Howard
South TX whitetail hunt
Friday, October 30, 2026, 12:04

I’ve wanted to hunt TX for a while. I found this place:
https://melloncreekoutfitters.com/
with some reasonably priced whitetail hunts and signed up for a Management Hunt of 1 doe and 1 medium sized buck. I went down a week ago Tuesday and explored Corpus Christi for a few days, nice area, great seafood and BBQ, went to a few wildlife areas and USS Lexington museum.
The outfitter picked me up at the airport Friday morning and we drove about an hour northeast to the lodge and ranch. The ranch is now or was formerly the O’Connor ranch, one of the largest in TX. It’s currently 110K acres. They have to take about 1500 deer a year off the property to manage the herd. There’s also hogs, bobcat, coyotes, turkey, nilgai and oryx. They also hunt west TX aoudad and elk.
The lodge was first class, food was excellent and the guides were very helpful. We hunted about 0700-1100 and 1700-1930 by driving the gravel roads and pathways of the ranch and seeing what there was. They put out corn in certain spots. I used the guides rifle as I had enough baggage to deal with between a cooler and gear bag. When we saw something, we’d either stalk or shoot from the truck. I got my doe and buck at 220 yards and hunted an extra day and got a little spike buck at 240 yards. Shooting a suppressed rifle was very nice as no ear pro was needed and you could really hear the bullet smack. In the pics the shots look far back but those are on the offside, I made some good behind the shoulder shots and I’m very pleased that I’m still shooting well with 69 year old eyes. For the area, that was a big-bodied 9 pt. Buck and that sunset felt like a gift from God. Had a great time and I can highly recommend this outfitter, some other hunters in camp had been there many times.