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ONLINE DEERHUNT 2005
Bowhunting With Billy Don Van Cleave at Wild Horse Prairie Ranch in the Texas Hill Country
Digital Logs Of The 2005 Bowhunt With Billy Don Van Cleave - by Robert Hoague

Bowhunting.net | Wild Horse Prairie Ranch Email: billydon@direcway.com
bdvanc@aol.com | Call: 254-749-6119 | Fax: 254-546-2709
 
Hog Hunt With Jay Liechty of Grim Reaper Broadheads
| Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 |
 

Jay Liechty, owner of 
Grim Reaper Broadheads
Jay Liechty and I loaded our gear in my truck for a few days hog hunting and field testing the new RAZORCUT broadhead that Jay's company Grim Reaper Broadheads introduced at this year's ATA Archery Trade Show in January.

On the way to Billy Don's we stopped and visited with a landowner that Jay had hunted with before. This resulted in an invite for an afternoon hog hunt and since we wouldn't be able to reach Billy Don's in time to hunt today we thanked them and went hog hunting.

We drove down a farm road and we stopped a half mile from where we would hunt.

Jay led the way to the small stock pond he had hunted before. We got behind a makeshift ground blind of large branches. At hog thirty we saw wild hogs on the dam above the pond but they apparently smelled us and moved on.

At dark we drove to Wild Horse Prairie Ranch and Russell Carpenter, the ranch foreman, met us and got us situated. Billy Don was busy loading a couple thousand cattle so he couldn't be there tonight. 

In the morning I was kinda groggy and moving slow so I skipped a shower and got ready. Russell drove us to #24, a stand site I had hunted earlier during the Bowhunting.net Annual Bowhunt. We popped up a Double Bull Matrix and got ready. 

After good light we heard hog grunts and footsteps in the woods behind us. Wooof ... a hog sounded off. It had smelled us. They trotted away. We waited half an hour and phoned Russell on the cell phone and asked him to come and get us. No sense in spooking more hogs away and I wanted to drive around and check out some other areas.

One of the good hog areas is called "Horse Pasture" and it is an open, grassy area, a pond, and thick cedars and scrub trees that hogs regularly bed up in. We went there and some rams were in the area, near a corn feeder. I took their pic from the truck window as two of them kept their eyes on us.

We wanted to check the area out so we got out of the truck. The rams were not overly concerned about the familiar truck but they weren't good to go with us getting out of it. They trotted down a trail that went past the pond and into the brush and trees. 

Hog sign was easy to find and we located some trails coming out of the trees that passed near a few live oaks. Jay put a Double Bull ground blind there.

Actually, on appearance alone, this doesn't look like a particularly good place to hunt. But nothing that beats experience and experience tells us that this is an excellent place to hunt. In the afternoon hogs come out of the scrubs and cedars and go to the pond. And Jay's blind is right one of their preferred routes.

Further down the road we saw 4 hogs. They entered a finger of woods near the road. Jay got out quickly and slipped into the woods a good ways ahead of the hogs. Russell and I waited and before long we saw two hogs come out of the other side.

Meanwhile, Jay was putting a sneak on the hogs and got ready to shoot when he heard one coming. But it was smaller than Jay wanted and he passed.

We saw other hog groups as we drove back to the lodge.

Jay and I drove into Burnett and ate a small mexican restaurant on Highway 281. The food was real good.

Russell Carpenter picked us up at 3:30 and drove Jay Liechty and I out to hunt. We topped a hill in a wooded area and saw hogs off to the side. Jay stepped out of the truck and Russell kept driving. 

Jay kneeled down and held still. Before long the hogs were 30 yards away and Jay got a shot at a hog but missed. The hogs spooked a short distance and stopped behind some bushes. But Jay couldn't get in on them.

We saw even more hogs before Russell let Jay off at the Horse Pasture blind. 

At 5:30 Jay heard footsteps behind the blind. About 20 hogs passed the blind and went to the corn feeder. The hogs were moving constantly and Jay waited, hoping for a shot. A hog moved away from the group and stopped broadside. Jay took aim and shot it behind the shoulder. The arrow passed through the hog and it ran to the left and dropped in sight 80 yards away. The other hogs ran away and disappeared into the live oaks.

Jay picked up his arrow and went to the hog. On the way back to the blind he saw hogs coming. Jay uses a back quiver and it was in the blind. So Jay nocked the arrow he had just killed the hog with and in minutes he shot a second hog with the same arrow. It ran 40 yards and dropped.

With half an hour to go before dark Jay got back in the blind. As Russell drove up another group of hogs was coming out of the woods.

That's Jay Liechty with both his wild hogs taken with the same Grim Reaper Razorcut Broadhead (It's New For 2006).
This is a close up of the broadhead Jay used to take the two wild hogs on this afternoon's bowhunt at Wild Horse Prairie Ranch.

Wild Horse Prairie Ranch | Email: billydon@direcway.com | Call: 254-749-6119 
| Fax: 254-546-2709

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Billy Don Van Cleave

Billy Don Van Cleave's
Wild Horse Prairie Ranch
PO Box 199
Satin, TX 76685

Call: 254-749-6119
Fax: 254-546-2709

Email: bdvanc@aol.com
Web: Wild Horse Prairie Ranch
 

Grim Reaper Broadheads
1250 N 1750 W 
Provo , UT 84604 

Web: GrimReaperBroadheads.com

Email
questions@grimreaperbroadheads.com

Dealer inquires:
dealer@grimreaperbroadheads.com

Phone:  801-377-6199 
 Fax:   801-373-3759