going to be open for everybody.

Little or no money is not the same as a $6,000-$7,000 trophy fee for an aoudad. Sorry. I'm a finance guy. Math isn't adding up to me.

That goes for $1,000-$2,000 just to be driven to a corn feeder to hunt hogs.

Open for everybody is not the same as charging a fair price to help solve a problem.

 

[jomw10]

Little or no money is not the same as a $6,000-$7,000 trophy fee for an aoudad. Sorry. I'm a finance guy. Math isn't adding up to me.

That goes for $1,000-$2,000 just to be driven to a corn feeder to hunt hogs.

Open for everybody is not the same as charging a fair price to help solve a problem.

You see, I don't think the landowner that have Aoudad and outfit hunts for them see them as an issue. They see them as an income. The state sees them as an issue as are very detrimental to bighorn sheep, but most of the ranches with Aoudad have no bighorn sheep.
I do not know what will people consider a good price, but you can find hunts in the $3000 to $4000 for self-guided hunts.
Same goes with hogs, folks that outfit for them don't see them as a problem but as a source of income.

If you want fair price, you need to find folks that don't have hunting as primary source of income for their property but agricultural activities. And good luck with that!

 

[HookMeUpII]

You see, I don't think the landowner that have Aoudad and outfit hunts for them see them as an issue. They see them as an income. The state sees them as an issue as are very detrimental to bighorn sheep, but most of the ranches with Aoudad have no bighorn sheep.
I do not know what will people consider a good price, but you can find hunts in the $3000 to $4000 for self-guided hunts.
Same goes with hogs, folks that outfit for them don't see them as a problem but as a source of income.

If you want fair price, you need to find folks that don't have hunting as primary source of income for their property but agricultural activities. And good luck with that!

There is a price everyone is willing to pay for something. I personally, like Texas, but would absolutely never travel that far just for hogs. With that being said, I have enough connections in GA where I could hunt them for basically just the price of gas, meals, and whatever a hotel room is at this point. The difference is a 14 hour car ride vs a 30-40 hour one. It's a matter of location, I suppose. I see your point, I also disagree with parts of it. We live in a free market economy. If someone wants to pay $1000+ for a red carpet hunt for hogs in TX, so be it.

Aoudad, different story. I'll concede that. With that being said, the Texas game farm exotics are going to clash with the state at some point. It hasn't been going on long enough for full blown conflict. I imagine having zebra, aoudad, blackbuck, etc running around all over the place is only going to fly for so long. Might take another generation but I think at some point the state is probably going to step in. The first indication is the fact they OK'd arial hunting for them.

 

[jomw10]

Agree, no idea where the exotic market is going to go. Right now there are a lot of exotics that are very well stablish through some areas of Texas, like Aoudad, blackbuck, axis, Nilgai, Fallow, hogs, etc. And some landowner despise them and hunt them out of their land, while others look forward to have them in their property. So far the state only has single out Aoudad and hogs to try to control them (unsuccessfully!).

 

[rifletimes]

Shooting anything from a helicopter is killing, not hunting

Agree, but it is culling which Texas needs. Way too many hogs.

 

[Major Bonkers]

I shot mine in SA with Mr. Abrie Arlow, past Kimberley on the Orange River. He told that the meat was too tough to eat, but I demanded the fillets regardless, which were excellent. I suspect that the rest of the meat found a happy consumer. Not particularly difficult to hunt.

I have also shot feral goats in Scotland, which roll in their own urine and it is impossible to get the smell out of the hide. The liver can be eaten, and is excellent barbecued.

 

[Flbt]

The problem I've always had with TX/OK/GA and hogs is it seems super greedy the way the industry prices hunting them. Granted, having people come in and shoot them is apparently only scratching the surface of the problem. I look at it from the standpoint of: If you're charging $1,000+ for a hog hunt, doesn't seem like much of a problem you are eager to solve, now does it? If there is lodging, meals, and so on, included, that's a different story. However, I've seen $1,000+ just to be driven to a box blind in front of a feeder on private property.

I had no idea, until this post, about the aoudad issue. Seems like a lucrative "problem" to have when places are charging $6,000 trophy fees on them.

Helicopter hunting is a bit different, obviously. Fuel is expensive, insurance isn't cheap, and pilots don't typically work for free.

I dont know about tx and ok

But ga all ways got me having to buy a permit to hunt hogs.
I like fl way hogs belong to the landowner on private land. No permit if I want to let someone form out of state hunt or trap.

For years I hunted with a bunch of guys that hunted fl ga and Al with a few trips to la.
In fl and ga alone they average over a 1000 hogs a season. ( they did not hunt during deer season). A lot of the places were big timber deer lease.
No one wanted money from them they were glad to get the hogs gone.
But the man that put it all together has been a cowboy, heavy equipment operator and county agent. So he knew a lot of people to put it together.

 

[Mountaineer]

Is there any public land that a person could hunt aoudad on?

 

[John Wasmuth]

Is there any public land that a person could hunt aoudad on?

You can go to Texas parks and wildlife to find any public land to hunt but I don’t remember any west Texas public land hunts. Texas is about 97% privately owned land and most every one that owns land gets a stiff price for hunting anything on their land. It covers taxes and liability insurance.

 

[dchum]

Completely uneducated guess but: Sounds like they're looking to efficiently cull the "escapees" while still making sense for the outfitters to continue charging the trophy fee on high-fenced captives.

I wouldn’t say not so.

Many aoudad hunts are conducted on free range areas in west Texas anyways.

 

[HookMeUpII]

I dont know about tx and ok

But ga all ways got me having to buy a permit to hunt hogs.
I like fl way hogs belong to the landowner on private land. No permit if I want to let someone form out of state hunt or trap.

For years I hunted with a bunch of guys that hunted fl ga and Al with a few trips to la.
In fl and ga alone they average over a 1000 hogs a season. ( they did not hunt during deer season). A lot of the places were big timber deer lease.
No one wanted money from them they were glad to get the hogs gone.
But the man that put it all together has been a cowboy, heavy equipment operator and county agent. So he knew a lot of people to put it together.

I have family in GA that has land to hunt. I'd likely have to buy a tag too. That's just the cost of doing business though. NJ charges $2 for a coyote special season tag here. I remember having to pay the tag when we hunted with an outfitter in GA. $20-$30 pales in comparison to the fees some outfitters charge.

We hunted with one in GA that was $600 a person. However, lodging and transportation were included.

 

[HookMeUpII]

Many aoudad hunts are conducted on free range areas in west Texas anyways.

Yup. For $6000-$7000. It's not horrible. It's not great considering its invasive.

I defer back to the question: How did they get there in the first place?

 

[JimP]

Yup. For $6000-$7000. It's not horrible. It's not great considering its invasive.

I defer back to the question: How did they get there in the first place?

They were brought in after WWII by the Texas Game department.

They were a good idea that got out of hand

 

[John Wasmuth]

History of Aoudad Sheep in Texas » Outdoors International

Discover the fascinating history of Aoudad sheep in Texas, a resilient and challenging species to hunt. With populations that have grown 1,800% since 1963.

outdoors-international.com

 

[Red Leg]

Aoudad are a great free range hunt. Like most animals, when hunted behind a fence it is more akin to shooting, but out in the mountains of West Texas around Alpine and Marathon, they are a first class challenge.

This one is no monster, but he represented four and a half days of really hard hunting - and we saw dozens.

 

[HookMeUpII]

Aoudad are a great free range hunt. Like most animals, when hunted behind a fence it is more akin to shooting, but out in the mountains of West Texas around Alpine and Marathon, they are a first class challenge.

This one is no monster, but he represented four and a half days of really hard hunting - and we saw dozens.

They were brought in after WWII by the Texas Game department.

They were a good idea that got out of hand

I actually would love to hunt one. Not for $6000-$7000 though. I just saw one outfitter charging the same price for mule deer. Just doesn't make sense to me.

I've also heard the same about them not being much of a challenge in high-fence.

 

[Russ16]

Thank you for a little help on this understanding the issue.

From what I'm able to gather, private Landowners can profit from the Aoudad, but not Bighorn or Mule Deer. Without all of the facts someone from that area has, it seems to an outsider that all of this is to the detriment of the native wildlife.

I helped on several Arizona wildlife restoration projects while I was stationed there, so I care very deeply about the Desert Bighorn and Mule Deer population.

Sit down, have a cup of coffee and lay it out for us. I'm more than willing to listen.

Landowners can very much profit from mule deer. They just have to do the hunts during the season set by the state. Look at the prices for Texas mule deer hunts.

 

[John Wasmuth]

Aoudad are a great free range hunt. Like most animals, when hunted behind a fence it is more akin to shooting, but out in the mountains of West Texas around Alpine and Marathon, they are a first class challenge.

This one is no monster, but he represented four and a half days of really hard hunting - and we saw dozens.

That’s a great looking aoudad ram.