# Sticky  Unusual discoveries you have made while hunting



## activescrape

What wierd, rare, unusual or interesting things have you come across while hunting? I'll go first.

Once while hunting along Home Creek south of Sanna Anna in Coleman county I shot a turkey. He ran off in to some very thick underbrush and I went in after him. Deep in there I discovered a washed out stone age indian grave. There were two double bevel knives, never resharpened(meaning new) a couple of Perdiz points a Scallorn and a Wa****a. Most interesting were some shell beads and pottery shards. I showed them to an archaeologist at SMU and he said that was very unusual for that far west and inland.
Another time I was pheasant hunting in the panhandle around an old playa lake. I noticed some flint and started looking around. I didn't find any arrowheads but I did find an almost perfectly round, something, that was white, about the size of a big marble, but too light to be clay or glass. I could not figure it out. I took it over to the museum in Plainview and the resident archaeologist there told me that it came from a buffalos stomach. He said they would lick themselves and ingest lots of hair. In their stomach this hair would form balls which were hard to digest. Sometimes it would get very hard. He said that apparently indians or wolves had killed a buffalo there and after everything else had decomposed this was left and that although they are kind of rare he had seen them before. I still have it. Wierd huh?
What about you guys, and girls.


----------



## Trouthunter

What was left of a .38-40 Winchester 92 rifle, still loaded and with the lever open laying next to a huge oak tree in the middle of nowhere in Colorado County. Found it while looking for a spot to put a tree stand.

An old .32-20 swing-out cylinder revolver, can't make out the maker that had the front sight cut off. I found it while setting up a feeder in a place we call Panther Springs west of Utopia. 

I found 3 catseye marbles out in the middle of the brasada near Encinal while hunting once. No idea how they got out there unless someone was shooting them with a slingshot.

Lots of points, flint knives and such. Old metal broadheads from arrows lost by hunters and an old Ford truck that had been washed down a gulley.

I'd probably kill more deer if I wouldn't be looking around for stuff all the time. 

TH


----------



## Bucksnort

My son found this turtle shell. We brought it home and made a clock out of it. (I was never so thankful for that 3rd grade arts and crafts class )


----------



## skurkp

As a child 14 or 15 years old, I went hunting with a friend of the family at the time it seemed like we walked for days after parking the truck. My first hunting trip, and when we got to the spot that he had chosen we sat in the tree all day to only see a few crow. On the way back we took a different route and came upon an old wooden house in the woods. We went inside and the walls were covered in news papers that had phone numbers on them that were only 4 digits long, prices of meat and store ads, but I could not find a date. It was pretty cool just reading them.


----------



## Pod

Found lots of arrowheads and scrapers, mostly broken but a few nice ones. Also old tools a cow bell, antique bottles and a litter of newborn kittens in one of my stands.


----------



## boom!

arrowheads, cannon ball, an old holding pen out at the ranch.


----------



## activescrape

antique bottles, a cannonball, that's pretty cool. keep em' coming.


----------



## Haute Pursuit

Model A Ford windshield/firewall section that me made into an awesome steak cooker, a couple of indian knives and 1 scraper, 8 or 10 arrowheads, 25-30 mexicans camped out and asleep in the bottom of a deep canyon. They woke up when I started tossing big rocks into it to see if there was a buck bedded down in there. I don't know who was more surprised...LOL


----------



## Sharkhunter

*Well!!!*

A couple of very atractive nude girls sunbathing


----------



## justletmein

Several arrow heads a couple cannon balls, some smaller things that looked like miniature cannon balls, and different types of fossils.


----------



## cncman

a rusted out gmc flatbed wrecker, looks like from the 40's-50's, no good arrow heads but I found one that had been started, book says it was a cache arrow head or something like that, they started them and built them to what they wanted later, pretty neat stuff.


----------



## activescrape

Another time I was still hunting mule deer up in the canyons of the caprock. I was in an offshoot of Tule canyon to be exact. Deep in the botom of the canyon I came across the frame of a model t. I was checking it out and started seeing where someone had taken a steel chisel and chiseled in old brands, like the rocking r and lazy s. There were probably 15 to 20 of them. I later learned that the Taylor brothers, long since gone, whose parents homesteaded there had put them all there, all the local ranchers brands they knew of. I wish I had a picture of that.


----------



## Trouthunter

scrape that the Taylors from Coleman by chance?

Never found a canon ball, that would be pretty cool. The ones that ya'll found were fromm the Texas revolution?

TH


----------



## scwine

For 2 yrs, I hunted on a friends place just south of George West(about 12 miles) towards Freer. In the stand I hunted in, you could see a house in the distance, with a large deck on the 2nd story. Using binoculars, you could barely make out if anyone was out on the deck. Well, this just wasn't anyones place. Ever heard of Sunset Thomas?  It was a big stand, enough for three people, and everyone would joke that no one will ever shoot a deer out of it(busy looking for something else). My wife did not believe it and once, after several times with me, she witnessed a blonde out on the deck, then she understood what everyone was always taking about. We still laugh about it today. The house a couple of years later burned down.

And yes this is true.

By the way I only killed one hog while hunting from that stand!


----------



## BEER4BAIT

We have several Covered wagons on the place. Lots of points and pottery. We are on the old Swenson Cattle Company land. We have the old slaughter house intact.


----------



## Sean Hoffmann

My uncle lives in NW Arkansas and for years has hunted with a muzzleloader on public land up there in the Ozarks.

He's relayed stories of coming across leveled stone-walled homes, old wells, and on occasion headstones with dates from the 1800s.


----------



## mule76

*Sunset Thomas*



scwine said:


> For 2 yrs, I hunted on a friends place just south of George West(about 12 miles) towards Freer. In the stand I hunted in, you could see a house in the distance, with a large deck on the 2nd story. Using binoculars, you could barely make out if anyone was out on the deck. Well, this just wasn't anyones place. Ever heard of Sunset Thomas?  It was a big stand, enough for three people, and everyone would joke that no one will ever shoot a deer out of it(busy looking for something else). My wife did not believe it and once, after several times with me, she witnessed a blonde out on the deck, then she understood what everyone was always taking about. We still laugh about it today. The house a couple of years later burned down.
> 
> And yes this is true.
> By the way I only killed one hog while hunting from that stand!


I used to hunt on the property that house was built on. I still hunt right next to it. That was certainly the talk of the town when it was being built and after it burned down!!


----------



## TXPalerider

I've found lots of arrowheads. Mostly when we were hunting in Zapata. Of course, most of the time, I was looking for them when I found them.


However, my most unique and suprising find came one day while I was deer hunting in the rain. I shot a nice 8pt buck with my pistol and was wandering through the brush trying to pic up the blood trail, when I came a cross and old headstone from the mid 1800's.


----------



## reelthreat

activescrape said:


> the resident archaeologist there told me that it came from a buffalos stomach. He said they would lick themselves and ingest lots of hair. In their stomach this hair would form balls which were hard to digest. Sometimes it would get very hard.


Those stones are called Bezoar stones or stomach pearls. Some cultures believe they have majic powers and the can be very valuable.

Anyhow, I have found buckets full of points, scrapers, spears... Shot bullets, spent casings from cals I have never heard of, unshot 50 cal bullets, petrified bones (not sure what they are from but they are rock), pesos, a live chicken tied to a tree in a creek in the middle of a 2000 acre pasture (it was stolen from a property about a mile away, must have scared the theif away)..... Man, I can go on and on.

I have also spooked up a Jagarundi (sp?). I thought that was one of the coolest things I have ever seen.


----------



## Trouthunter

Pale Guy on our old lease south of Sheridan we found a marker out in the middle of a thicket...no road leading to it, it was all grown up and it was in memory of the crew of an Army Air Corps plane that crashed on a training mission during WW-II. Somewhere I have all of the info from it.

I think that there has been at least one marked grave on every lease I've been on, lol.

Oh yea, found a full but faded can of Billy Beer in the fork of a tree near Sublime once, lol.

TH


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

*Wierd Tracks*

At Matador WMA last year, my son and I found some very strange tracks. They looked vaguely human, but only had two toes and a very narrow heel. about 8 inches long, very fresh , very clear. The ball of the foot looked just like a human's, and there was a big toe and one smaller toe just like our first two toes, but the heel tapered to a point.

We looked at them for a while trying to figure out how they could have been made by some part of some animal set down just so, but we couldn't and it started to creep us out.

That and my fearless dog kept running from stuff we never saw. Tail between his legs and everything.

No one on that hunt had a drink all weekend, either, so that wasn't the problem.

Lance.


----------



## activescrape

Thats weird all right


S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain) said:


> At Matador WMA last year, my son and I found some very strange tracks. They looked vaguely human, but only had two toes and a very narrow heel. about 8 inches long, very fresh , very clear. The ball of the foot looked just like a human's, and there was a big toe and one smaller toe just like our first two toes, but the heel tapered to a point.
> 
> We looked at them for a while trying to figure out how they could have been made by some part of some animal set down just so, but we couldn't and it started to creep us out.
> 
> That and my fearless dog kept running from stuff we never saw. Tail between his legs and everything.
> 
> No one on that hunt had a drink all weekend, either, so that wasn't the problem.
> That's pretty wierd all right.
> Lance.


----------



## cncman

Just a safety note, anyone that finds a cannonball, please keep in mind that these can and have been know to spontaneously explode, please do not ever mess with one when you find it, you do not know what is in it. There were kids years ago that pulled cannonballs out of Buffalo bayou when it was low and when they dried out they blew up. Please do not mess with those and if you have one and want to keep it have someone that knows these things make sure they are inert, some are just lumps of metal but some have powder or other explosives in them, not worth the chance for a souvenier.


----------



## CentexPW

I hunted the Colorado Rockies for Elk and Mulies in the 70's and found a lot of Mining and Prospecting stuff. Found it in the deepest darkest parts of the forrest. Most of the stuff was overgrown and hidden, Cabins, Huts, Shacks, Mine shafts, Mining Equipment, bottles , cans, tools. A lot of writing on trees from miners and sheep herders. Stuff you wondered how they got it there. The coolest thing was a complete Elk Bull skeleton. The Bull had stepped between a root on the side of the hill and it was now straddling the root trapped. It died right there. It looked like the ceyotes had'nt gotten to it because it was intact and bleached out. The interesting thing was the back leg was broken and had healed side by side making one leg shorter than the other.


----------



## Bleed~Fish

*finds*

found a couple of swords in the creek bottom from the Spanish exploration of Texas; one an officers sword with full engravings with inlayed jewels and gemstones...a pocket watch....


----------



## activescrape

Wow! I would love to see those. What county was that in?


Bleed~Fish said:


> found a couple of swords in the creek bottom from the Spanish exploration of Texas; one an officers sword with full engravings with inlayed jewels and gemstones...a pocket watch....


----------



## activescrape

One other time I was in the canyons up there and I was walking a creek bottom. The sides were steep, tall and sandy. About a third of the way down I see a big bone sticking out of the side. I dug it out and it was a huge...looked like leg bone. I took that over to the museum and they examined it and later told me it was from a buffalo, an extinct kind of buffalo that was much larger than todays kind.


----------



## Soapeddler

I wasn't hunting, but was backpacking in the Harrison National Forest in Southern Indiana and we stumbled across this. 

A buddy of mine had a place near Tarpley when we were kids and there was a confederate soldier's grave on his place. History is just everywhere.


----------



## ETXHNTR

The stories are awesome................


----------



## Soapeddler

ETXHNTR said:


> The stories are awesome................


I agree - great thread!


----------



## wet dreams

Wild Orchids, in the Big Thicket. WW


----------



## tokavi

A couple of mine. While hunting elk in Colorado in the early 90's I found a a knife lying on a very steep hillside. Damascus? steel blade with what was left of wooden handle. The point as rusted off and it was pitted badly. I still have it. In Montana I found a coyote skull bleached, looks like it had been there for a couple of years with a piece of antler about 6" long stuck into the eye socket and out the top of the skull. I can't say for sure but I think the yote lost that fight. We still have it at the lodge where I guide. I found a petrified bone on my lease in north Tx. a couple of years ago. Took it to a prof. at the university. He said it was from a dinosaur and told me what kind. I don't remeber the name. I had mentioned it to the ranch manager and the owners made me put it back where I found it. They did not want the hassel of someone wanting to look for the rest of the skeleton.


----------



## activescrape

I didn't discover it but I have a friend who is curator of the Floyd County historical museum. Avbout 10 years ago a local ranch hand discovered the rocky resting place of a Commanche brave. Everything was taken to the museum and was in the back, not on display. She let me back there to go through basically anything I wanted to. I found that box. The skull was there, as well as other bones, incredibly the bones of one arm were still articulated. He had metal bands around the arms. He had necklaces strung with tiny turquoise and coral beads. There were a couple of arrow shafts in there too. I felt a little wierd about it. Not long after that the Smithdonian came and got it and then it was all returned to the tribe. I really got the feel of the guy though, he must have been a tough old survivor, and a fighter. One thing I did notice is that his teeth were worn down bad. This was because when the women ground corn and stuff with the sandstone manos it got full of grit. Years of eating this wore down the teeth. RIP


----------



## kportis

Back in the Mid-Late 90's I hunted between Dallardsville and Warren in East Texas on Timber Company land. One trip I found several asphalt shingles scattered throughout the lease and a receipt from WW Granger dated 1954. 

Turns out their were some tornados in the Channelview area and all this trash ended up on our lease, in the middle of nowhere.


----------



## HonkyFin

Dino. tailbone fossil (small section) about 15 " long while exploreing a small section of a Mercury Mine out near Terlingua on a Mulie hunt.


----------



## Juicy

tokavi said:


> I found a petrified bone on my lease in north Tx. a couple of years ago. Took it to a prof. at the university. He said it was from a dinosaur and told me what kind. I don't remeber the name. I had mentioned it to the ranch manager and the owners made me put it back where I found it. They did not want the hassel of someone wanting to look for the rest of the skeleton.


I think this happens a lot. People find dinosaur bones, but don't want an archeological crew digging the place up so they're never reported. I know it's happened to me.


----------



## Aggieangler

Bleed~Fish said:


> found a couple of swords in the creek bottom from the Spanish exploration of Texas; one an officers sword with full engravings with inlayed jewels and gemstones...a pocket watch....


I agree with scrape....can you post up a pic or two? That sounds really cool!


----------



## tomball terror

Great thread! Wish I had something to contribute!


----------



## EBHunter

TH,

Now I remember where I left my Winchester!

I have found dinasour tracks in the Comanche Peak area around Glenrose. My sister in law lived on a ranch in a house that was on wagon trail. The house served as a stopping point for wagons. The house was built in the 1840's. Lots of old stuff around the property. 

I've also got several flint points, some type of stone mallet that came from Zapata. I've alos got pottery chips from East Texas. A friend up there would pull a disc in one of his fields and we would walk behind it looking for artifacts.

Lots of petrified wood from East Texas. Pieces up to 6-8 ft long. We spent a weekend pulling large petrified logs from a caynon.

One of the most interesting finds was a stone marker in northern Newton County. The marker was some type of boundary marker. It was from the late 1700's and was written in French. My friends actually made the discovery. 

EBHunter


----------



## capn

One time when I was hog hunting, I discovered that I had lost my knife. Then when I was hunting for my knife, I discovered a hog. 

Another time I discovered that it's really hard to climb down a cypress tree after a deer hunt in the rain, and that your crotch is not a good place to catch a limb with as you're falling out of said cypress tree.









But I'm not sure if those discoveries count.


----------



## Trouthunter

I found the old revolver last night but the rusty old Winchester must be at my folks house.

That marker with the French writing on it...do you have any pictures? 

TH


----------



## Ahill

great threads,, enjoyed eating my lunch and reading...wish there was pics !


----------



## ETXHNTR

tomball terror said:


> Great thread! Wish I had something to contribute!


I agree.Nothing to offer.I keep coming back to this thread over and over


----------



## EBHunter

I wish I had pictures of the marker. This is in the area around Toledo Bend. I believe the the land was neutral ground between French and Spanish settlements throughout the 18th century. The area is still lighty populated with thousands of acres of timber company land.


EBHunter


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

My grandpa has12 sections of land in Sanderson he kept for mule deer hunting. My uncle and I climbed up a steep incline into a cave and found it full of Indian artifacts and engravings on the walls. My uncle told me not to touch anything out of respect for the Indians. I remember seeing artwork all over the walls the ceiling was black from fire and about 5 pottery jars standing side by side. We looked around for awhile and climbed back down. My grandpa was too old to climb up to the spot but he had a crew of archeologists go up with a sifter and collect everything. Another cool thing we found that my uncle still has is the backbone of a deer with an arrowhead stuck in it.


----------



## MUY GRANDE MEXICO

Was Hunting Callaghan Ranch Friend Climed Up In Stand And Found A Dead Illegal Man That Crossed Over From Mexico Into Usa Wow What A Shocker He Had That Evening Buy The Way He Didnt Hunt His Favorite Stand That Day!


----------



## activescrape

Fascinating stuff. Did you ever get a catalogue of what all was in that cave, that is the fantasy of a lifetime for lots of people. Lots of great posts everyone, I'm thoroughly enjoying this thread.
Thanks


ATE_UP_FISHERMAN said:


> My grandpa has12 sections of land in Sanderson he kept for mule deer hunting. My uncle and I climbed up a steep incline into a cave and found it full of Indian artifacts and engravings on the walls. My uncle told me not to touch anything out of respect for the Indians. I remember seeing artwork all over the walls the ceiling was black from fire and about 5 pottery jars standing side by side. We looked around for awhile and climbed back down. My grandpa was too old to climb up to the spot but he had a crew of archeologists go up with a sifter and collect everything. Another cool thing we found that my uncle still has is the backbone of a deer with an arrowhead stuck in it.


----------



## TXDRAKE

> Lots of great posts everyone, I'm thoroughly enjoying this thread.
> Thanks


Me too, I have had stuff happen and seen a few things but nothing compared to most of these. Keep them coming.


----------



## Pablo

I've found a few arrowheads while getting gates and feeding cattle. My dad had a ranch near Hamilton and they found a type of mortar and pestle. It was a flat rock about 2 feet across with a depression it for the shaped stone metate.

Funniest thing that happened to me was very early in the morning in my tripod. I got there at dark thirty and promptly dozed off. A while later something rustled in front of me. I woke up and there was a frickin barn owl sitting on the tripod rail about 2 feet in front of me. I nearly had to go back and change my drawers. LOL

It's amazing about all the things that have been seen/found out there. Makes you wonder about who came by before you did.

Sunset Thomas would have definitely been an eye opener. 

Adios,
Pablo


----------



## mommas worry

Was hunting out north of Del Rio and came across a low (1-2 ft.) stone wall that you could see went on for maybe a mile. Ranch mgr. said that it was build by the Spainards to get behind and shoot from during indian raids. Pretty cool ! Kept going back there and just sitting and thinking about the history of that wall. Have a buddy that was given a large (football size) rock and an x-ray which showed a baby dinosuar in it. Really neat. Came from some geologist buddy of his that was doing work in China when they came across a bunch of these "rocks". Needless to say, the geologists got out real quick and never returned.


----------



## activescrape

I met an old man in Turkey, Texas about 15 years ago. He was in his late 80's then, and his name was Otho Stubbs. He was a surveyor for the federal government waaay back when. No landowner could tell him no for access to any and all property he needed to get on. He was a real nice guy anyway and he had the most extensive private collection of indian artifacts known to anyone. I went to his house and was blown away. There were two things that stood out in my mind , among the unbelievable collection he had. One was an exquisite flint thunderbird, one of only two known. The other was in the collection of the University of New Mexico. This is the eagle/god head standing figure with folded wings at it's side. Indians painted it on cave walls, put it on totems, wove it into headdresses and blankets etc. He found it in a cave in Motley county, near Quitique. You just should have seen it, it was perfect. The other was the skull of a dire wolf, a species that went extinct at the end of the Pliestoscene. What made this one particularly interesting was the arrowhead sticking into the skull right between the eyes. Otho tried to loan all his stuff to the state of Texas for permanent display at Caprock Canyonlands state park but the would not do it. They said, "You can give it to us but we will not borrow it." So he died and to my knowledge it is still in some closet somewhere and no one gets to see it.


----------



## Flaquita

*Satanic Rituals*

In the late 70's, just before the Choke Canyon Dam project kicked off above Corpus, a friend and I got permission from several land owners we knew whose land was to be flooded and got permission to log the area for mesquite and other hardwoods we cut and dried for furniture wood. Weeks into the project we ran across a cleared circular area deep in the woods that had a dirt mound about a foot high all around it. Inside the circle there were several burnt out fire pits. In the middle of the fire pits we found some really strange stuff. The most notable item as we approached was there were dead burnt chickens suspended above the firepit with a steel rod stuck up their back sides. A little more searching and we found what were hundreds of plaster castings of rams heads, human-like heads with horns (the devil) and many symbols we could not identify. It seemed we had found an area for satanic worship. We took several of the plaster figures to show the land owner and our friends. Everyone agreed with our accesment of what we'd found. The guy I was working with ( a very different kind of guy) took the figures we'd removed back after several weeks. He believes in that stuff and was afraid what might happen to him if he kept the icons. WHO KNOWS WHAT LURKS UNDER THE WATERS OF CHOKE CANYON???


----------



## Trouthunter

> WHO KNOWS WHAT LURKS UNDER THE WATERS OF CHOKE CANYON???


Well one thing is for certain...they ain't worshiping the devil unless they're all scuba divers or can hold their breath for a really long time. Plus I betcha it's hard for them to keep that fire going. 

Good one.

TH


----------



## Sace

Last year while in Colorado hunting Elk we came across quite a few old mine shafts, and shelters.....but what was amazing was halfway up this mountian amongst all the trees was an intact Steam Engine on tracks...now didn't try to follow the tracks much but there were either buried or fallen apart...it was on a very steep section of the mountian...it was amazing to see that thing there...it wasn't like a commercial train engine, obviously smaller and used to transport what ever they were mining, but it was strange seeing it sit up on that mountian. Can only imagine what it was like for those miners who worked up there.

Also a bit off topic, I used to work construction, and I was digging out a trench for the new ER at Santa Rosa Hospital here in SA about 8-9 years ago...and I had jumped down in the ditch to check a few things and noticed what I first thought was a pork chop bone sticking out of the dirt...upon further inspection realized it was a femur and a casket. Foreman wasn't too happy but they called out some archies...and they dug up everything, turned out to be a Mexican Mother and a baby that had been buried there way back when Santa Rosa was a Mission I believe...found a few other items in the casket with the mother and child...pretty wild. They were moved and given a respectful re-burial.


----------



## Aggieangler

This thread rocks!


----------



## Old Whaler

This is such a great thread, so now my turn to chime in. We had a deer lease seven miles from Del Rio from 1980-1990. It had a huge canyon on it. The landowner had told us that he had been losing many sheep to what he thought was a cougar. One morning after a hunt, a friend says that he saw a cougar scale part of the canyon wall and go into a hole. He decides to take a 45 cal. pistol and a 870 riot gun that he had and go after it. We told him he was CRAZY! Well, several hours later, he scales the wall and goes into the hole. We were expecting him to come out flying with a cougar on his arse! He comes out about fifteen minutes later and tells us that this hole opened up into a cave that was probably five-feet tall and twenty-feet in diameter. He found a bunch of Indian artifacts and the bones of many sheep. Also, the walls had all kinds on Indian writing on it. He left everything in-tact and it's probably still there.


----------



## TXPalerider

Aggieangler said:


> This thread rocks!


Yes it does. And, it has apparently drawn quite a few lurkers out of the shadows. Hopefully they will stay and contribute more.


----------



## CHARLIE

Oh my let me see, elk hunting in Colorado years ago. Finding old log cabins on mountain sides with roof gone but only part of the walls remaining. small pond in front of the old house. Finding where an old log cabin (partially) was dug into the side of a mountain with double log walls filled with dirt inside for insulation I guess. Both were extremely small maybe 10 by maybe 20. Both in different areas of Colorado. Absoloutely no roads or trails to these plaaces totally isolated. Another old homestead in Colorado where you could see where the rows of the garden was, fallen down pens, a water diverter ditch from way up on the mountain that provided water to the place, the old cans thrown about mostly lard cans, some farming machinery (what was left), fallen in undeground spot I guess to store food stuff. Your imigination can run wild. 

From Texas nothing more than a few arrowheads.

Oh yeah lots of indian writing(I guess) on rocks one depecting a rocket (or something) going up in the air. Someones name with 18 fifty something scratched in. All in Colorado 

Charlie


----------



## Bucksnort

I found a recently shot .270 round near my buddies stand and nobody had a .270 on the lease. That'll chap your arse.


----------



## Old Whaler

That reminds me. The only time I ever got on an East Texas lease, we pulled up the afternoon before opening day and decided to drive down some of the roads and when approaching my stand, a guy jumps out and hightails it into the woods!


Bucksnort said:


> I found a recently shot .270 round near my buddies stand and nobody had a .270 on the lease. That'll chap your arse.


----------



## trentmc

when i was about 10 years old my grandparents had 5000 acres near montrose county colorado that the whole family would go to every summer. well about 300 yards way from the cabin i found an underground shelter with allkinds of weird stuff in it. i can really remember much about it except mom got made when i told her i went in it. also on the same land towards the top of the mountain there where a few old log houses that had fallen over probably built in early 1800's if i had to guess but i remember when no one was around id use to sit on the logs of those old houses and wonder about who lived there and how it was for them. but i was too young to get some good artifacts but still boggles the mind bout how someone could build a house up there away from civilization with out any means of transportation or help.


----------



## bluegill addict

From south Texas(Laredo area) i've found arrowheads. I have hunted on some property near Lufkin where there is an old graveyard from the 1800's. Also throughout East Texas you come across old tram roads through the woods from when the area was originally logged. My dad has an old slingshot ball from the Roman Wall in England, no telling how old it is.


----------



## activescrape

My gosh, if we had pics of all this stuff we could have a 2cool best seller. It's got me wanting to find caves, underground bunkers and stuff.

Up in commanchero country around Flomot there is a little cemetary that time has forgot. There used to be a tiny settlement called Gray Mule up there that dissapeared in the early 1900's. The old Gray Mule cem. is still there but you have to know where to go to findit. It's on a dirt road, on a hill overlooking the headwaters of the Pease River. These days it's not much more than rattlesnake country, and other similar critters. Anyway, it is fascinating to look through it. There's probably less than a hundred graves there and about half are from infants to teens. Some have multiple burials of kids from the same family, often dying at birth or within a year or two. I can't imagine how hard it was to be a pioneer in that country. When you had a kid there was no guarantee it would grow up. Most of them are in the 1800's and my favorite is just a little piece of concrete about 8" by a foot for a marker. When it was cast someone took a twig or something and scratched in there UNKNOWN COWBOY 1879. I can go there and listen to the wind howl up the river bed and think,.... he's still lonely. What a deal.


----------



## bohunk1

lots of fossils, I have most of them in my rock fire place.


----------



## mywifeshusband

*old memories*

Years ago we went to alaska to see some of my wifes kin sitesee and hunt. While in the White mountains i found an old car that had been there for years. I wondered how it got there and why it was left. Now to Texas.We hunted the Winters ranch in Langtry where we could find artifacts from the old railroad such as hand forged rail spikes,nails, and gate hinges. we also found a lot of fossils the most notable one of our guys found a rock about 2ft in diameter with the impression of a nautica that was about 10in big. His wife still has it now at her house in channelview. I found a clam shell that you could be seen inside a rock at our Rocksprings lease. We often find shells in flint and quartz. I guess Rocksrings was really wet at onetime and yes great thread.


----------



## mjmaxwell8

after a deer-less morning, i walkied my buddy, (we will call him craig) to tell him i would be walking up to his stand from the south, so not to shoot that way. with no reply and no shots fired, i figured he was waiting on a particular shot so i figured it best not to bother him. after a while had passed, i got on the four wheeler and headed over with quite a bit of hunters orange on figuring he had fallen asleep. what i found when i started walking up the steps was my buddy and some **** woman scurrying to pull their pants up- in the deer stand! the kicker of this whole story is that- i swear to god- the girl had something of a mustache, not to mention a few extra pounds! to this day he wont tell us the full story, but i think she lived not far from the lease, and this wasnt their first rendezvous. he politely gave her a ride home.


----------



## Freshwaterman

This Is Some Good Reading....i`ll Give It A Thought And Chim In Later


----------



## ETXHNTR

mjmaxwell8 said:


> after a deer-less morning, i walkied my buddy, (we will call him craig) to tell him i would be walking up to his stand from the south, so not to shoot that way. with no reply and no shots fired, i figured he was waiting on a particular shot so i figured it best not to bother him. after a while had passed, i got on the four wheeler and headed over with quite a bit of hunters orange on figuring he had fallen asleep. what i found when i started walking up the steps was my buddy and some **** woman scurrying to pull their pants up- in the deer stand! the kicker of this whole story is that- i swear to god- the girl had something of a mustache, not to mention a few extra pounds! to this day he wont tell us the full story, but i think she lived not far from the lease, and this wasnt their first rendezvous. he politely gave her a ride home.


Well thats definetly "an unusual discovery".Mustache and a few extra pounds LMFAO Did she have all her teeth?


----------



## deadeye68

Back in the early 70's we had a small ranch outside Cotulla, 640 acres. It came with a 3 room camp house, that was on blocks and skirted, a couple of sheds, a hay barn, and 4 or 5 box stands that sat on 10 foot legs. I was in my late teens and was at this place every chance I got and had a number of unusual things take place.

We saw that Black Panther that everyone else has seen, it was running beside our Bronco as we were driving to the ranch.
We went into one of the sheds looking for rats and found one under a cabinet as big as a beaver.
We went to check out the stands and so I climb the ladder on the first stand (this place had not been hunted in 2 or 3 years) I open the door and was face to face with a 2 foot tall Barn Owl that was not real happy to see me. I jumped, the owl came out the door and I decided not to check anymore stands.
The barn was off limits as it did not look structurally sound so we went to check out the camp house. This is winter and it was in the 40's at night so the snakes were supposed to be hibernating. We walked into this cabin (wood floor) and must have awakened every rattle snake on the ranch because they all lived under that house. There were so many snakes rattling that you could feel the vibration in the floor. We did not go back in the camp house til summer.


----------



## Pocboy

My father-in-law had a lease outside of comstock that I was able to hunt on for several years. There was a canyon that had been washed out in the bottom so that the walls were rounded and smoother than most and they were full of picotgraphs of people and animals and some really strange looking objects. There was a painting of a man with a halo and if you had an imagination you could say that some of the strange objects looked like UFO's. On the way down to the bottom of the canyon there was an old rock house that I'm sure was built sometime in the 1800's.


----------



## hunt2grill

Great thread this is the first one I have ever subscribed to to make sure I get updates


----------



## Trouthunter

*Yea...*



ETXHNTR said:


> Well thats definetly "an unusual discovery".Mustache and a few extra pounds LMFAO Did she have all her teeth?


And was her name Earl or Lester? 

TH


----------



## libertyFF

3 years ago while checking a deer stand I heard a loud hissing before I opened the door. Backed up regained my courage and opened it up to be face to face with 2 baby Vultures. (there is still bird poop in that stand)


----------



## Bret

We hunted near Alto for several years.. and the cabin we stayed in was bulit in 1847 out of virgin timber.. 18in mainbeams. and a couple of huge fireplaces... behind the house was the grave and headstone of helena berryman, the first Anglo child known to have been born in Tx after it became a state.. There were old slaves quarters back down the hill.too with lots of old machinery etc.. Lots of old stuff there.. 
I did find a nice hand scraper and tons of broken flint on my place near Blanco.. Still looking for arrowheads.....
This is a great thread You guys find lots of cool stuff.


----------



## Bucksnort

Trouthunter said:


> And was her name Earl or Lester?
> 
> TH


Musta been hunting in Utopia


----------



## BertS

this thread has got to be in the top ten list on this site......

I've enjoyed reading about ya'lls finds, humorous, and informative.....while I don't consider myself a history buff, this thread has been a great read.....


----------



## jw1228

awesome thread just wish i had something to contribute.


----------



## Sea Aggie

It's amazing what we find when we just take the time to look.

-pottery shards on the shore of a lake.

-bird points, scrapers, big-game points & spear tips, along with all sizes of flint chips

-Old houses on several ranches, all abandonded for decades. One was an old stagecoach stop on the Blacktop Ranch, next to Elephant Mtn in West Texas. Several on the Briscoe ranches that I hunt on every year. Others on friends ranches throughout South, Central & West Texas. Every house is different and all had their own character, showing just how nice we really do have things today. Most of our "camp houses" are much nicer than the "family homes" of 100 years ago.

-all sorts of fur, feathers and bones. I am always picking up fur & feathers for my "model insect building" (fly tying)...

-various small stone carvings, little animal shapes, etc.

Mostly, it's the intangible that fascinates me the most. It's the silver on the edge of a dark cloud. It's the way the trees sway in a gust. It's the way my daughter looks at me and I know we'll always be best friends...


----------



## activescrape

I'll go again. This is another pheasant hunting find. Lots of homesteads were abandoned in the panhandle during the dust bowl days. People just moved out and took with them only what they could carry. These old places start falling down and eventually return to the earth. I used to check them out while hunting. I found those old crystal door knobs and a set of hand painted christmas candy dishes from England. They are very cool. I also found a pound of pot hidden in a closet, bootleggers. 
Anyway I still have this hanging on my wall. Someone took an old Saturday Evening Post and cut a Norman Rockwell cover out of it. Then they framed it and hung it on the wall for decoration. It must have been during the depression. Anyway, I thought it was neat and often wonder what life was like for the original owners.


----------



## drred4

On one of the places we hunted on in Doss there was a place where the rancher took us too and showed us where the Indians had a camp and lookout point. Talk about a very good vantage point to harvest game and watch for anything else.

On the same place I found a concrete stone marking the county line for Gillespie and Mason county. Weird that it was right in the middle of his land. Wish I had a camera.

Dad has the end to a tomahawk(sp) found on the CC veltman place in Uvlade when he use to hunt there in the 60's and 70's.

Just a few


----------



## ETXHNTR

libertyFF said:


> 3 years ago while checking a deer stand I heard a loud hissing before I opened the door. Backed up regained my courage and opened it up to be face to face with 2 baby Vultures. (there is still bird poop in that stand)


I can relate,a few years ago the same thing happened at my lease.The stand was filled with bird poop,busted eggs,old hides...really nasty.To this this day the stand is still dubbed ...."THE BUZZARD STAND"


----------



## Levelwind

Neat thread. I used to find lots of neat stuff as a boy growing up in Kansas. The arid climate and an abundance of flint in the hills, indian raids and wanderings until almost the twentieth century. Well, and of course the fact that I walked and walked and walked and walked hunting pheasants, mostly. Different than duck hunting. Anyway, some I remember

A fair number of arrowheads, mostly bird points. A scraper, and a very perfect flint spear point. A grinding stone. You can still see many "buffalo wallows" in the hills that have never been plowed, and sometimes the old conestoga wagon tracks. Lots of antique barbed wire, depression glass, etc. Found a buffalo skull once, with intact horns. In my fathers childhood they were commonly found. Found a tomahawk head (metal) in a big cottonwood trunk once. 

About twenty years ago I walked into a small, natural, spring fed pond in the hills on the property of a good friend. As a boy, we'd jumpshot a many a sassy duck off of it. I noticed (as if for the first time) that there was a small hill just to the southwest of the pond and for some reason walked to the top of it. There on top in the rocky, nearly barren ground, lay 23 spent 45.70 casings. They were tarnished nearly black, but all appeared in fairly good shape. Sitting there beside them with sunset coming on, I could imagine the man, with his Sharps rifle and shooting sticks gunning the buffalo at the little water hole, the most likely scenario. But then I wondered why he didn't pick up his brass. Maybe they didn't reload in those days, but one would think they would have. Possibly he'd been chased by the Commanche or the Kiowa - both prevalent there until the 1890s - and chosen that little promontory to make his stand. 

I bent down to pick up the brass as I left, thinking it would polish up and make a very neat conversation piece, perhaps two, one for me and one for my friend, the landowner. But when my fingers touched the first casing I felt as if I were stealing. They're still there.

We'll run across some neat stuff out there. Don't automatically put it in your pocket and take it home. It belonged to someone, once, and unless you own the land, it probably isn't yours. Not saying never take anything, I found a gold nugget in a creekbed while hunting chukar and mountain quail in the Sierra Nevada mountains - BLM land. But especially personal effects, antiquities, artifacts, things like that - think about enjoying them - and leaving them.


----------



## GYB

At my lease in east texas north of Jasper. I found an old glass Dr. Tishners mouth wash bottle. You could tell from the opening on the top that it was ment to be corked. Also once found 2 unopened cans of Fallstaff beer.


----------



## huntinguy

I've found bird points and arrowheads, scrapers and grinding stones, and 1853 Quarter, old marbles and once a spoon. An old homestead on a hilltop in Alabama and wagon traces in Alabama and Mississippi. Picked up some old tools found in the fields farming. Lots of History in this area, my uncle owns an origingal dugout canoe.

Plenty of old ink bottles and medicine bottles, old log chains and the engine block from a Cat D8 dozer.

My dad used to hunt a stand down in the swamps here that was in a huge hollow cypress..............there were still lumps of coal scattered around on the ground leftover from the whiskey still that used to be there. (Run by some of my family while hiding out after the fued.)


I used to hunt a stand that was called the Coal Oil Stand, there was an old Coal oil lantern grown into the tree nearby.


----------



## sea sick

I was invited to hunt up near the panhandle in a town called Paduchah. While we were driving around the property, which is mostly scrub brush, we came upon a small piece of what use to be a house. It looked to be made of wood and some type of clay. There was only a corner section and 3ft to one side and 5 ft on the other. it was 5 ft tall and had a small window cut out about 4ft off the ground. It was weathered realy bad, but you could see burnt marks in the corner where a fire was goin. A small creek ran next to it, and the scrub brush was cleared as if they used the area for farming. A little futher away was a head stone carved out of wood. I wish i would have taken a few pictures. If i go back, I'll definantly take a few. I also sat there for a second to wonder who and who they lived there so far away from any town. The real cowboy and indians back then. Some of these post give me chills, history is fun to come across upon.


----------



## Soapeddler

Some of these stories need to go on Coast to Coast after midnite with George Noorey.

This is just 2COOL! Keep them coming!


----------



## Bucksnort

Soapeddler said:


> Some of these stories need to go on Coast to Coast after midnite with George Noorey.
> 
> This is just 2COOL! Keep them coming!


LOL, I listen to that show all the time. Pretty entertaining.


----------



## CentexPW

As a kid I grew up in Colorado. My grandparents were lived and died in western Kansas. As a young teenager before I could legally drive, my grand dad would let me drive the section roads as long as I stayed off the Oil roads. I would go look thru abandoned farms. Found a lot of artifacts from the turn of the century. Mostly I would look for a house and then find the trash pile and look for old bottles. I still have a collection of them. Found several Sod houses from when the country was homesteaded. Several of the old houses had cellars with canning jars with food still in them. 30 - 40 years have passed and while visiting with my sons i took them to some of the places and they were still the same. Even the old cellars still had jars of food. Part of that country is like a time capsule. I can still take you to the place where my great grandfather had a sod house. There is nothing but a corner still standing because the cows have trampled it.


----------



## Trouthunter

*Excellent Thread*

What a great thread and much deserving of this award.

TH


----------



## Batboy0068

Trouthunter said:


> Snort, that particular turtle is on the endangered species list and it is a federal offense to even possess that shell.
> 
> Just thought I'd pass that along to you.
> 
> 
> 
> TH


 if that is true FUNNY but o well nice clock


----------



## laguna24

here is my contribution

My family had a small lease in Concrete, TX when i was about 10 or so. The camp house was from the mid 1800's but had been occupied up until a few years before we got on. The attic was off limits due to its questionable structural intergrity. My brother and i snuck up there once and made quite a find.....a entire collection of Playboys from the 60's and 70's. We never told anyone about them, just snuck up there to go "exploring" on occasion. 

When i was about 14 i was hunting in the woods that border my family's place in Matagorda County. I found a good tree and climbed up in it. In a fork i found a pocket knife stuck in it that was old and rusty. I took it home to show my Dad. He went pale when i showed him that evening. He said nobody is gonna belive this, but i lost that knife out there hunting when i was a teenager. I guess i learned something from him about picking a hunting spot. I still have it in my gun safe. I stuck my pocket knife in the fork of that tree last year when my son was born. Who knows, maybe he will learn something about picking a hunting spot from me!


----------



## Capt.Cook

Pocboy said:


> My father-in-law had a lease outside of comstock that I was able to hunt on for several years. There was a canyon that had been washed out in the bottom so that the walls were rounded and smoother than most and they were full of picotgraphs of people and animals and some really strange looking objects. There was a painting of a man with a halo and if you had an imagination you could say that some of the strange objects looked like UFO's. On the way down to the bottom of the canyon there was an old rock house that I'm sure was built sometime in the 1800's.


I have seen those UFO paintings on a ranch outside of Langtry on the Pecos river.Also paintings of what looked like big bugs,a very large pictograph of a campfire with what looked like Indians,a Shahman(half animal half man)and what looked like people with body armor and helmits like maybe a Conquistador or something.

We found lots of points,scrapers and knives on that place.Also found a big fossilized bone.A friend found an old silver spur,I found an old metal saddle horn and a metal clip from an old clip on pistol holster.One day we were looking around in a big overhang/cave and I found a half buried very old womens shoe that had part of a bone in it.


----------



## Freshwaterman

This thread has been fun reading. Like a lot of others I have found many points, scrapers etc. The thing that to me was the strangest find was what was left of a weather baloon. As a young boy my grandfather gave me a new Case pocket knife that I was so proud of. We hunted on a place in the hill country and on the last weekend of the season I left my knife sticking in a tree. We lost the lease after that year and my knife was gone. About 4-5 years later my dad leased the same place again and my knife was a rusty mess but it was still in the tree.


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

laguna24 said:


> I stuck my pocket knife in the fork of that tree last year when my son was born. Who knows, maybe he will learn something about picking a hunting spot from me!


*VERY 2COOL*


----------



## ZenDaddy

Levelwind said:


> There on top in the rocky, nearly barren ground, lay 23 spent 45.70 casings. They were tarnished nearly black, but all appeared in fairly good shape. Sitting there beside them with sunset coming on, I could imagine the man, with his Sharps rifle and shooting sticks gunning the buffalo at the little water hole, the most likely scenario. But then I wondered why he didn't pick up his brass. Maybe they didn't reload in those days, but one would think they would have. Possibly he'd been chased by the Commanche or the Kiowa - both prevalent there until the 1890s - and chosen that little promontory to make his stand. .


Tell you what ... if he was paying what I'm paying for 45.70 cartridges he'd be pickin' the casings up even if a hundred Commanches were after his scalp.


----------



## Professor Jones

Back in the late 80's my Dad and I were hunting in Mexico. He wanted to move a portable tripod so I agreed to help him. As we were carrying the tripod down a trail, I looked down and saw a wallet laying on the ground. We stopped and I picked it up. It looked like the corner had been chewed on. It belonged to a man from Houston and had around $80 in it. My Dad took the wallet and contacted the man. He was hunting on the ranch next to us and was very grateful that we had found it. He asked my Dad how much money was in it and my Dad told him. He told my Dad that when he lost the wallet, it had $30,000 in it and accused my Dad of stealing the money. My Dad got really irritated, but he still sent the guy the wallet. Comeon now, $30,000 is three hundred $100 bills. I do not think a person could get 300 bills into a wallet. Anyway, that is the wierdest thing I ever came across while hunting.

Professor Jones


----------



## GYB

This year while de-wasping my deer stands I found 4 snake skins about 4foot long each inside one of my box blinds. I am not looking forward to crawling into that stand any time soon.


----------



## jay07ag

I no longer have pics for this because my camera got stolen the day after I got home, but my uncle and I found a time capsule marking stone dated 1821 on the very top of Marble Island while stalk hunting Rusa in Australia two years ago......we went back to tell the guys at the camp and they said "yeah weve seen it before, not supposed to open it for another 15 years". I thought we had stubled upon a long lost treasure chest! It was really cool though....other than that nothing but arrowheads and prehistoric sharks teeth at Sam Rayburn


----------



## baldhunter

Professor Jones said:


> Back in the late 80's my Dad and I were hunting in Mexico. He wanted to move a portable tripod so I agreed to help him. As we were carrying the tripod down a trail, I looked down and saw a wallet laying on the ground. We stopped and I picked it up. It looked like the corner had been chewed on. It belonged to a man from Houston and had around $80 in it. My Dad took the wallet and contacted the man. He was hunting on the ranch next to us and was very grateful that we had found it. He asked my Dad how much money was in it and my Dad told him. He told my Dad that when he lost the wallet, it had $30,000 in it and accused my Dad of stealing the money. My Dad got really irritated, but he still sent the guy the wallet. Comeon now, $30,000 is three hundred $100 bills. I do not think a person could get 300 bills into a wallet. Anyway, that is the wierdest thing I ever came across while hunting.
> 
> Professor Jones


He forgot that he paid for his hunt before he lost his wallet!!!!!Too many tequilas!!!!!!!!!!!!!


----------



## huntinguy

Man this is a great thread!


----------



## Hair Trigger

That is pretty cool. Joe B. Taylor and Riley B. Taylor were my Grandfather and Great Grandfather, who all lived on top of the Caprock. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## Hair Trigger

*very cool*



activescrape said:


> Another time I was still hunting mule deer up in the canyons of the caprock. I was in an offshoot of Tule canyon to be exact. Deep in the botom of the canyon I came across the frame of a model t. I was checking it out and started seeing where someone had taken a steel chisel and chiseled in old brands, like the rocking r and lazy s. There were probably 15 to 20 of them. I later learned that the Taylor brothers, long since gone, whose parents homesteaded there had put them all there, all the local ranchers brands they knew of. I wish I had a picture of that.


That is pretty cool. Joe B. Taylor and Riley B. Taylor were my Grandfather and Great Grandfather, who all lived on top of the Caprock. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## ranchpeddler

*disturbing find*

While deer hunting on a lease in Zavala Co. about 10 years ago one of the lease members found a backpack full of very nice ladies undergarments in a tree stand. The ranch owner had a 13 year old boy that was a real piece of work.


----------



## TXPalerider

Hair Trigger said:


> That is pretty cool. Joe B. Taylor and Riley B. Taylor were my Grandfather and Great Grandfather, who all lived on top of the Caprock. Thanks for sharing.


WOW!! Now that's 2Cool. What are the chances of that?


----------



## activescrape

The ones I knew were, and I just knew them by what everyone called them, Fat Taylor and his wife Trudy. Trudy and my wife's mother used to go down in the South Pole Canyon and pick wild plums and make jelly. The best you ever ate. Fat and Trudy are buried in Gray Mule Cemetary. Jones Taylor, he was a lifelong bachelor and a bit of a recluse. Booger Taylor, I met him a few times and know his daughter Kay and her kids a little better. I mule deer hunted on their land. There is a Joe Taylor that is married to Virginia Taylor, daughter of Fat and Trudy, who has the same last name but is obviously not blood related. Is that the Joe you are talking about?


Hair Trigger said:


> That is pretty cool. Joe B. Taylor and Riley B. Taylor were my Grandfather and Great Grandfather, who all lived on top of the Caprock. Thanks for sharing.


----------



## Hair Trigger

*__*



activescrape said:


> The ones I knew were, and I just knew them by what everyone called them, Fat Taylor and his wife Trudy. Trudy and my wife's mother used to go down in the South Pole Canyon and pick wild plums and make jelly. The best you ever ate. Fat and Trudy are buried in Gray Mule Cemetary. Jones Taylor, he was a lifelong bachelor and a bit of a recluse. Booger Taylor, I met him a few times and know his daughter Kay and her kids a little better. I mule deer hunted on their land. There is a Joe Taylor that is married to Virginia Taylor, daughter of Fat and Trudy, who has the same last name but is obviously not blood related. Is that the Joe you are talking about?


No but I have seen the name Trudy in the family tree many times...


----------



## Trouthunter

Are these Taylors any kin to the Coleman County Taylors?

TH


----------



## activescrape

Not sure Martin. I'm going up for pheasant this year and I'll do some asking around. 
You go out up there and you are liable to come home with, pheasant, quail, duck, goose, cottontail and sandhill crane on the same day.


Trouthunter said:


> Are these Taylors any kin to the Coleman County Taylors?
> 
> TH


 That first pic _I'm holding up rabbits and there are mallards and cranes in the pile, the second one is more of the same._


----------



## haparks

im bumping this cuz when i get home i want to read more this is cool


----------



## activescrape

haparks said:


> im bumping this cuz when i get home i want to read more this is cool


Come on HA, ain't you found a still or something out in them east Texas woods?


----------



## Trouthunter

It's way up on top of Texas that's for sure. I have a friend who owns a large ranch out of Clarendon and the quail are just everywhere. It's just so dang far, lol.

Thanks.

TH


----------



## copperhead

That my then wife had a boyfriend who didn't hunt. Now she's an ex.


----------



## Trouthunter

> That my then wife had a boyfriend who didn't hunt. Now she's an ex.


Okay that's pretty funny, lol. 

TH


----------



## TXPalerider

copperhead said:


> That my then wife had a boyfriend who didn't hunt. Now she's an ex.


Just one more thing we sacrifice for hunting.


----------



## S-3 ranch

while hunting on the hopper ranch in brooks co , we had been driveing cross country bird hunting . we found a car " about 5 miles from any road " and next to the car hanging from fishing line was a dead guy " he looked like a mummy / leather " we called the cops they could not tell us what or why the guy was doing that far from a road


----------



## dwhite

Now That Is Freaky!!!!!!!!!!


----------



## big john o

activescrape said:


> Come on HA, ain't you found a still or something out in them east Texas woods?


We've found several old and abandon deer stands in places which are currently inaccesable except on foot. Heres a pic of one.


----------



## haparks

*well lets see*

ill start from when i was a kid to young to hunt-to young to be away from my parants--i wonderd off down the hill from the house back into the woods just lookin just woundering whats around the corner--met an old black man fishin along the white river--sat next to him and watched--nice memory--next--about 7 years old--wondering the creek bed of the farm--finding small geodes--(breakum open they have crystals in them--found a giant one bigger than me--never found it again and no one belived me--about 13--wounderuing the woods-HAD MY BB GUN--popin limbs birds etc--decided to treck off the paths deep into the woods it got real quiet--i got nervous--the only time i get nervous is when there is no sound--and there was no sound--i could not figure what was wrong but i knew there was somthing wrong---all of a sudden the forrest exploded with deer--in every direction--all around me--passing inches from me i thought i was gonna be trampled--i WAS NOT and stood there and all i could think and say was wow----about 13--same woods--same bbgun--found an old grave yard in the middle of the woods with headstones from the 1800's--early 20's--worked for a company in sandiego called diving unlimited international--bettter known as DUI---DID ALOT OF DIVING in my spare time--some times at 1-2 or 3 in the morning by my self if i could not sleep--my new bride hated that--but while i was diving and on the bottom only about 20 feet down i spent an hour nose to nose with a halabut --he looked at me and i him--same time frame--same beach--10 ft of water =---mortar and peatal's -- lots of them--along with a communal mortar --big--i was rolling it under water and as i was gonna take it home i thought wow what would i do with it once i got it ot my truck--so i rolled it back--i kept 2 small mortars and pestals--and left the rest and gave one to my father as a xmax present--couple of years ago in a deep creekbed found some petrified logs on my deer lese and gave to my neighbor--but yalls stories are much better than mine---i hope thish thread goes for ever cusz i know there are a zillion more interesting stories--oh ps--while diving i found a huge anchor standing strait up in about 80 to 100 feet of water wedged in some rocks--it was an anchor of many moons ago---wooden ship days--:work:



activescrape said:


> Come on HA, ain't you found a still or something out in them east Texas woods?


----------



## texasarrowhead

I have found so many artifacts I don't even know what I have.I can say I have one huge collection of Texas indian atifacts and caddo pottery.I can say I have found most of it.I have dug all over Texas.Most of my stuff came the east Texas coal mines and all is destroyed now.What I wish I could have salvaged that is now lost forever.Some of the things I have found are one of a kind and is very rare.I have found pipes,arrowheads,whole pots,beads,and yes french swords and knifes.This pic is a caddo pipe and a big knife that was in a beaded bag note the beads in the pipe


----------



## texasarrowhead

Some more pics!


----------



## activescrape

That is phenomenal! Did you have to restring all those beads?


----------



## texasarrowhead

I did find all the beads loose and strung them up on fishing line.I found almost a 5 gallon bucket full of beads.I found a jackpot of artifacts from this caddo indian site that traded with the French.Most of the artifacts I found from this site is rare as hens teeth.
This is a pic of the only 2 found and very rare King of all trade beads.









I think this a very cool arrow point found in Singer,Lousiana


----------



## texasarrowhead

I have got to learn how to resize!LOL


----------



## TXPalerider

Arrowhead,

I gotta say, I am very impressed. You must be a very dedicated searcher/digger. I used to piddle around looking for arrowheads when we hunted in Zapata, and I know that stuff ain't easy to come by.


----------



## haparks

wow thats so cool i would just like to find one arrowhead one day


----------



## activescrape

*here's a few of mine*

I have posted these before, but since it came up. All surface finds and not all I have found. I have many more and lots of manos and metates.


----------



## haparks

those are some killer pics thanks


----------



## Samson

I went dove hunting opening day near Richland Springs, staying with my some friends at their Deer lease. We in between hunts on the 1st when my friend and I decided to go for a pasture cruise in his newly restored FJ-40. We were coming up out of a gully and into the far back pasture when we saw about 100 buzzards take off from the lone Oak tree in the middle of the pasture. Figuring there was a dead cow we drove over to investigate. When we got to the tree, there were nine cows lying in a circle, all dead, around the tree. The only thing we can think of was that when it started raining, the cows went to the nearest shelter, which happened to be the only tree in a 100yd radius. Then BAM, lightning hit the tree. They had been dead a few days by the time we found them so we didnt hang around for too long (the stench was really bad!). Didn't really inspect the tree but that is our best guess. I felt really bad for the farmer, judging by the amount of cattle we saw that were alive, it was about 1/2 his herd dead. Can someone get insurance for something like this? Lightning Insurance? Or does this qualify as one of those acts of god? Great thread, keep it going!


----------



## Barrett

Have read some neat stuff on this thread, want to share the same but .........


----------



## John Galt

Hair Trigger said:


> That is pretty cool. Joe B. Taylor and Riley B. Taylor were my Grandfather and Great Grandfather, who all lived on top of the Caprock. Thanks for sharing.


This doesn't count as "finding something while hunting" because I was working and the things was parked next to the trash pit, but there was an old road grader, must have been from the '20s at the latest, it was horse drawn. Still worked fine.

I mention it because the rancher I was working for was named "Taylor." They'd been in the Crosbyton area for a hundred years. The Caprock ran thru the ranch.

His office was full of old stuff he'd found, mostly tools but he had a set of old Spanish spurs with rowels 3" across.

I'm surprised no one's found parts of the Space Shuttle...probably still some scattered across LA and ETX.


----------



## Porky

A friend and I were turkey hunting a lease S of I10 Waelder area and we kept hearing a cow braying with a reverb effect. At pull-out time we went in search of the ghost cow because there was not supposed to be any cattle on the lease. Finally my buddy yells over here. There was a unmarked 30'deep cistern that was about 12'wide at the bottom and a taper at the very top to about a 3-4 foot hole. There was the cow, no broken bones looking up at us! We dragged some brush over it and I marked it with my orange vest. Told the owner and he told a rancher and they pulled it out the next day. 
Just glad nobody walked into it like the cow.


----------



## TexasTurtle

copperhead said:


> That my then wife had a boyfriend who didn't hunt. Now she's an ex.


Guns dont kill people, Husbands that come home early do.


----------



## hunt2grill

I found that if you have a guy desparate enough to want to kill something you can convince him to belly crawl 30 yards to take 3 shots at 2 turkey decoys at 8:00am in an open field before he realizes what they are.


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

Those reflective trail marker thumbtacks work for that, too. Put them out before you go spotlighting with that trigger happy cousin.

Lance.


----------



## MouletteRouge

I was a Geology major in college, but spent the majority of my time in paleontology sifting through sediments looking for paleo mice teeth, and wondering how this pertained to me working for an oil company..._nonomisces (sp) _I think where the tiny little coastal rodents, but its been a while...They used these little guys teeth to trace the paleo shoreline of Texas...Found Tarpon_esque _scales west of Del Rio... Had a guy in the department that always went down to the McFaddin area after a storm, and found numerous Mastadon teeth, and a really good section of a tusk...Next time you guys are down soaking some bait for bulls after a storm, keep an eye out...Some of this stuff was amazing, and the preservation was really nice...Used to find a bunch of arrowheads when I was a kid around Toledo Bend...Indian Mounds used to be a great place to fish in the lake...


----------



## Freshwaterman

*Eagle pass*

Buddy of mine had a lease just west of Eagle pass,while riding around he is the back of the truck jumps out & blast a dove that land in some thick brush, so I jump out grab my brittany and go looking. I see a big burlap sack painted black go over & feel it (Oh Shatt) feels like bundles ask buddy to bring a knife, cut it open sure enough bout 80 lbs of weed. Call the border patroll they came & got it said they had a big bust there bout a month earlyer must of missed it, they were loading it up & tell us it is worth a lot of money, buddy says yep worth a lot of time too.

Wes


----------



## 1976Bronc

In 1990-1992 we were fortunate to be on a lease about 50-60 miles out of Laredo on old mines road. The land was saturated with game and indian artifacts.One day we were walking down in a gully, I found a perfictly shot 50. cal bullet. It was black,about 3" long, I think armor piercing round. I kept it thinking how and what the heck put it there. I have heard that sometimes the air force practices in rural areas like this some times not accesable by most humans. 
I will never forget that place, we lost the lease to Texas A&M at least thats what the ranch owner said for research purposes.


----------



## Pathfinder

My father-in-law hunts off of old mines rd and it's covered with 50 cal bullets. A lot are unfired. I was told the military used to fly helicopters over the ranch and shoot targets. They would also dump unspent rounds into the lakes. You're right about the artifacts. The ranch has quite a few.


----------



## Trouthunter

I'm going to "stick" this thread for as long as I can, or at least until after this hunting season as long as Mont is okay with it.

It will be cool to see if after reading this thread, more of us pay better attention to what's around us besides deer. 

TH


----------



## BigBuck

*Find*

I hunted as a guest on a ranch off Old Mines Rd., I think it was the Tordas pasture, part of the Briscoe Ranches. Years ago it was used as a training grounds for aircraft, and you could find .50 and .30 cal casings, lead, and sometimes the complete bullet. This ranch was 17,000 acres right on the Rio Grande, and a beautiful ranch. Lots of hills, draws, etc... Also some nice deer, one guy killed a 196 gross the year I hunted there. One guy's son found a human skull, the border patrol said it was an illegal, and several years old. The boy wanted to take it to school for show and tell. Probably not a good idea. They buried it where they found it.
BB


----------



## MatagordaWader

No amazing finds or anything here but...

I grew up in Bay City but had a few acres of woods behind my house that I roamed almost on a daily basis from when my parents let me venture away from the backyard until I graduated and I got to the point where I knew it like the back of my hand.

I watched deer, found fencing tools, and old wire, arrowheads, cans, etc. but nothing too old. Pretty much built treehouses with anything I could find. 

However, I was walking through a creekbed once and stumbled on a cleared spot within thick trees. In the area was an empty cooler, about 5 chairs hanging about 20 feet off the ground tied in the trees, a mattress with wooden posts on each corner holding up a roof of leaves...Creepy..didn't know what to think and still don't. 

A little further I found a house that appeared to have fallen in, a deep well with a ladder into it, and a little stable...all within tall trees and very thick brush. 

Finding all of that when I was in elementary school was a pretty fun experience. I did not venture back to the old house after a couple of other kids in the neighborhood started a rumor that "Shotgun Granny" lived there. 

All of the area now is cleared off for another neighborhood though.


----------



## dolch

my family has 100 acres in Lavaca county. My cousin and I were playing around an old dump site and found 3 or 4 old chinese coins. I never did look into how old they are. My family has had the place sinc the early '70's. Maybe I'll see if I can dig the one my cousin let me keep out and post a pic in the next couple days.


----------



## activescrape

dolch said:


> my family has 100 acres in Lavaca county. My cousin and I were playing around an old dump site and found 3 or 4 old chinese coins. I never did look into how old they are. My family has had the place sinc the early '70's. Maybe I'll see if I can dig the one my cousin let me keep out and post a pic in the next couple days.


That would be neat,


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

MatagordaWader said:


> I was walking through a creekbed once and stumbled on a cleared spot within thick trees. In the area was an empty cooler, about 5 chairs hanging about 20 feet off the ground tied in the trees, a mattress with wooden posts on each corner holding up a roof of leaves...Creepy..didn't know what to think and still don't.
> 
> A little further I found a house that appeared to have fallen in, a deep well with a ladder into it, and a little stable...all within tall trees and very thick brush.


Were yall thinking the same thing??? "*put the dog in* *the basket*!!"


----------



## Tiny

"It puts the lotion on its skin..."

"It puts the dog in the basket......IT Puts the Dog in the Basket......

*PUT THE FRICKEN DOG IN THE BASKET!!!!!!!!"*

Man I love that movie!!



ATE_UP_FISHERMAN said:


> Were yall thinking the same thing??? "*put the dog in* *the basket*!!"


----------



## chasingtails

My dad cleaned a deer and laid his buck knife down on a rock when he was done. This was out in the middle of nowhere in Fort Stockton TX area. The next time he hunted that lease was six years later and he was tracking a deer when he had seen something shiny. It turned out to be the knife that he had forgotton six years before. The funny thing is he thought that he was miles from the same area.


----------



## SSNJOHN

*Mills/San Saba County*

Use to hunt on a place between Goldthwaite and San Saba. Colorado river ran through the middle of the lease. Old rock camp house, nice place. At the river was an old rock dam with two rock stanchions that supposedly held a water wheel at one time. Place was called Ratler at one time and supposedly was where people came to grind corn in the 1800's. Not a lot of rattle snakes, but never killed one under 4 foot on that place.

Found several places on the lease that were 10-15' in diameter with burnt looking rocks and the ground was higher than surrounding areas. Mom said there were midden's or Indian trash pile. Numerous broken points, etc. on areas close to these spots. Most were on high ground with good visibility of surroundings, so suppose they were making them in this area.

Up the river from here was an old suspension bridge called Regency Bridge. I was informed it was one of the first built in Texas. It may still be there, haven't been up that way in ~ 10 years.

Good memories.


----------



## activescrape

SSNJOHN said:


> Use to hunt on a place between Goldthwaite and San Saba. Colorado river ran through the middle of the lease. Old rock camp house, nice place. At the river was an old rock dam with two rock stanchions that supposedly held a water wheel at one time. Place was called Ratler at one time and supposedly was where people came to grind corn in the 1800's. Not a lot of rattle snakes, but never killed one under 4 foot on that place.
> 
> Found several places on the lease that were 10-15' in diameter with burnt looking rocks and the ground was higher than surrounding areas. Mom said there were midden's or Indian trash pile. Numerous broken points, etc. on areas close to these spots. Most were on high ground with good visibility of surroundings, so suppose they were making them in this area.
> 
> Up the river from here was an old suspension bridge called Regency Bridge. I was informed it was one of the first built in Texas. It may still be there, haven't been up that way in ~ 10 years.
> 
> Good memories.


The bridge is still there. It was refloored about 5 years ago because it was getting rickety. The very next year some kids set it on fire by shooting fireworks off the bridge. They closed it again for a while but it's open now. On the southeast corner of the bridge there are some big flat sandstone rocks at the edge of the cliff overlooking the river. They have grinding holes in them. The only way in and out of there is by dirt road. I own some land about 5 miles from there and there are some good arrowheads on it too.


----------



## CoastalOutfitters

I was bow hunting in SanSaba county in the late 70's, camoed up really well in a makeshift tree stand. about 7 am, watched 2 yahoos cross the border fence and walk over and stand directly underneath my tree and smoke a cigarette and talk about where to hunt.

I never said a word to em, both were packing handguns.


----------



## JWHITE

I have never seen anything too unusual while hunting, but I found a website that is interesting. You East Tx. hunters need to check it out. You never know......

http://www.texasbigfoot.com/


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

JWHITE said:


> I have never seen anything too unusual while hunting, but I found a website that is interesting. You East Tx. hunters need to check it out. You never know......
> 
> http://www.texasbigfoot.com/


At first I thought that was my ex's MYSPACE..


----------



## EastBound

We have some land in Bandera County. When my son was out hunting, he found an old badge. The interesting thing about the badge is that it is from Logan County Oklahoma. It is a Special Deputy Sherrifs badge. I have done some research and contacted Logan County to find out info on the badge but have not been able to come up with anything. It is an authintic badge made by C.D Reese from 57 Warren Street, in New York. I researched this address to find that he was a badge maker in early 1900's. I have not been able to find a photo of this badge, but simular badges are dated in the 20's-40's. It would be truly interesting to find out how and why this badge ended up in Bandera County. All kinds of interesting ideas come to mind, from my research Logan County was a pretty wild place during this time frame. He may have been on a possie on the trail of banditos or something. Maybe one day we will know. I have posted some pictures, and any help in finding the owner, and thus possibly the reason the badge came to rest in Bandera County would be appreciated


----------



## activescrape

One of the best finds so far, thanks!


----------



## Trouthunter

A special deputy sheriff's badge from Oklahoma to Bandera...that will get your imagination going, lol.

TH


----------



## theotherwaldo

New guy posting. Fair warning.
I've never found much while actually hunting, but I've found lots of stuff while looking for likely places to hunt. 
Some samples: a rusted-solid but loaded Paterson Colt in a creekbed, a '28 double eagle along with a bent $5 gold piece and a Remington pocket knife on a river bank, a two-pounder cavalry cannon barrel out behind an old bootlegger's shack, and all of the parts for a 1915 Model T in the attic of a garage attached to an abandoned hunting lodge. 
I've found a lot more while fishing, ranging from Zane Grey's drift boat to 9,000 year old proto-Indian fishing camps.
I guess it's because I still-hunt but I'm always moving when I'm fishing.


----------



## activescrape

theotherwaldo said:


> New guy posting. Fair warning.
> I've never found much while actually hunting, but I've found lots of stuff while looking for likely places to hunt.
> Some samples: a rusted-solid but loaded Paterson Colt in a creekbed, a '28 double eagle along with a bent $5 gold piece and a Remington pocket knife on a river bank, a two-pounder cavalry cannon barrel out behind an old bootlegger's shack, and all of the parts for a 1915 Model T in the attic of a garage attached to an abandoned hunting lodge.
> I've found a lot more while fishing, ranging from Zane Grey's drift boat to 9,000 year old proto-Indian fishing camps.
> I guess it's because I still-hunt but I'm always moving when I'm fishing.


Got any pics of some of that stuff you could share with us?? We like pictures.


----------



## hunt2grill

*Check this out*



EastBound said:


> We have some land in Bandera County. When my son was out hunting, he found an old badge. The interesting thing about the badge is that it is from Logan County Oklahoma. It is a Special Deputy Sherrifs badge. I have done some research and contacted Logan County to find out info on the badge but have not been able to come up with anything. It is an authintic badge made by C.D Reese from 57 Warren Street, in New York. I researched this address to find that he was a badge maker in early 1900's. I have not been able to find a photo of this badge, but simular badges are dated in the 20's-40's. It would be truly interesting to find out how and why this badge ended up in Bandera County. All kinds of interesting ideas come to mind, from my research Logan County was a pretty wild place during this time frame. He may have been on a possie on the trail of banditos or something. Maybe one day we will know. I have posted some pictures, and any help in finding the owner, and thus possibly the reason the badge came to rest in Bandera County would be appreciated


http://marti.rootsweb.com/law/lawmend.htm

Searched around but didn;t spend much time this is a pretty interesting site especially for the history buffs might help your search


----------



## theotherwaldo

activescrape said:


> Got any pics of some of that stuff you could share with us?? We like pictures.


 No real pics left, just some stuff on the net. Last I heard, the Josephine County (oregon) Historical Society had the cannon barrel and the Paterson, the drift boat was moved from a collapsed shed (about to be destroyed by the BLM) to Zane Grey's Winkle Bar cabin, and the University of Oregon was excavating the ancient fishing camp. Sold the coins, someone stole the knife. Neat memories, though!


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

I don't think I would part with the gold coin. Thats cool


----------



## EastBound

Thank you Hunt2grill


----------



## chad

Carnivorous dillos

About 2 years ago we had killed a buck at our ranch on the morning hunt. We left the carcus on the slab of the cleaning station to keep the vultures and Kara Kara from eating it so we could use it for some night time coyote bait. When we arrived back at the ranch house around 2:00 pm we found these 2 armadillos eating it. I have never seen armadillos eating carion before or since.


----------



## sharkhunter50

arrowheads, a horse shoe, and some cool looking fossils.


----------



## sotol buster

We had a geologist hunting with us and he would tell us what kind of rocks and fossils we found. Pretty cool. My bud found a genuine certifyed verified leverite.


----------



## luisvetrano

Discovery in Jasper. Had a deer lease a few miles from Jasper. After a morning hunt walking on a logging trail I discovered a couple saving sex. At first I thought it was a big hog. I walked passed them and scared the hell out of them.


----------



## Kody Emmert

luisvetrano said:


> Discovery in Jasper. Had a deer lease a few miles from Jasper. After a morning hunt walking on a logging trail I discovered a couple saving sex. At first I thought it was a big hog. I walked passed them and scared the hell out of them.


now that is funny!


----------



## Trout Laguna

Was on a river camping trip in West Texas and stumbled along this old cabin with a big, well maintained foam mattress. The cabin had a outhouse that clearly didn't get much use, a front porch big enough to hold 2 plastic lawn chairs, and fire pit with grill off to the sid. Inside was a number of useful items:

Three Bottles River Water, Knife, Wet Stone, Old time wash board, three cans pork beans, and a big broom with a sign over head said "Whatever you use, put back and you're welcome as long as Cabin is not occupied."

The cabin was well decorated with all sort of antique farm tools and horse riggings, what was amazing what this- No cobwebs, no hornet's nest's, very little dusty surfaces.

Someone obviously maintained the property and didn't seem to mind letting passers by use the cabin for a night or so. This cabin was up on a hill about 60 ft above the river with in a incredible view. It was obvious that who ever was traveling through the area would be traveling along the river because there were no major roads nearby so I am sure they (owner) knew who and when people were using the cabin, but didn't mind none the less, thought that was pretty cool.


----------



## Captn C

WOW! I just finished reading all 18 pages!

Great stuff guys and gals!

I too have made a few finds. The last one I think I still have and I'm going to see if I can find it and take pic of it. It's afire "bullet", but it's LARGE...I was hunt quail down on our place in Port Lavaca...shot a quail and went to pick it up. There this thing was It was 6" to 8" in length and about as big around as the core for a roll of paper towels. It is mostly stell which is badly rusted, but the it has a ring around it that has the rifling on it. That part has no rust on it at all.



I also found a pocket watch and on old license plate 20's or 30's???on a lease in San Saba.

I have a 32 cailber pistol that was found by a friend who pasted away a few years ago that he found while elk hunting in Colorado.

I have some photos of carvings in some trees when I hunted Colorado, but I can't recall what it said now. I'll have to look them up to see.

Great thread. I hope to locate the projectile tonight.


----------



## dcathey01

On a lease in Coryell County I found a hidden 40x40 plot of Marijuanna growing. That killed the deer season. The authorities did a two month stake out and would not let us hunt. Come to find out, a University of Texas college student that lived on the property years earlier snuck onto the property and planted it. 

When I got my first digital deer tracking camera I set it up in the backyard to test it out. I thought I could use the kids as guinea pigs. Our backyard is totally enclosed with a seven foot tall solid wooden slat fence and the gate remains locked at all times. After a week I bring it in the house and download the photos onto my laptop. To my horror I discovered two photos of a total stranger in my backyard. One of the photos has him looking into one of our windows. The photos have a date and time stamp on them. We were not home at the time the photos of the stranger were taken. When the police came they had some interesting news. The house directly behind us had been broken into the very day the photos were taken of him.

The most interesting find of all for me. We currently have a family lease north of Lampasas. The 90 year old man that owns the place had the property handed down to him. He and his family have always lived elsewhere and do not spend much time at all on the place. Anyway, there is a heavily wooded secluded canyon on the property that is only accessable by foot. It requires lots of climbing, descending and crawling to get to parts of it. I have seen every inch of it. I found two indian skeletons complete with artifacts, pottery ect. Until now, I have told nobody. Not even my family knows about it.


----------



## activescrape

dcathey01 said:


> On a lease in Coryell County I found a hidden 40x40 plot of Marijuanna growing. That killed the deer season. The authorities did a two month stake out and would not let us hunt. Come to find out, a University of Texas college student that lived on the property years earlier snuck onto the property and planted it.
> 
> When I got my first digital deer tracking camera I set it up in the backyard to test it out. I thought I could use the kids as guinea pigs. Our backyard is totally enclosed with a seven foot tall solid wooden slat fence and the gate remains locked at all times. After a week I bring it in the house and download the photos onto my laptop. To my horror I discovered two photos of a total stranger in my backyard. One of the photos has him looking into one of our windows. The photos have a date and time stamp on them. We were not home at the time the photos of the stranger were taken. When the police came they had some interesting news. The house directly behind us had been broken into the very day the photos were taken of him.
> 
> The most interesting find of all for me. We currently have a family lease north of Lampasas. The 90 year old man that owns the place had the property handed down to him. He and his family have always lived elsewhere and do not spend much time at all on the place. Anyway, there is a heavily wooded secluded canyon on the property that is only accessable by foot. It requires lots of climbing, descending and crawling to get to parts of it. I have seen every inch of it. I found two indian skeletons complete with artifacts, pottery ect. Until now, I have told nobody. Not even my family knows about it.


Staggering! Just fascinating. Thank you for sharing those stories. WOW!!!! I'm so not morbid, but I would LOVE to see pics of those pristine artifacts. I found a washed out grave myself with awesome knives but the pottery was busted up bad. No bones at all. If there was a respectful way to do it.........


----------



## theotherwaldo

dcathey01 said:


> I found two indian skeletons complete with artifacts, pottery ect. Until now, I have told nobody. Not even my family knows about it.


 Yeah, I can follow that. I spent a year on the Klamath River, eight miles downstream from Happy Camp. Most of the valley had indian graves, and many had been exposed or washed out by a recent flood.

I never saw anything wrong with taking items that had washed completely out into the rubble field along the river, but I always tried to respect any recognizeable graves.


----------



## phi214

*Awesome find*

Found this on our lease this past spring when we were walking through the brush calling up a couple gobblers.


----------



## Captn C

Captn C said:


> WOW! I just finished reading all 18 pages!
> 
> Great stuff guys and gals!
> 
> I too have made a few finds. The last one I think I still have and I'm going to see if I can find it and take pic of it. It's afire "bullet", but it's LARGE...I was hunt quail down on our place in Port Lavaca...shot a quail and went to pick it up. There this thing was It was 6" to 8" in length and about as big around as the core for a roll of paper towels. It is mostly stell which is badly rusted, but the it has a ring around it that has the rifling on it. That part has no rust on it at all.
> 
> I also found a pocket watch and on old license plate 20's or 30's???on a lease in San Saba.
> 
> I have a 32 cailber pistol that was found by a friend who pasted away a few years ago that he found while elk hunting in Colorado.
> 
> I have some photos of carvings in some trees when I hunted Colorado, but I can't recall what it said now. I'll have to look them up to see.
> 
> Great thread. I hope to locate the projectile tonight.


Here is the pic of the two of the things I mentioned:

The pistol is a H&R and it still functions, but I have never tried to shoot it.


----------



## John Galt

Captn C said:


> Here is the pic of the two of the things I mentioned:
> 
> The pistol is a H&R and it still functions, but I have never tried to shoot it.


Looks like a 37MM shell. How much does it weigh? If around 6 lbs, it's a 57MM, and if about 2lbs, it's a 37MM. Looks like it's been fired.

You might give some careful thought to learning if that is a live shell. There are still French farmers getting killed every year when their tractors hit WWI UXO. The shells get pushed to the surface by frost heaving.


----------



## Captn C

It is pretty heavy closer to 6lb than 2lb...it also has a white powder in the rear end of it.



I assume it was shot from an airplane because of where I found it. Our lease in Port Lavaca is the area of land between Keller Bay and Cox Bay. If you look at any map of the area it will show you "Mud Point". That is where i found it, maybe 200 yards from the waters edge.


----------



## Trouthunter

Anti-Aircraft round, probably fired from one of the bunkers between Keller's and Palacios. Use to find all kinds of shell casings and bullets there when I was a kid. Nothing bigger than a 40mm though which is what they had down there. The white powder in the hollow of the base was the phosphorus that made it a tracer. Could it be a 40mm shell John?

TH


----------



## John Galt

Trouthunter said:


> Anti-Aircraft round, probably fired from one of the bunkers between Keller's and Palacios. Use to find all kinds of shell casings and bullets there when I was a kid. Nothing bigger than a 40mm though which is what they had down there. The white powder in the hollow of the base was the phosphorus that made it a tracer. Could it be a 40mm shell John?
> 
> TH


I'll bet so...40MM Bofors? I was guessing it was from a 37MM field gun (training) but that makes more sense. They used a lot of those Bofors guns..standard secondary AA battery on capital ships (USS Hornet below), but also used by the Army as AA and even mounted on AC-130's.

In the pic below, gun was fired by tapping the footpedals in the lower RH corner. Gun was not power assist but was trained with the little handwheels...bet that got tiring during an extended attack. Hats off to those heroes.


----------



## Captn C

I had thought it might be a tracer round too. 



Thanks


----------



## ShawnQ

Any land owners willing to let a few of us 'explore' their property? All proceeds and finds go to the owner! Let's get a 2cool 'exploration' day together! I like to look around the woods more than I like to shoot...but not having a place to hunt sure makes it tough.

A good friend of my father's found a bayonet(sp?) south of San Antonio on his land. It was stuck in a mesquite tree and it cleaned up nicely. The strange thing was the few human bones found right below it. Apparently someone was 'stuck' and pinned to the tree. The Bayonet remained stuck in the tree and the body fell below. Most of it was likely drug off by varmints, as only a few smaller bones were found. No skull. He donated the Bayonet to the Alamo, which they assumed was the timeframe and location where/when the bayonet was last used. The remains were re-earthed and the land was cleared and developed. He also found several other texas/mexican war artifacts on this property...but this one had the coolest story.

Same friend of my father's had a family connection on some land down in what I believe was Eagle Pass. I was young and don't remember for sure where it was, but I know it was near the border and had corn fields on it.
He had been out there on a Tuesday to make sure everything was suitable at the ranch house for a weekend stay and hog hunt. We arrived on Friday night, and planned to spotlight for hogs in between the planted fields. As we were going around the back to the barn(about 100 yds away)to get in the ranch truck, he noticed the truck was gone! So, we got in our personal vehicle and drove down the only road on the place that didn't lead off the ranch. We saw a few tracks in some mud and assumed it was from the ranch truck. It is completely dark outside, and we see some extremely dim lights coming from the center of one of the fields. The crop was tall enough so that you couldn't see the top of it, but the ranch truck (F150) was driven off, stuck, and abandoned in the middle of the field - still running, lights on. At this point I was told to stay in the truck as my father and his friend got out and investigated further. Guns drawn, they checked everything out and never found anyone. They did hear rustling in the field, but it was going away so they let it be. What they DID find was a .44 on the seat of the truck and a case of cold-ones on the passenger floorboard. They later found out that the beer was stolen out of THEIR TRUCK while we were inside (maybe 10mins) getting ready for the nighttime hunt. So, apparently, someone was around the house planning to sleep their or rob it, steal the truck, and head out of town. We showed up and ruined their plans...so they stole my dad's beer and the truck, but didn't get far - and they forgot their gun!


----------



## theotherwaldo

Look familiar? Notice where it says TNT?


----------



## dwhite

Havent found nothing as interesting as some of you guys but there were things that made me wander...First thing was on our lease west of Del Rio off of Fm 1024, was a deep hole, bout 40 feet down, then went straight to the left. My dad put a javalina in there one time cuz it smelled so bad, the next day it was gone! We never ventured down there to see what was down there after that. Next was some sort of compass marking directions and coordinates, it was embedded in some rock, after searching around i found 4 other ones all around the first one, think it said corps of engineers or something like that, cant really remember. Never really knew what they were, it was on the same place off of 1024. Any of you guys have an idea???


----------



## Old Whaler

We had a lease in Del Rio for ten years. I bet a cougar dragged the Javelina off


dwhite said:


> Havent found nothing as interesting as some of you guys but there were things that made me wander...First thing was on our lease west of Del Rio off of Fm 1024, was a deep hole, bout 40 feet down, then went straight to the left. My dad put a javalina in there one time cuz it smelled so bad, the next day it was gone! We never ventured down there to see what was down there after that. Next was some sort of compass marking directions and coordinates, it was embedded in some rock, after searching around i found 4 other ones all around the first one, think it said corps of engineers or something like that, cant really remember. Never really knew what they were, it was on the same place off of 1024. Any of you guys have an idea???


----------



## Captn C

theotherwaldo said:


> Look familiar? Notice where it says TNT?


This has me abit worried. Does TNT become inherit from exposure or just become unstable?!?!?


----------



## slabseeker

*strange items*

Once when I was sitting in my stand,there was a bush in front of me.
As I sat there looking for deer,that small 3' tree? shed all of it's leaves 
as I watched.They fell one after another in a span of 1 minute.I bet
that no one has ever seen that.If they did please let me know....
I'm not talking about one or two.It was about thirty.
Let me know,don't be late....


----------



## John Galt

Captn C said:


> This has me abit worried. Does TNT become inherit from exposure or just become unstable?!?!?


Sometimes goes inert, but it can get unstable. Every few years a few French farmer is killed when his tractor hits a shell (the shells land deep underground, but frost heaving pushes them to the surface.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_harvest


----------



## Freshwaterman

*Old Spanish Silver Coins*

I have a small handful of these 2 reales sliver coins minted in Mexico City around 1540. These coins were the 1st coins minted in the New World. Coins were found at a site on a South facing step below a bluff over looking a creek in Texas. We only found some silver coins in what must of been a leather pouch, what looks like a crossbow action, some old lead rifle balls of about 70 caliper and some severely rusted out objects that may have been steel edged weapons, arrowheads and old rifle actions. We also found some flint arrowheads but these were at a lower level and likely pre-dated the Spanish artifacts. What's the story here? I have never been able to determine. A proper archeological survey was done and found nothing else of any significance other the these few coins. This area in the 16th century was far beyound the edges of civilization. My bet the Padre island shipwecks of April, 1554 was the source of the coins.


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Very cool.


----------



## activescrape

FlakMan said:


> I have a small handful of these 2 reales sliver coins minted in Mexico City around 1540. These coins were the 1st coins minted in the New World. Coins were found at a site on a South facing step below a bluff over looking a creek in Texas. We only found some silver coins in what must of been a leather pouch, what looks like a crossbow action, some old lead rifle balls of about 70 caliper and some severely rusted out objects that may have been steel edged weapons, arrowheads and old rifle actions. We also found some flint arrowheads but these were at a lower level and likely pre-dated the Spanish artifacts. What's the story here? I have never been able to determine. A proper archeological survey was done and found nothing else of any significance other the these few coins. This area in the 16th century was far beyound the edges of civilization. My bet the Padre island shipwecks of April, 1554 was the source of the coins.


Man, what an awesome find. What are those things worth? That is a dream find right there.


----------



## Freshwaterman

Average value is around $500/coin.


----------



## activescrape

FlakMan said:


> Average value is around $500/coin.


Worth every penny too. They aren't making many of those anymore.


----------



## Freshwaterman

*PADRE ISLAND SPANISH SHIPWRECKS OF 1554.* On November 4, 1552, fifty-four vessels under Captain-General Bartolomé Carreño set sail from Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Spain. The fleet had been preparing since the previous February and included an armada of six vessels, well armed and carrying 360 soldiers. The armada plus eighteen other vessels were bound for _tierra firme_ (the mainland). There were also ten ships headed to Santo Domingo, four to various other destinations in the Indies, and sixteen for San Juan de Ulúa (Veracruz) in Mexico. These sixteen included the _San Esteban_ (Francisco del Huertoqv, master), the _Espíritu Santo_ (Damián Martín, master), the _Santa María de Yciar_ (Alonso Ojos, master, and Miguel de Jáuregui, owner, captain, and pilot), and the _San Andrés_ (Antonio Corzo, master). Of the sixteen ships bound for New Spain, these four and one other were the only ones scheduled to make the round trip; the rest were to be scrapped upon arrival in the New World. This was a common practice since the outbound cargo was much more bulky than the cargo to be returned to Spain, which consisted largely of precious metals that occupied very little space. Of the _tierra firme_ contingent only seven of twenty-four were slated for return. On the outbound trip the fleet was cursed with foul weather, corsairs, and disaster. For instance, the _capitana_ (the ship carrying the captain-general) burned and sank in mid-ocean, leaving over 300 dead and only twenty survivors, among them the captain-general himself. The fleet was scattered before the journey was well begun, and in all, eight ships were lost on the outbound voyage. None of the ships bound for Mexico was among those eight, and arrivals at San Juan de Ulúa occurred between early February and late March 1553. Upon arrival the mariners found a port still devastated from a hurricane in September 1552. Repairs were slow, which resulted in delays in unloading and prevented all but one of the five returning vessels from being ready to depart in time to meet Carreño in Havana for the return voyage. The _San Pedro_, one of the first to arrive on February 2, was ready to sail again on May 15 and departed with four ships which had come with a previous fleet. The remaining four ships waited in San Juan de Ulúa for more than a year, hoping to return with the next fleet. However, on April 9, 1554, they sailed independently with Antonio Corzo as captain-general, only about three weeks before the arrival of the New Spain contingent of the next fleet, that of Captain-General Farfán. The combined cargoes of the four ships had an estimated value of a little over two million pesos or more than $9.8 million (1975 values).

Twenty days later, on April 29, three of the four vessels were lost in a storm on Padre Island. Only the _San Andrés_ escaped, reaching Havana in such bad condition that it had to be scrapped and its cargo transferred to other vessels for the return to Spain. Approximately 300 people were on the three wrecked vessels. Perhaps one-half to two-thirds drowned before reaching the beach. A small contingent, including the most skillful mariners, probably departed immediately for Mexico in one of the small ship's boats to inform officials of the disaster and organize a relief expedition. *The second and larger group of survivors who remained ashore undertook what they mistakenly thought was a short journey back to Mexico along the beach. They ran afoul of the local Indians, and the trek turned into a death march with only one of the survivors, Fray Marcos de Mena,qv reaching Pánuco.*

Upon learning of the disaster officials in Mexico promptly organized a salvage expedition, which arrived at the wreck sites within two months of the loss of the vessels. One of the three ships was still visible above the waves, and free-diving salvage workers began recovery operations. The other two wrecks were located by dragging. The expedition raised somewhat less than half of the approximately 1,000,000 ducats lost in the three ships. About 41 percent of its cargo was recovered.


----------



## scwine

Here is another good read on early Padre Island treasure hunters and what was found or could be found.......

http://corpusfishing.com/treasure.htm
and
http://www.ccmuseumedres.com/tour.php?action=details&record=33

kinda making me want to load up and head down there


----------



## activescrape

I was telling my wife about this thread and she reminded me of a fascinating hunting find I have that I kind of forgot about. It's another panhandle pheasant hunting find from one of the old dust bowl, falling down to the ground houses we used to hunt around to find birds. I found this ancient cookbook close to 30 years ago and tonight I checked the date on it and it is 1940, so it is 67 years old. It's full of all kinds of recipes we would find wierd now. I took a pic of the spine and for kicks a goose and duck recipe page. There must be 30 waterfowl recipes like "stuffed goose necks" yum. 

Before anyone gets legalistic I have seen them dig a pit, push a house into it and bury it so many times it would make your head swim. Then they plant cotton there. Everything that was in the house is lost forever. So was my pheasant hunting spot. Anyway, it's an awesome old keepsake and quite the conversation piece.


----------



## nasakid

*Arrowhead*

Found this on our trip in San Angelo 2 weeks ago. It was 25 yards from our camp. I'm assuming it's Apache or Comanche. They've had some good rains out there this year. It was lying on the surface of the dirt, so it was an easy one. It's my first arrowhead, so I'm pretty proud of it.


----------



## TXPalerider

Nasakid,

My guess is that arrowhead is way older than the Apache/Comanches.

Nice find though.


----------



## salth2o

I am going to the deer camp tomorrow for the first time this season (work schedule sux!) and cant wait to go on a "treasure" hunt. We have a few old home places on our land, so I'm sure there is something just waiting to be found.


----------



## Freshwaterman

*Let's see who finds this one!*

*Casa Blanca legend*
Mrs. S.G. Miller in "Sixty Years in the Nueces Valley" tells the legend of Casa Blanca, the old Spanish ranch house built of white caliche blocks that dated back to the 1750s. It was located on the banks of Pinetas Creek a mile or so from where the creek joins the Nueces. This later became part of the Wade Ranch near Sandia.

This is the legend: When Texas was part of the Spanish empire, a wealthy rancher in South Texas planned to return to Mexico with his two sons and daughter. He packed up his goods, along with 10 kegs of gold and silver. The day before they were to leave, a Comanche war party was seen nearby. For safekeeping, the rancher had the kegs submerged in a small lake near a lone mesquite.

That night, the Indians attacked. The rancher and his sons were killed; only a daughter survived. She returned to Mexico. Many years later, the daughter, now an old woman, returned to Casa Blanca to search for the treasure. But she couldn't recognize a single landmark. Where the lake had been was a mesquite thicket and the one tree was one of many. She never found the buried kegs. Other people over the years searched for the lost treasure of Casa Blanca.

Mary Sutherland in "The Story of Corpus Christi" had a different take on this legend. When a garrison of Spanish soldiers was stationed where Corpus Christi is today, the commander reported the existence of a silver mine two days ride away. He had opened the mine and had been working it with soldiers when the work party was attacked by Indians. He asked for more forces to be able to work the mine. Mrs. Sutherland speculated (without much to go on) that the mine was near Casa Blanca.

Perhaps each of us, deep down, expects to find a great treasure. Maybe that's why we buy lottery tickets. But considering the odds, you're more likely to find hidden kegs of gold and silver at old Casa Blanca than to win the lottery.


----------



## offthehook

wild mary jane plant in sabinal.


----------



## theotherwaldo

offthehook said:


> wild mary jane plant in sabinal.


Used to that. I used to live in Southern Oregon, where it's their main cash crop.

Well, that and tourists.


----------



## shonuffbagum

Wow! What away to keep up a tradition!


----------



## clouser

When I was 13, my dad had a lease outside of Del Rio that had a deep dry creek bed running through it. Dad and I had some time to kill between hunts one day, so we decided to walk the dry creek bed. We found numerous footprints embedded into the rocks on the creek bottom. The footprints were about 18 inches long, and VERY narrow.


----------



## activescrape

clouser said:


> When I was 13, my dad had a lease outside of Del Rio that had a deep dry creek bed running through it. Dad and I had some time to kill between hunts one day, so we decided to walk the dry creek bed. We found numerous footprints embedded into the rocks on the creek bottom. The footprints were about 18 inches long, and VERY narrow.


So do you have any kind of a guess what made them???


----------



## CoveredUp

I was in South Dakota two years ago, and one of the guys shot an albino pheasant. It was completely snow white. Very cool.


----------



## bobbycocano

S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain) said:


> At Matador WMA last year, my son and I found some very strange tracks. They looked vaguely human, but only had two toes and a very narrow heel. about 8 inches long, very fresh , very clear. The ball of the foot looked just like a human's, and there was a big toe and one smaller toe just like our first two toes, but the heel tapered to a point.
> 
> We looked at them for a while trying to figure out how they could have been made by some part of some animal set down just so, but we couldn't and it started to creep us out.
> 
> That and my fearless dog kept running from stuff we never saw. Tail between his legs and everything.
> 
> No one on that hunt had a drink all weekend, either, so that wasn't the problem.
> 
> Lance.


funny story... last year dove hunting on our ranch in decatur texas next to a pond and some woods we found some tracks just like those. a heal and two toes. it was bigger than my foot or my dads. it freaked us out. we made a cast of it. i dont have the cast anymore but we told ourselves that it was just a beaver. really weird. i spent like 8 years on that ranch running all over the place but i wouldn't ever go into those woods. i don't believe in that sasquash stuff but im not going looking...


----------



## Red3Fish

*I was saving this thread for a nasty day! LOL*

A couple of tales to add:

When I was about 9 (1953) a couple of neighborhood boys and I were playing soldiers and toy cars in a neighbors flowerbed....while digging in it we found a huge fossilized tooth...about 10" high, and 6" by 8" on the sides...must have been a mammouth tooth...they used it as a doorstop for years (this was before air conditioning and people actually left their doors open for air! LOL)

A good friend of my dads' was clearing land in the 60's at his place north of Gonzales, with a D-9 cat...he unearthed a big cast iron coffee type pot with flip type lid with the Texas Rangers emblem on the bottom (top? I dont remember) of it. Still in very good usable condition.

The same friend while clearing more land, came upon the graves of a family that was supposed to have been killed by Indians....he looked for it for years to show me, but never found it again! Was in a big cedar thicket.

While floundering around POC in the 60's found some sea turtle skulls...shrimpers used to kill them and dump bodies overboard to keep from tangling in their nets...not saying I still have them, but if I did, they sure would make an interesting mount on a piece of shinny varnished oak!! LOL

I used to date a gal I called Betty Betty(another story how she got that name)...her family used to own land on the Blanco out of Wimberly...there was an old shack there that her grandmother had built for a handyman to live in (prolly in the 30's). She and I went exploring and went in it...there was a box (~ 8" x 8" x 12"), brim full of arrowheads. She said the story was the handyman had collected them from a flint outcropping that was later submerged when they built a dam and flooded it (Canyon Dam??) I dont remember. Also a few fossels in it and some other "stuff". I laid all the arrowheads out one day (prolly 300 -400) and took pics, but cant find the pics for the life of me.....they are prolly over there in that GIANT stack of unlabled floppies!! LOL

Later
R3F


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Red3Fish said:


> A couple of tales to add:
> I used to date a gal I called Betty Betty(another story how she got that name)...her family used to own land on the Blanco out of Wimberly...there was an old shack there that her grandmother had built for a handyman to live in (prolly in the 30's). She and I went exploring and went in it...there was a box (~ 8" x 8" x 12"), brim full of arrowheads. She said the story was the handyman had collected them from a flint outcropping that was later submerged when they built a dam and flooded it (Canyon Dam??) I dont remember. Also a few fossels in it and some other "stuff". I laid all the arrowheads out one day (prolly 300 -400) and took pics, but cant find the pics for the life of me.....they are prolly over there in that GIANT stack of unlabled floppies!! LOL
> 
> Later
> R3F


That sounds like "Lil Old Arkansas ranch" the land that used to be owned by Henny. We stayed there all the time when we were kids and my grandpa William Kennedy helped build the dam there.


----------



## activescrape

Red3Fish said:


> A couple of tales to add:
> 
> When I was about 9 (1953) a couple of neighborhood boys and I were playing soldiers and toy cars in a neighbors flowerbed....while digging in it we found a huge fossilized tooth...about 10" high, and 6" by 8" on the sides...must have been a mammouth tooth...they used it as a doorstop for years (this was before air conditioning and people actually left their doors open for air! LOL)
> 
> A good friend of my dads' was clearing land in the 60's at his place north of Gonzales, with a D-9 cat...he unearthed a big cast iron coffee type pot with flip type lid with the Texas Rangers emblem on the bottom (top? I dont remember) of it. Still in very good usable condition.
> 
> The same friend while clearing more land, came upon the graves of a family that was supposed to have been killed by Indians....he looked for it for years to show me, but never found it again! Was in a big cedar thicket.
> 
> While floundering around POC in the 60's found some sea turtle skulls...shrimpers used to kill them and dump bodies overboard to keep from tangling in their nets...not saying I still have them, but if I did, they sure would make an interesting mount on a piece of shinny varnished oak!! LOL
> 
> I used to date a gal I called Betty Betty(another story how she got that name)...her family used to own land on the Blanco out of Wimberly...there was an old shack there that her grandmother had built for a handyman to live in (prolly in the 30's). She and I went exploring and went in it...there was a box (~ 8" x 8" x 12"), brim full of arrowheads. She said the story was the handyman had collected them from a flint outcropping that was later submerged when they built a dam and flooded it (Canyon Dam??) I dont remember. Also a few fossels in it and some other "stuff". I laid all the arrowheads out one day (prolly 300 -400) and took pics, but cant find the pics for the life of me.....they are prolly over there in that GIANT stack of unlabled floppies!! LOL
> 
> Later
> R3F


So what did ya'll do with the arrowheads??


----------



## minner skinner

from the Crosby area. 1 cannon ball 

from Trinity river. a fossil that looks like a plant or a rib section.


----------



## Red3Fish

*Activescrape...Re arrowheads...*

I still have them in the same box out in the garage ...Betty Betty told me to take them if I wanted them....most of them are broken...theory the old handyman had told her grandma, was that, that prolly was a place where several different Indian tribes came to make arrowheads, and when they had a "mistake" and they broke or split, the Indians just tossed them aside and started a new one. I looked some up on the internet, and they seem to span a wide range of time periods and tribes.

Some are small bird arrowheads, some pretty large (4"-6"), some are drills, some are scrapping knives...but virtually all are missing a point or corner. Several seashell fossles, some bones, and either fairly large cattle or bison teeth. And what my dad said was a model A wrench.

I have let several grandsons pick out a few to take home. One grandson is really into Indian stuff, and is one of his "prized possessions". LOL I told my sweetie when I croaked, to send him the whole box! LOL

Later
R3!


----------



## Don Smith

A human skull, an old GG Jelcher muzzleloader with all the wood rotted off.


----------



## hunt2grill

Well the thread caused me to walk a ton more this season and have my eyes on the ground last weekend in the Dilley area I found 2 arrowheads about a mile apart from each other one in good shape and the other with a corner broken off. My first two but surely not my last. I enjoyed it just as much as the hunt in general


----------



## activescrape

Red3Fish said:


> I still have them in the same box out in the garage ...Betty Betty told me to take them if I wanted them....most of them are broken...theory the old handyman had told her grandma, was that, that prolly was a place where several different Indian tribes came to make arrowheads, and when they had a "mistake" and they broke or split, the Indians just tossed them aside and started a new one. I looked some up on the internet, and they seem to span a wide range of time periods and tribes.
> 
> Some are small bird arrowheads, some pretty large (4"-6"), some are drills, some are scrapping knives...but virtually all are missing a point or corner. Several seashell fossles, some bones, and either fairly large cattle or bison teeth. And what my dad said was a model A wrench.
> 
> I have let several grandsons pick out a few to take home. One grandson is really into Indian stuff, and is one of his "prized possessions". LOL I told my sweetie when I croaked, to send him the whole box! LOL
> 
> Later
> R3!


He will treasure that. green


----------



## RockinU

Floatin Doc said:


> A human skull, an old GG Jelcher muzzleloader with all the wood rotted off.


more info please. where did you make this find? were they together? any theories?


----------



## 220swifter

what a great thread. I have not found anything all that interesting. Plenty of arrowheads. An old license plate (1937), and an old spur(Kenedy Ranch)


----------



## jerry23

found an old rusted fridge in SHNF yesterday. that was it.


----------



## theotherwaldo

Speaking of rusty, I found a canoe made from two 1940 Ford hoods, some siding tin, and some old lumber. It actually worked OK after a little tightening up! 

I used it for a full summer then left it where I found it, in a lake in north Alabama.


----------



## Pod

This is our latest find at the lease. My kids were poking around in the dry creek bed in the background of the picture and found this old water well pulley, partially covered with gravel. We have been in the creek lots of times and had not noticed it before. The creek had been running pretty strong over the summer and the water may have uncovered it.


----------



## activescrape

awesome, If that thing could talk.....Imagine the kids or whomever having to go draw water, I bet all kinds of things were said. Thanks for posting.


----------



## lchien

John Galt said:


> Sometimes goes inert, but it can get unstable. Every few years a few French farmer is killed when his tractor hits a shell (the shells land deep underground, but frost heaving pushes them to the surface.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_harvest


You mean, more unstable than normal (e.g. TNT is basically unstable to begin with).

Capn C, better get that unexploded shell taken care of!


----------



## Captn C

lchien said:


> You mean, more unstable than normal (e.g. TNT is basically unstable to begin with).
> 
> Capn C, better get that unexploded shell taken care of!


Yeah! Every time I look at the thing it makes the hair on my neck stand up now!

I have been thinking about taking it back down to the lease and shooting it with a full metal jacketed bullet to see if it will go off.

I wonder if they made practice/dummy rounds during WW2 for use to practice with on artillary ranges?????????


----------



## theotherwaldo

Captn C said:


> Yeah! Every time I look at the thing it makes the hair on my neck stand up now!
> 
> I have been thinking about taking it back down to the lease and shooting it with a full metal jacketed bullet to see if it will go off.
> 
> I wonder if they made practice/dummy rounds during WW2 for use to practice with on artillary ranges?????????


 Yeah, they did, but only an expert can tell the difference. I would suggest finding a relatively safe place, perhaps in a deep, off-shore mudbank, and rendering that shell to the deeps.


----------



## 15476

scwine said:


> For 2 yrs, I hunted on a friends place just south of George West(about 12 miles) towards Freer. In the stand I hunted in, you could see a house in the distance, with a large deck on the 2nd story. Using binoculars, you could barely make out if anyone was out on the deck. Well, this just wasn't anyones place. Ever heard of Sunset Thomas?  It was a big stand, enough for three people, and everyone would joke that no one will ever shoot a deer out of it(busy looking for something else). My wife did not believe it and once, after several times with me, she witnessed a blonde out on the deck, then she understood what everyone was always taking about. We still laugh about it today. The house a couple of years later burned down.
> 
> And yes this is true.
> 
> By the way I only killed one hog while hunting from that stand!


 who is sunset thomas ?


----------



## scwine

jackk said:


> who is sunset thomas ?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunset_Thomas


----------



## Saltwater Servitude

Well, these aren't my finds or stories, but I'll pass them along.

A friend of mine from high school has a few acres right on the Rio Grande south of Amistad a few miles. Got invited twice to go white bass fishing and couldn't say no. Fish were on a hunger strike the first trip out there so he and his father took me to a gully/creek tributary off the Grande to show me one of their prize finds on the ranch. 

They had found what was a fossilized prehistoric alligator of some sort. When I saw it, the skull was mostly covered by sediment run off and only about two foot of it were sticking out. The teeth on that critter were easily the size of a beer can and about as long. Jake said his grandfather had found it back in the early 40's when a B-25 went down on their land. The crash site was directly across from the gulley on the Mexican side. 

Anyway, his grandfather had dug it mostly out and said the head was about 8' long x 3' wide. Jake said he had seen it almost all exposed once in the late 70's after a flood. 

But that wasn't the neat find out there.

Jake's father had built a new hunting/family retreat house in the mid-70's. During the foundation dig out, they found a few swords of some type, a pair of conquistador helmets and chest armor, a bunch of brass buckles and buttons, a few tomahawk stones, metal and flint spear points, coins, beads, and a slew of human bones. They moved the house a few hundred yards away and had the site excavated by some UT folks. 

Jake's dad (can't remember his dang name for the life of me) had a room in the house where they had it all on display inside of a big old locked glass case. Pretty neat. One of the helmets had a big old dent on one side that had split the metal in half. Most of it was really worn and corroded, but the buttons and the coins they had really had cleaned up well. The swords weren't much left besides a slender piece of rusted metal. The chest armor pieces looked like old pieces of scrap iron if you didn't know better. 

After the excavation they figured there were 6-8 (I forget) indians and three (again, I forget exactly) dead Spanish conquistadors there on that particular site. Must've been a nasty battle if neither side retrieved their dead. 

Jake's grandfather refused to let UT have the remains and they have a granite grave marker for them out there on the ranch. 

---------------------------
When I was about 9-10 my uncle took me out to his lease near Solms to go fishing. There's an old cabin out there with not much left besides the collapsed chimney in a pile of rock. 

There's a limestone marker there that's in German that says "IND. hast meine familie gestohlten, Marz 1843". 

Translated it says "Indians have stolen (or have taken) my family, March 1843". It lists five names, and at the bottom says also "May God find their bodies in peace" or something close to that. 

My uncle has a rubbing he took off of it that he later got framed. I got to take it to school once for my third German class as part of a report I did on German immigration into central Texas as part of the Fisher-Miller grant influx.

The landowner had told the guys on the lease that the father was killed later that summer. After that supposedly another German immigrant family moved into the cabin and were killed in 1844. There's also a marker for them off in the brush, but it's wasn't carved very deep and it almost unreadable. 

Somewhere out there was a indian mound, but I never got to see it. 

-------------
Like everyone else, I've got a few arrowheads and such. Nothing spectular. I did however find a arrowhead a little bit bigger than a nickle in the San Marcos River after the flood of 1998. Dang thing was sharp as a razor too and the point was incredibly well done. The point got chipped during a move, but you still wouldn't want to put any pressure against it at all. I've got to see if I can find it and I'll put up a photo of it if I can.

Folks, keep the stories coming. I found this thread about 2:30 last night and read the whole thing through bleary eyes. Fascinating stuff out there....


----------



## Ranch Dog

mommas worry said:


> Was hunting out north of Del Rio and came across a low (1-2 ft.) stone wall that you could see went on for maybe a mile. Ranch mgr. said that it was build by the Spaniards to get behind and shoot from during indian raids. Pretty cool ! Kept going back there and just sitting and thinking about the history of that wall. Have a buddy that was given a large (football size) rock and an x-ray which showed a baby dinosuar in it. Really neat. Came from some geologist buddy of his that was doing work in China when they came across a bunch of these "rocks". Needless to say, the geologists got out real quick and never returned.


That wall runs from Del Rio to Camp Wood and represented the frontier to the Spaniards. Some places it is very well maintained. I hunted a ranch in Uvalde County in the 90's and it extended for miles across it.

I found a BB gun (the Daisy rifle that looks like the Model 94) leaning up against a remote fence post. Very rusted, but still had a slight charge that got the BB out the barrel.


----------



## 15476

*sunset thomas*



scwine said:


> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunset_Thomas


 thanks scwine, wonder if theres any openings on that lease ! lol


----------



## txbigred

This a great thread. While I was reading, I was wondering if I had anything to offer, hmmmm. Well I did find some arrow heads on an Island up at Toledo Bend, I thought that was pretty cool. Then, while drivng home from Dallas today I was thinking about this thread and it hit me, DOUBLE DOHHHHH. How about the front landing gear from the space shuttle Columbia? I was riding my four wheeler through the Sabine National forest when I spotted it. Here's a link to some more pictures of it:

http://gallery128664.fotopic.net/c631604.html


----------



## nasakid

Did you find it after the initial search just after the crash? How long was it out there? Wow, that's eerie seeing that. I was up in Alto on an offroad trip the day it came down. People found pieces of it all over that area. We got the call from Mission Control on the way up there about it. Sad day.


----------



## txbigred

nasakid said:


> Did you find it after the initial search just after the crash? How long was it out there? Wow, that's eerie seeing that. I was up in Alto on an offroad trip the day it came down. People found pieces of it all over that area. We got the call from Mission Control on the way up there about it. Sad day.


It was a couple of weeks after the crash. I flagged down a Navy dive boat and took them to it.

Dave


----------



## Tankfxr

Not something i have seen but my grandpa told me about it. They had a lease outside of Uvalde he was stitting in the blind and kept seeing something white moving in a tree. He didnt have his Binos but he took them with him on his next hunt. Turns out it was a small Monkey. Seems there was a research facuilty around there somewhere that shut down and realeased all of their monkeys to the wild. He had another lease between Brackettville and Rocksprings that had some cliff overhangs with ovens in them and some drawings on the walls, stuff like that was really neat to see to me. 
My other grandparents used to have a motel in POC and my dad would go back behind it and would find old stuff from the railroad that used to run to POC. While wade fishing i have found lots of old pottery shards and stuff like that around the old Saluria settlement in POC, and my dad has found some coffins around the old coastguard station that he thinks were from Saluria as well.


----------



## omegaman66

What a horrible horrible thread. Ugghhh.... who is responsible for this mess. Do you realize I just spent an hour of my life reading this stuff. I will never get that hour back!!! haha. Great thread.

Being from Louisiana I haven't ever found any arrowheads but I might after reading this. There is an indian mound on a neighbors property next to my hunting land in Mississippi.

Found a 50 cal round on the ground somewhere around Yellowstone when I was a kid.
Some civil war bullets and shell fragments on private land next to Port Hudson. hmmmm... an old well in the middle of the woods.


----------



## Nick Smith

Great thread. Somebody a few pages back mentioned watching a bush shed all its leaves in just a few minutes. This year, while hunting, I watched a large tree begin shedding. It is a lone tree that sits maybe 15 yards outside of the tree line of the woods. There was a breeze, but not enough to really make the branches move too much. And suddenly the one tree began shedding and tons of leaves fell off. For about a minute it shed and then it was over. Quite wierd. It didn't shed all it's leaves, but it got rid of a bunch.

I have found lots of old broken pottery. Old farm equipment pieces from 50 or so years ago. Outside my grandmothers old house, I used to go pick up smooth rocks. They look like rocks that were tumbled in a tumbler. There were bunches of them in the dirt out beside the house. I asked my grandmother and she didn't know how they got there. Didn't seem too impressed by their being there. But I have never found such rocks anywhere else. Maybe somebody dumped out an aquarium with rocks years before, but did they sell smoothed rocks for aquariums 60 years ago? (It was 30 to 35 years ago when I asked my grandmother about the origin of the rocks.) Also, the rocks are a bit larger than those usually sold for aquariums. Maybe just a unique rock formation, but there are very few rocks found in that area (unless you look near a gravel road.  )

My uncle (a dragline operator) found a lot of petrified wood. 

I found an abandoned UFO once, but Elvis took it. (Just kidding, but have no outstanding finds like some detailed here.)


----------



## Tankfxr

Could they be rocks from the drian field of a septic tank or maybe some sort of rock for the foundation of the house.


----------



## Cody092083

Found a BMW SUV in the Brazos River a few days ago. Some architect from Houston was driving along the river when the bank underneath him gave way and he and the vehicle slid into the river is the story I heard back during the summer. The river hasn't been this low since it happened so there is a good chance I am the first person to stumble across it.


----------



## jighed

Not hunting but a fishing find...
We were surf fishing at High Island, my son was throwing the cast net for bait and pulled up a $20 bill. He threw that net for a solid hour after that but no more $. We talk about that every trip now.


----------



## theotherwaldo

-Maybe we should have a thread like this in the fishing forum! That's when I find the neat stuff!


----------



## sharksurfer66

Tripped over what I thought at first was a part of a rotten landscape timber at High Island two years ago. Picked it up to realize it was a bone. Let a friends sister who is an archeologist check it out and she says it is a couple million year old Mastadon bone (like a wooly mammoth). Also, hunted a lease in Nacadoches for a few years. Found a part of the space shuttle there about 7 months after it crashed. It was about a one foot by one foot piece. Took it to the land owners house and he called the sheriff's dep't and they came out and picked it up. Wouldn't let me keep it. Also found a two headed fence lizard at our lease in Johnson City when I was a kid. That thing was wierd looking. Also got to go hunting for first time in Del Rio this year. There are old Western Union Telegraph poles out there from the 1800's. Pretty cool to see.


----------



## axespino

*Finds*

My brother-in-law who lives in Mexico found a mortise but not the pestal (spelling), a flat grinding stone, and when he was younger he would dig water wells by hand and found a box full of gold coins. He HAD some friends that told them that they would sell them for him needless to say he is not friends with them anymore. My wifes nephews found a old iron with a flip up to top to put the coals into. The only good thing I found so far is my wife. I guess I used all of my luck up then.


----------



## texasrhino

When I was a kid we lived on a farm in the panhandle (Whte Deer) It was an old historical house and suppoedly had a tunnel that the women and kids would hide in when they would get raided by indians. I always looked for it but never found it. We did find some old tools. We have found lots of arrowheads at lake livingston. A good one is my friend Bruce went elk hunting in colorado and lost his billfold, he looked for it the next day and never found it. He had $300.00 in it and had to get his wife to cancel his credit cards and wire him some more money. Two years later he takes his dad up there to the same area and his dad sees a 20 dollar bill. They end up finding all the credit cards ,his drivers liscence and all but 23 dollars. The billfold was ate up, the chipmunks got it.What's the chance of that happening. I left my costas on a ridge in Sanderson went back the next morning and found them 10 yards away with the bands chewed off. Also found lots of fossils in the canyon there.


----------



## Nick Smith

Tankfxr, the house was pier and beam. I still remember fondly the sound of dishes rattleing in the china cabinets when my grandmother walked through. The drain field for the septic was nowhere near the spot where the rocks were. Oh well, just a mystery.


----------



## Galveston Yankee

JWHITE said:


> I have never seen anything too unusual while hunting, but I found a website that is interesting. You East Tx. hunters need to check it out. You never know......
> 
> http://www.texasbigfoot.com/


Rainy and I have a friend from Woodville who is big into hunting down signs of Texas bigfoot! We ran into him at the pawn shop at US 190 and US 69 about six or seven years ago. He had a photo album of weird stuff they had found throughout east Texas. Turns out that most of the bigfoots were larger monkeys/orangs people had let loose when they figured out they couldn't handle keeping them. One site turned up hair that tests showed were neither human nor animal. Something in between.

That's east Texas for ya!

GY

Oh yeah. We knew they guy only as mud minnow Clyde. And there are some good stories behind that one, too.


----------



## Galveston Yankee

WHen I was a young teenager in my hometown of Westport, MA, I came across about 20 to 25 small, flat granite stones sticking up out of the ground in the woods. Looked around and found a more modern head stone. Turns out I came across the unmarked grave site of a band of revolutionary war militia who fought in what was known as the Battle of Westport. The marked gravestone was for a LT Joshua Perry. Some efforts had been made over the years to move the graves to a main graveyard, but they all got stopped. The graves were at the battle site and would remain their about a half mile off of the road. It was about a mile from our house.


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Galveston Yankee said:


> One site turned up hair that tests showed were neither human nor animal. Something in between..


OLD PINE NEEDLES. LOL. I saw something wierd that ran off human like while I was hunting with a friend. He wanted me to shoot at it but I figured it was someone pulling off a joke and I didn't want to take a chance.


----------



## katybuilder

two years ago while mulie hunting in sierra blanca on a friends property we found two indian sites with stone mills and pictographs of fish and a river and an arrow pointing the direction of the river one was in a low lying area and the other was way way up on the ridge in a cave. there was alot of mining equipment there too mined back in the 1890s she said. i cant wait to go back for more. after walking a creek bed for a mile i realized that i was walking in solid black sand i got about 3 pounds in a back pack before i left when i got home i panned it out and shure enough had some color....


this thread got the bug biting me again....i gotta go find something lol


----------



## activescrape

katybuilder said:


> two years ago while mulie hunting in sierra blanca on a friends property we found two indian sites with stone mills and pictographs of fish and a river and an arrow pointing the direction of the river one was in a low lying area and the other was way way up on the ridge in a cave. there was alot of mining equipment there too mined back in the 1890s she said. i cant wait to go back for more. after walking a creek bed for a mile i realized that i was walking in solid black sand i got about 3 pounds in a back pack before i left when i got home i panned it out and shure enough had some color....
> 
> this thread got the bug biting me again....i gotta go find something lol


That is awesome man! Take some pictures next time. I would love to see them.


----------



## theotherwaldo

Yeah, I know the feeling. Dad and I were fishing in Cow Creek, back in Oregon, when I realized the pothole I had stepped in was full of black sand.
Fishing suddenly lost its importance!
We dug and sluiced a bunch of potholes over that summer, and made a pretty good wage out of that vacation. Paid for my kid sister's birth!
Then I went back to school so I could rest.


----------



## theotherwaldo

Thinking about it, those potholes should be just about full again - of the usual mix: old bullets, fishing weights, rusty lures, spark plugs, ....(gold).


----------



## J L Dunn

Back in the early 70's, my No. 2 son and I were hunting on property bodering the Alabama Coshouta reservation near Dallardsville (Big Sandy). Unbeknownst to us at the time, several large trees had fallen across the fence line, and we found ourselves actually on Indian property looking for limb rats.

We had split up, and No. 2 was about 100 yards away from me when I heard him shoot, so I went to the sound of the shot. On my way, I happened to glance to my right, and saw an Indian holding a Browining 5 looking intensely at me. I acted like I did not even see him, and proceeded toward my son.

When I found him, he had two big fat fox squirrels, so I spoke softly to him and told him what I had observed, so we put on the act: we are turned around, we don't know where we are, we talk loud, and wander back toward my new found friend, the Indian.

As we back tracked, this Indian stepped out from behind one large pine tree, and aggressively demanded to know why we were on Indian property. I told him we were so lost we could be on the moon and I wouldn't know it. He just glared. Then he pointed the way "off" his property, and we gladly obliged.

Scary moment!

JLD


----------



## bzrk180

Well, I grew up in Colorado, Colorado Springs. East of CS there was nothing but open range and rolling hills. There was a large parcel of land that was 50,000 acres and private. I worked at the Marriott Hotel and was fortunate enough to meet the owner and he said I could hunt the property. 

I took a friend and we went Dove hunting and got bored so we got on a dirtbike and went exploring. We came up on an old homestead....In the middle of NOWHERE...No roads to or from it, all overgrown and the house looked like it had exploded or something...There was very little of the old house left. There was however, a large barn still intact. We went into the barn and found all kinds of things....Old medicine bottles, liquor bottles, glass doorknobs, and old car with a turn crank on the front of it that still looked like it would run (we didnt try though) and a large box of old Saturday Evening News magazines...The dates were from the forties! Clothes and jarred goods, old saws...It looked like someone just "left" and decided to leave everthing there.

We explored almost all that day and would go back from time to time just to look around. I never asked the landowner about it because I didnt want him to tell me to stay away ftom it so I dont know the story. We did take a few of the magazines though and I think my mom still has them somewhere. Man, as I type this, I can remember back and still experience the thrill of this find....It was a very cool experience. 

That was 20 years ago and now, the entire area is developed...Houses, streets, strip malls....I always wonder about that place when I go back to visit family. Makes me sad to see so much development in that area... Everytime we hunted this place we would find something new....Large areas of petrified wood...Old cow skulls...Old windmills with water troughs...It was a very cool place.


----------



## bzrk180

OK...A few more.....

Surf fishing in Crystal beach for Bulls and reeled in to re-bait...I was using a surf sinker, the ones with the wires and hooked on the sinker was a wallet.... No cards, no ID, no pictures but there was 200.00 in it....I have to say that was a good day of fishing!!

I have also found a few seabeans and one time, surf fishing on the West end, I found this spot on the beach....It was probably 10 feet wide and 10-15 feet long, near the waters edge but still a distance from it (closer to the water than the dunes) and it was a patch of sandollars....HUNDREDS OF THEM!! My wife and I took about 10-15 full, perfect sandollars and left the rest...It was really weird, I have never seen that before or since. 
_________________


Lampassas deer hunting and was walking down a small creek. I noticed a large indention on the opposite side of the creek and went to go check it out. The indention was as large around as a big truck tire and about 2-3 feet deep. Inside the indention were thousands of crystals...It looked like a large geode had split in half and the other half was pushed down the river. I even took a few crystals. I tried to find the pictures I took of that but cant find them right now...I will post them if I do!
__________________________

Medina Texas....Right on the river bank (man, what a beautiful place...I lived here and this place is by far the best find I ever found) I was hoping to kill an Axis and right where I was sitting, I found 2 fossilized clams. I later found out (by going to Lost Maples) that a few hundred thousand years or so ago, this was all a seabed here. I know of others in this area who have found dinasour eggs.
_________________________________

THIS IS A GREAT THREAD!!


----------



## theotherwaldo

I checked on Google Earth and found that the site is bulldozed, so I can talk about it now.

I was squirrel hunting in near the Merlin Airport in southern Oregon when I found an old bootlegger's shack. Most of the stills were gone, but there were two huge Navy-surplus wood stoves, tons of old bottles, ranks of bottle cappers and corkers, and all kinds of stuff. The area was also used as a dump by the local hippies, and it introduced me to the "alternative lifestyle" via Zap Comix, The Whole Earth Catalog, and the huge mess that they left.

The neatest thing that I pulled out of this was a caboose stove with O&CRR markings from the non-existant Oregon & California line.

It heated my clubhouse until I gave it to my grandmother.

There was also a field of '30s Chevys, sedans, coupes, and trucks.

All gone now.


----------



## activescrape

bzrk180 said:


> Well, I grew up in Colorado, Colorado Springs. East of CS there was nothing but open range and rolling hills. There was a large parcel of land that was 50,000 acres and private. I worked at the Marriott Hotel and was fortunate enough to meet the owner and he said I could hunt the property.
> 
> I took a friend and we went Dove hunting and got bored so we got on a dirtbike and went exploring. We came up on an old homestead....In the middle of NOWHERE...No roads to or from it, all overgrown and the house looked like it had exploded or something...There was very little of the old house left. There was however, a large barn still intact. We went into the barn and found all kinds of things....Old medicine bottles, liquor bottles, glass doorknobs, and old car with a turn crank on the front of it that still looked like it would run (we didnt try though) and a large box of old Saturday Evening News magazines...The dates were from the forties! Clothes and jarred goods, old saws...It looked like someone just "left" and decided to leave everthing there.
> 
> We explored almost all that day and would go back from time to time just to look around. I never asked the landowner about it because I didnt want him to tell me to stay away ftom it so I dont know the story. We did take a few of the magazines though and I think my mom still has them somewhere. Man, as I type this, I can remember back and still experience the thrill of this find....It was a very cool experience.
> 
> That was 20 years ago and now, the entire area is developed...Houses, streets, strip malls....I always wonder about that place when I go back to visit family. Makes me sad to see so much development in that area... Everytime we hunted this place we would find something new....Large areas of petrified wood...Old cow skulls...Old windmills with water troughs...It was a very cool place.


I wonder who got all that stuff, or even worse, if it was just bulldozed out of the way. Way back in this thread I posted a pic of a cover of a Sat. Evening Post framed and hung as wall art in an old, falling down house like you are talking about. I love that old thing and it hangs in my trophy room. 
Your comment on the old glass doorknobs remended me that I still have a few I found pheasant hunting. They are very cool. Here is one to remember them by.


----------



## bzrk180

yeah, the ones I remember are similar to those...Wow...Old memories man!! 

I love the Norman Rockwell stuff. I saw the pic...Very cool!


----------



## bzrk180

I have a good one I remember....In Colorado, turkey hunting... An exciting few hours for sure!

As I entered the field I was going to sit in, I heard something move, its before sunrise and pitch black... I knew whatever it was, it was big and it was near me. I had been told of bears in the area so I was freaked out. I clicked on my flashlight and a few yards from me were eyes glowing back. Now all of this happened in an instant and I about crapped myself! It was a herd of cows but man it scared me.

I got comfy in my place under a tree and waited until sunrise and started calling. After about 30 minutes I hear a "whoooosh" and realized someone had just taken a shot at my decoys with a bow and the arrow had a yellow nock that was stuck in the ground...he missed. By the time I could stand up and get from under the tree, the guy was hauling butt into the woods. 

Sure glad it was a bow and not a shotgun...He was directly across from me. I am really surprised I didnt see him make his way in before the shot...Like I said, an exciting couple of hours!


----------



## B-Money

I was in the hill country and kicked over a rock. This jumped out from under it....


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Bobby Miller said:


> I was in the hill country and kicked over a rock. This jumped out from under it....


Thanks to you, shes been bugging the HE11 out of me every since.


----------



## B-Money

Ate Up Fisherman, Did you take this Godziller woman to your wife????


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Bobby Miller said:


> Ate Up Fisherman, Did you take this Godziller woman to your wife????


EXWIFE NOW BOBBY...


----------



## tinman

My Dad told me of a place in the Hill Country on a very large ranch where a small river started. He said that the water just bubbled up out of the ground, crystal clear and cold. Said the whole area was surrounded by tropical plants like ferns and such. Also said that out of a dirt bank there was a large mastadon tusk sticking out of the ground.
I never saw it before he passed away, but I always wanted too. He made me promise to never tell anyone that he told me about it because the ranch owner didn't want all the people that things like that bring poking around and digging up the place.
Tinman


----------



## haparks

there is a place in wimberly where the ground bubbles with freash water i have drank from it


----------



## bzrk180

tinman said:


> My Dad told me of a place in the Hill Country on a very large ranch where a small river started. He said that the water just bubbled up out of the ground, crystal clear and cold. Said the whole area was surrounded by tropical plants like ferns and such. Also said that out of a dirt bank there was a large mastadon tusk sticking out of the ground.
> I never saw it before he passed away, but I always wanted too. He made me promise to never tell anyone that he told me about it because the ranch owner didn't want all the people that things like that bring poking around and digging up the place.
> Tinman


Get on a kayak, hit the Medina river on a year that isnt draught stricken and you will see bubbling springs with the foliage like you are talking about in many areas. Its very cool!


----------



## shepard24

about 15 years ago we found an old hand-dug well on our ranch in south texas out in the middle of the brush, way off the road. I really cant remember why we where out there, but this well was maybe 6' x 6' x ? deep. All I can remember was that when you threw a rock down into it, it was a long time before it hit the bottom. My dad tried to video down inside of it, but you could not see very far down. If i remember correctly, the walls were secured with some kind of wood buttresses. There were all kinds of tracks showing signs of animals skidding into the hole before they could stop. Who knows what was down there. 
I shot my first doe very close to that well just before dark one day, and we looked for her for a short time before my dad finally got worried that we may walk up on that well in the dark. We went back the next day and found what would amount to about 10 pounds of skin and bones left after the coyotes got there.

After reading these stories I have been inspired to find that well again and get some pics!


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

Man Shepard, Be careful of places like that in S. Tx. Those things are full of rattlers!!

Cool find, though.

Lance.


----------



## rvj

*Get a rope*



shepard24 said:


> about 15 years ago we found an old hand-dug well on our ranch in south texas out in the middle of the brush, way off the road. I really cant remember why we where out there, but this well was maybe 6' x 6' x ? deep. All I can remember was that when you threw a rock down into it, it was a long time before it hit the bottom. My dad tried to video down inside of it, but you could not see very far down. If i remember correctly, the walls were secured with some kind of wood buttresses. There were all kinds of tracks showing signs of animals skidding into the hole before they could stop. Who knows what was down there.
> I shot my first doe very close to that well just before dark one day, and we looked for her for a short time before my dad finally got worried that we may walk up on that well in the dark. We went back the next day and found what would amount to about 10 pounds of skin and bones left after the coyotes got there.
> 
> After reading these stories I have been inspired to find that well again and get some pics!


 Get a rope and a video camera with a light and lower down slowly. I would bet there are some interesting thing in that hole. And be carefull


----------



## Dcrawford

I found a naked stripper in my deer stand, oh wait I put her there.


----------



## Icetrey

*Well didnt find anything but a story*

I have alot heres one weirsd to me. So it was early december, pretty warm. This past year. Im in a box blind 75 yards from a feedr with a field about 300 yards across to my right and 100 yards to my left. Anyways, there is about an hour left before dark and here comes a very tiny doe, headin towards the feedr Alos the feeder is close to the edge of the woods, the doe was coming from the woods very cautiously. So she finally decies to jump in. She carefully, she was nervous, begins to nibble. Then out of the corner of my eye in the field to my left, wht do i see heading my way, A BLACK CAT! The nearest house is about 2 miles away. So this cat gos striaght to the feedr and walks under the doe freezes up and then puts her head down and starts to feed. Believe here it gets wierd. So the doe is eatin but you can tell shes keepin an eye onb the cat. So the cat walks into the pile of corn and lays down. You know when cats lay dowen and get on their backs nd want you to scratch them thats what the cat was doin right at the does nose!WOW! The doe would try to pick arpound and it would slide in tis way. A few minutes later the doe snorted and walked a few steps away. I guess the cat got bored and took off to my left and disappeard Never to be seen again...


----------



## bear hide

I was bear hunting in Negomane Ontario 2 years ago. My bait was 5 miles from electricity and almost 20 miles from the closest home. What walks past my tree stand? A chicken!


----------



## hardhead34

I found some old beer cans on my deer lease


----------



## Red3Fish

*Tankfxr got me to thinking....*

I had forgot about it, til now, but years ago, our neighbor Mr Barnes in POC, told us about what he thought was the remains of an old Steamboat parts. He wrote about it in one of his books. Anyway went there and found it...large rusty piece of iron that looked like some kind of gear, about 2 1/2' across, and another piece of rusty iron, that looked like a large windlass or wench. That was 15 yrs ago when I last saw them.

One of you might want to go see if it is still there. When you come around Mitchells' flat and enter Saluria..take a right... you go into 2 ond oil field cut, just after you enter it...there is a very shallow 8 or 10 acre lake (too shallow for anything but an airboat) to your left with lots of mud oysters in it. at the very back of it, is a small tidal stream that enters it, and a small 15' diameter island in front of where it enters. If you entered the stream, about 50' to 100' up it on the right, about 20', from the stream, were the parts. I actually beached my boat in Saluria, and walked inland about 300', crossed the stream and wandered around til I found them. You would actually be a long cast from the back end of the shallow lake.

I always wanted to take my metal detector there and check it out. There is some record of a steamboat that got wrecked there during a hurricane...dont remember the date...but late 1800's or early 1900's if I recall.

Anyway, the only repayment for this info, is you post any finds and pics if you do!! LOL

Later
R3F


----------



## firelt

Red3fish, I have seen some pics of some old businesses that were in Saluria in the late 1800's or early 1900 before a hurricane wiped them out. I'll bet that might have been some remains. They were located south of the old Coast Gaurd station. I haven't seen anything but I'll start looking. There is no telling what is buried around there. Tigrett Real Estate has alot of pics. Good luck.


----------



## Trouthunter

I know we're getting off subject, but I've found some really old medicine and other bottles in the area of Old Saluria.

TH


----------



## activescrape

Trouthunter said:


> I know we're getting off subject, but I've found some really old medicine and other bottles in the area of Old Saluria.
> 
> TH


Do you have any pictures or descriptions of them?


----------



## Bucksnort

Trouthunter said:


> I know we're getting off subject, but I've found some really old medicine and other bottles in the area of Old Saluria.
> 
> TH


Surely, the cop didn't believe you when you told him that?


----------



## activescrape

*cool fossil*

Hunting along the Trinity river in Tarrant County about 15 years ago I stumbled across this rock. It is layered with these leaf imprints. You could break it along the strata, if you were a pro, and who knows what is in there? It is sandstone though and I'm satisfied with what I can see. There was a pretty large deposit of this but I lost permission to go there. You can see the bottom of another leaf at the lower edge of the rock.


----------



## jdsuperbee

When I was a kid (3 or 4) my dad was chief engineer on the Navarro Mills dam near Corsicana. We would go out on the weekends near the excavation site and find all kinds of arrowheads, even a tooth (molar I think) with a cavity. I have them in a box somewhere.


----------



## deerdude2000

*Arrowheads*

Here's some arrowheads i found on my ranch in Freer Tx.found 100s found these walking down the road about 100yds also found a buffalo skull there and lot's of backpacks left by wets,guy i bought the ranch from found pottery and other artifacts lots of fun looking.


----------



## drakechaser515

old lead shot in a duck blind. [not mine]


----------



## BIG PAPPA

*Sanderson Texas*

A few post about Sanderson Texas on this thread reminded me of years back, 10-15 years back, my brothers best freind owns land we would Bow hunt(they still go) for Mule deer. His freind has Bad Bad Diabetes and has lost parts of his feet so he can't really climb everywhere. On top of a couple of hills, i have found not one or two but litterally 20-30 even more huge fossils of what looks like prehistoric snails of some sort in big flat rock ledges. These things range from about 1 1/2 feet diameter to 3 1/2 feet. the shape is like a big horn sheep horn that continues it's curl until the entire center is filled in. What the heck are they? i found this the same day i came face to face with a Mountain Lion when i was sitting in a cut-out of a big cedar tree. It was a very small Lion, but it didn't matter since he was within 4 feet of my face just before daylight. he might have been 15-16inches high at the back and his tail looked way to long for his body. He/she stopped and turned it's head and looked eye 2 eye with me, then jumped about 10-12 feet further down the trail, stopped, looked back like he couldn't beleive i was there and then slowly crept off. When i thought about it, sitting there on the ground, the hair on my back seemed to tingle a little. I'm just glad i was alot bigger than it was. and he probably wasn't that hungry.


----------



## Trouthunter

*Ammonites*



BIG PAPPA said:


> A few post about Sanderson Texas on this thread reminded me of years back, 10-15 years back, my brothers best freind owns land we would Bow hunt(they still go) for Mule deer. His freind has Bad Bad Diabetes and has lost parts of his feet so he can't really climb everywhere. On top of a couple of hills, i have found not one or two but litterally 20-30 even more huge fossils of what looks like prehistoric snails of some sort in big flat rock ledges. These things range from about 1 1/2 feet diameter to 3 1/2 feet. the shape is like a big horn sheep horn that continues it's curl until the entire center is filled in. What the heck are they? i found this the same day i came face to face with a Mountain Lion when i was sitting in a cut-out of a big cedar tree. It was a very small Lion, but it didn't matter since he was within 4 feet of my face just before daylight. he might have been 15-16inches high at the back and his tail looked way to long for his body. He/she stopped and turned it's head and looked eye 2 eye with me, then jumped about 10-12 feet further down the trail, stopped, looked back like he couldn't beleive i was there and then slowly crept off. When i thought about it, sitting there on the ground, the hair on my back seemed to tingle a little. I'm just glad i was alot bigger than it was. and he probably wasn't that hungry.


Common and cool to find.

TH


----------



## BIG PAPPA

*thats them*

thats exactly what he has out there. and they are everywhere in this rock hillside ledge or formation(whatever geologist call it). but the ones i found are very big. as far as 3 feet across best i can remember. so what are they called? Ammonites? does that mean Giant Snail?


----------



## Trouthunter

am·mo·nite1 
Spelled Pronunciation[*am*-_uh_-nahyt] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation 
-noun the coiled, chambered fossil shell of an ammonoid. 
[Origin: 1700-10; < NL _Ammonites_ < ML (_cornū_) _Ammōn_(_is_) (lit., horn of Ammon) + _-ītes_ -ite1; fossil so called from its resemblance to the horn of Jupiter Ammon







]


----------



## gunnut

Great thread guys/gals...Spent 1 1/2 hours at work reading the whole thing (Real productive day)

After pre-season work on a lease outside of Hunt TX, we went fishing in the South fork of the Guadalupe river. I must have found 20 fossils of "sea-life". They were all imbedded in the limestone. I still have quite a few...

Also found a bunch of "computer chip boards" from the space shuttle. Gave them to the FAA.


----------



## Bucksnort

Actually found quite a few of those snails and clams myself when I was a kid at the ranch my Dad hunts in Wimberley,TX. Still have them in a box somewhere.


----------



## TXPalerider

Trouthunter said:


> am·mo·nite1
> 
> //
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> </a>", "6"); interfaceflash.addParam("loop", "false"); interfaceflash.addParam("quality", "high"); interfaceflash.addParam("menu", "false"); interfaceflash.addParam("salign", "t"); interfaceflash.addParam("FlashVars", "soundUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fcache.lexico.com%2Fdictionary%2Faudio%2Fluna%2FA03%2FA0399700.mp3"); interfaceflash.write(); // ]]> Spelled Pronunciation[*am*-_uh_-nahyt] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
> -noun the coiled, chambered fossil shell of an ammonoid.
> [Origin: 1700-10; < NL _Ammonites_ < ML (_cornū_) _Ammōn_(_is_) (lit., horn of Ammon) + _-ītes_ -ite1; fossil so called from its resemblance to the horn of Jupiter Ammon
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ]


Dude, did you also find some peyote up in them hills?? WTH is that mess?


----------



## activescrape

I thought Ammonites were some religious group from up around Indiana.


----------



## Trouthunter

Embedded text that pasted with the information I wanted.

You could have fixed that for me if you weren't so lazy. 

TH


----------



## TXPalerider

Trouthunter said:


> Embedded text that pasted with the information I wanted.
> 
> You could have fixed that for me if you weren't so lazy.
> 
> TH


If you weren't so lazy, you would have fixed it when you posted it. I thought it might have been some sort of crtyptic message to Stumpy in y'alls nubluvinese.


----------



## Trouthunter

No we use C++ for that stuff 

TH


----------



## trentmc

This isn't my story, but I heard it from the cable guy yesterday while he was at my house. It;s about his friend that was hunting in Poteet. 
He was sitting in his stand and right around dark when theres just enough light to make out figures he saw a cat walk behind the feeder. Not thinking anything of it, he continued watching. A little bit later he saw a group of people dressed as Pilgrams. Yes, all decked out in Pilgram outfits, hats and everything. A little girl that was in the group looked over and saw him and said something to one of the other guys in the group who looked at him and procedded on their way. 
My first thought was illegals, but why would illegals be dressed in Pilgram outfits? so my thoughts now are ghost. Which brings me to another story about Bass Pro Shop. 


The guy also worked for BPS before he got into the cable business. He told me a story of one morning when the guys came in at around 5-6 am to open the store for the day they found a bottle of cover scent that was off the shelf and drained all over the floor. The manegers in attempt to figure out who did this without cleaning it up reviewed the security tapes. While watching the tapes, they found the point where the bottle fell off. It was sitting back on the shelf about 6-8 inches and fell. when the liquid started pouring out on the ground there was a spot where it was forming around a foot that wasnt there. a littl bit later they saw a figure that looked like the predator. Unknown how true these are because they both are second hand stories, but I found them pretty interesting.


----------



## txcowpoke

OK Where is the video?


----------



## Ckill

Just got a chance to contribute to these stories on Saturday. I had some time so I made a long ATV ride around our land its in the country so I drive the quad on the roads to all the different places. I have explored all the places since I was a young boy when I realized I had never been in this very brushy area in the corner of a place. It's probably 5-10 acres solid brush. I am making my way through when I see a pile of trash(Gallon water, coke cans, Cheetos and Doritos) did not think a whole lot of it until I saw another pile about 30 yards away just like it. You know that feeling that you might not be alone? It hit me, that wheeler went to high gear until I felt safe. Well after a very thorough check that no one was around I stopped and checked it out. There were about 5-6 little camps. Lots of Trash about 30 gal Water jugs, Cokes, Chips and some canned food. Some pants, socks&#8230;ect. There was even an old plastic Truck bed liner they hauled there from across the pasture because I remember dumping it way on the other side years ago. I could find no sign of fire looked to have been gone for over a month&#8230;.but some things were older so they were there for a while. Best I can come out with is someone had 'them' dumped there and would probably go pick them up for work and such. They did put in a place very unlikely to be found shows how good they are and maximizing others resources.


----------



## trentmc

txcowpoke said:


> OK Where is the video?


Said the video was destroyed so media wouldnt get ahold of it.


----------



## stxhunter

Sasquatch trying to steal my Beef Jerky!!!


----------



## TXPalerider

Please don't hi-jack this thread. It is already long enough.


----------



## trophy_hunter

One of my better friends and hunting partner's brother is a sr manager for Bass Pro Shops. He will know if this is an urban legend. I'll ask him tomorrow.

I hunted in the the Northeast corner of Maine in 1995 on International Paper land. I hiked for hours into the back country/timber and came across an old rock root cellar. The house was gone. There were antique canning jars with the contents still in tact. I found a 5 to 6' hand saw with the handles rotted off..... It was still sharp! I regret not packing it back. At the time it seemed like too much trouble. I didn't venture into the cellar due to the bears in that part of world.


----------



## Tate

I'm dropping off on post 158 for this evening. I'll read the rest tomorrow. 

I have a book suggestion for you guys, read The Haunted Mesa by Louis Lamour. You won't regret it! You don't know what's out there in those desolate places in West Texas or further north.


----------



## fish and grin

******* a long time ago*

im 50 now. when i was 6 or8 i would go visit my grand parents about 8 miles south or denson springs tx with my mother out in the boonies of east texas. ma and pa had 70 acres. about 1/2 mile behind their house there was a small natural lake. on the back side of this lake there was a tree rotted from the top, only about 10 foot remaining standing. on this tree there was carvings. there was a scissors, rising or setting sun, a symbol like that of a crow foot, and under that a pot , like ? maby a pot of gold maby. i still have kin that are alive and can verify these markings. loggers came in yrs ago and clear cut everything. i do remember this tree. my grand mother died at 99, and told storries about playing with indian girls while growing up. she passed in 83. beleive it or not---------mike


----------



## kenny

In 1984 I rented the Barg building in old Harrisburg corner of Broadway and Cypress St.
That's the street to Brady's Island. The old storefront was built in 1925 and when I tried to hook up some heaters the gas leaked so I went under the building to try and find & fix the leak(s).Underneath among the clean cut stumps of huge cypress trees I found a large horn handled knife/machette with cpl. on it. I thought it might be from the Texas revolution? It's a heavy sucker and in my studio somewhere.


----------



## FishinHippie

kenny said:


> I found a large horn handled knife/machette with cpl. on it. I thought it might be from the Texas revolution? It's a heavy sucker and in my studio somewhere.


I would love to see a picture of that!! Please find it!


----------



## weedline08

Found a 1953 TX licence plate it a creek bed on a lease out close to Del Rio.


----------



## TRACERP

Great thread...someone should make a book of short stories on some of the stuff I've read on here. Thx to all.


----------



## twitch-twitch-reel

Once, while hunting for waves in Mexico. Me and a friend of mine, went to check the surf on the other side of a cliff that stuck out in the ocean about 800 yards. We followed a trail back into a field that seemed to be on course to take us around the back of the cliff and possibly back down to the beach. After about 2 hours of walking, the trail opened up into a field of plants about chest high and as far as you could see in every direction. My friend got a really scared look on his face and said, WE NEED THE GET THE BLANK OUT OF HERE! I must have looked very confused because he asked, "do you know what that is?" no not off hand&#8230;&#8230;. It's weed! It was a field of pot plants. I was scared the next thing found up there would be, 2 dead white guys!


----------



## seattleman1969

CentexPW said:


> I hunted the Colorado Rockies for Elk and Mulies in the 70's and found a lot of Mining and Prospecting stuff. Found it in the deepest darkest parts of the forrest. Most of the stuff was overgrown and hidden, Cabins, Huts, Shacks, Mine shafts, Mining Equipment, bottles , cans, tools. A lot of writing on trees from miners and sheep herders. Stuff you wondered how they got it there. The coolest thing was a complete Elk Bull skeleton. The Bull had stepped between a root on the side of the hill and it was now straddling the root trapped. It died right there. It looked like the ceyotes had'nt gotten to it because it was intact and bleached out. The interesting thing was the back leg was broken and had healed side by side making one leg shorter than the other.


I found a lot of mining stuff and old mine shafts backcountry archery elk hunting in washington state. Also found a Taurus Raging Bull .44 rusted and pitted completely beyond repair/recovery, fully loaded, laying in the pine/fir needles about 8 miles from the nearest road. I still have it as a little memento, but I treat it very carefully!


----------



## texas8point

This is a great thread.......I found a clear marble with a pure silver band around it and inside the clear marble is the picture of a civil war soilder in it..........I will take a picture today and update my post. It was a very cool find. I can't beleive all of the things people are finding.....crazy


----------



## RandyM

*East Texas lease*

Thats east Texas alright.



Old Whaler said:


> That reminds me. The only time I ever got on an East Texas lease, we pulled up the afternoon before opening day and decided to drive down some of the roads and when approaching my stand, a guy jumps out and hightails it into the woods!


----------



## Redfishon

Sharkhunter said:


> A couple of very atractive nude girls sunbathing


I wanna go hunting where he hunts..LOL


----------



## activescrape

I never thought a 100,000 hit thread was possible.


----------



## Blue Water Breaux

I found a few arrowheads and a sweet cow skull that had something carved on it


----------



## Blue Water Breaux

also forgot to mention that I found some teeth, long look like from a hog or panther...i'll have to find some pics and post!


----------



## Captain Stansel

I was wade fishing on the edge of San Jose Island across from Rockport. Stopped at a duck blind and my buddy and I took a rest and at a sandwich. After about 30 minutes we slipped back into the water. After getting about 50 yards from the duck blind I realized I had forgotten my wading belt. As I got back in the blind I noticed a 5' Rattle Snake curled up in a wooden shell box no more than 12" from the back of our head.


----------



## theotherwaldo

Went pottery-shard hunting down near Penitas about a month and a half ago in an area that I'd heard was about to be used for land fill, and found more than I'd bargained for. A severely cut-down 1876 Winchester, a clasp-wallet with a crunchy rubber lining, and a mouse-eaten jacket, all stuffed in a dog-hole in the side of a bluff.

The Winchester's barrel and magazine are just over a foot long. The butt has been cut down to a rounded club-like shape. A carpet tack has been brazed on coarsely in place of a front sight. No original finish left - in fact, the surface has an odd brick-red orange-peel finish all over the exposed metal. All parts are still operable, although the bore is crusty and full of bugs. There was a live .45-75 round under the hammer and two more in the magazine.

Yes, it's obvious that this is a crime gun, although the crime was probably committed in the 19th century.

Since I was concerned about having a short-barrelled rifle, BATFE-wise, I went through my options. Should I donate it (anonymously) to the local historical society? Chuck it in a resaca?

I finally decided to make it somebody else's problem. I found a real estate guy who was willing to buy it, provided i did away with the evil barrel. That took some research and a bit of work, but the barrel is safely removed and I sawzall'd through the chamber, just in case.

The proceeds went to buy me a nice Savage 110 in .270 with a Nikon variable, just in time for hunting season.

No pics, for obvious reasons!


----------



## CCRanch

*found*

Not hunting, but rumaging around my Grandpa's barn and came across a pair of spurs hanging on a nail. Asked him about them, and he said back in the 50's when there wasn't any fences, everybody got together and worked all their cattle together and if someone needed something, they just shared and traded. Well, he ended up with these spurs and even remembered who he swapped with. I took them to work and started cleaning them up and they had some silver on them and a coin next to the rowel. I found the coin on EBAY and bought it for $ 8. Anyway I got to looking and found a single spur like these that had the original leather and silver buckle in it and the high bid was $600. I had a matching pair with original leather on both and original silver buckles. I would say they are worth $1200 at the least. They are in my gun safe locked up, with the matching coin.


----------



## Fin "N" Tonic

I have found 100's of points and some peices of pottery while hunting on our ranches in south Texas and Mexico. Attached is some pics of my better ones.


----------



## FISHNNUTT

Found this several years ago on Buffalo Creek
just out side of Buffalo,Tx.Blade is approx 3-1/2"
I guess its some sort of skinning knife.


----------



## EGT Limited

A little of topic:
Several years ago when I took my Troop canoeing in Canada we were on a big lake and making short dashes between some islands to avoid a howling wind, we were holding onto a rock ledge to rest and one of my scouts found a Indian painting of some braves in canoes depicting exactly the same thing, (dash and rest as we called it). When we got back to the base I checked on them and there were known, but I never told the scout so he could have the memory of discovery for the rest of his life.
Craig


----------



## theotherwaldo

Hey FISHNNUT, that looks like a patch knife for muzzle-loading. Good find!


----------



## FISHNNUTT

Thanks was not sure what it was used for. Handle as you can
see is made from deer antler. Its starting to dry out and crack
any suggestions as how to treat it ??


----------



## theotherwaldo

I've haven't had very good luck preserving old horn. Best so far has been boiled linseed oil, rubbed in and left in the sunlight.


----------



## catchysumfishy

15 years ago , i was hunting up in Laramie peak outside of Wheatland WY and came across a old broken down shack, went out behind it and found a Gas Engine powered washing machine. It had a tiny single cylinder engine with a "Kick Start " on it ! It was in excellent shape just sitting out in the open in all of the elements for so,so many years. I asked the land owner about it and he told me i could have it if i could get it out of there HeHeHe, i still don't have it Lol!


----------



## fin&feather

Interesting knife, FISHNNUTT, I also hunt that area.


----------



## deano77511

catchysumfishy said:


> 15 years ago , i was hunting up in Laramie peak outside of Wheatland WY and came across a old broken down shack, went out behind it and found a Gas Engine powered washing machine. It had a tiny single cylinder engine with a "Kick Start " on it ! It was in excellent shape just sitting out in the open in all of the elements for so,so many years. I asked the land owner about it and he told me i could have it if i could get it out of there HeHeHe, i still don't have it Lol!


 I have hunted Laramie peak with a friend severl yrs back,his best friend lives on the mountain .His grandfather forefathered the land,Man what nice country to walk


----------



## pintail74

2 weekends ago, I discovered a man hunting in my favorite bow stand. 

Turns out the ranch hand had been selling day hunts on my families' land. Needless to say, neither the ranch hand or the hunter will be back.


----------



## Belt Sanders

I hunted mule deer in the Apache rannge north of Van Horn. In the highest, most jagged unimaginable spot where no human ever walked I found a really old 7-Up bottle. Ha!


----------



## Texas Jeweler

Arrow heads, shell casings, old serving sets, but near Sanderson, on the Cox Ranch, there were fossilized bones sticking out of the side of the mountains! These things must have been the rib bones of a BIG critter, as they were over 4 feet in length that were exposed.


----------



## TX CHICKEN

Last year while bow hunting and waiting for the sun to come up I could make out a big black blob under the feeder and thought I was going to get a shot at a nice hog-but after a few minutes it never moved??? When it was light enough to see I realized it was a dead hog-200lbs or so. My dang brother shot it 2 bays before and said he was too tired to drag it off so he left it directly underneath the feeder! I wondered where that dang stinik was coming from. HE WON'T BE DOING THIS AGAIN!


----------



## Bucksnort

TX CHICKEN said:


> . HE WON'T BE DOING THIS AGAIN!


LOL, I wouldn't think so


----------



## USAFDAD

This thread is awsome.
I was bow hunting in West Texas down in a dried up creek bed. I was sitting there as quit as could. I had a bolder on my right that the top of it was eye level. the weather was warm and as the sun came up right there 2 feet from my eyes on top of that bolder was a horny toad about 2" long. Now that might not seam like a big deal to some of you but this was the first time in my life I had ever seen one in the wild and I have been hunting since I was a kid.
Amazing.


----------



## skniper

Wow, just read this whole thread!! Great stuff and I actually have something to add.

Hunting in Brady numerous years ago after the evening hunt I found my good friend standing behind the truck with his pants around his ankles digging at his bare rear, and asking if I could help him. Tricky moment for sure. Turns out he stumbled stepping off the tripod ladder and fell rear end first into a prickly pear patch. He was miserable, I had to help him and I NEVER let him forget it.

Fast forward 8 or so years to our current lease (with same friend) near Sonora. We were setting up a new blind in a remote corner of the property. As usual I go wandering off thru the brush, look down and there is the lever of a Winchester rifle(30-30?) sitting right on top of the dirt, very pitted, rusty, but in really good shape considering. 
We know of 2 old long gone homesteads on this land but this location is a little far away from both.
It has always struck me very odd that an old Winchester lever was just randomly laying out there. The stand was aptly named "30-30", but went mostly unused until we reset it this year. I plan to go look for the rest of that rifle....or something.
The lever is hanging on some shed horns over the camp door. Oh, last weekend found a complete head to tail rattlesnake shed skin.

Related: My aunt has spent 40 years walking west beach and has hundreds of sharks teeth she found....unbelieveable keen eye for it, although seems sharks teeth are no longer found on the beaches anymore..maybe its just me.

Anyway...cool thread!!


----------



## monark

I personally didn't discover this but I saw the guy who did. He discovered the property he was poaching on had just been recently bought by a DPS trooper & his ATF wife. The couple was showing their new property to a friend who was also in some branch of law enforcement when they walked up on the poacher. They walked him right by my camp on their way to the main road were the Game Warden was waiting. :headknock :headknock :headknock


----------



## michaelbaranowski

I have found a few traps and I just cleaned them up and added to my string. I am going to loose one from time to time so it is always good to get another one. And as a young kid riding horse on a friends place north of Rosenberg my dad and I found two bags of duck decoys hanging in a tree.


----------



## Hevy Dee

*Pretty neat thread*

As a 10 or 11 year, walking through hills and woods, just off the Hudson River on USMA land around West Point, New York - I found an old pre-Revolutionary-era bayonet. It was found under some redoubt rocks that we were moving around looking for shell casings etc. and it was in remarkable condition. It is now proudly displayed in the West Point Military Academy museum (or so my father tells me). The etchings in the bayonet were in another language, French if I remember correctly. - HD


----------



## Sace

I was about 10 or 12 and was fishing at a lake on FT. Meade, Maryland. The lake was partially drained so I would walk barefoot (probably not a good idea) through the mud to get to some of the water holes around the lake...was catchin' some good bass, and bluegills....after awhile I got a bit bored and started diggin up rocks from the mud and chunkin' 'em in the water...ended up diggin up an old civil war cannon ball...still got it here on the floor...it's just a chunk of whatever they are made out of...it's inert....but pretty cool....also have an old Russian T-54 Tank shell "unfired, TNT removed"....some Polish friends gave to me while over there...they find all kinds of WWI and WWII stuff walking in the woods in Poland...racks of these shells, guns, ammo, and the occasional skeleton with uniform and stuff....


----------



## Lonestar

My ph found this landmine while we were hunting cape buffalo on the border of Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
Left over from the Rhodesian war I suppose.







www.TexasLSO.com


----------



## 1-2-Fish

WoW....At this point I would have stood still & been air lifted out!!!



Lonestar said:


> My ph found this landmine while we were hunting cape buffalo on the border of Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
> Left over from the Rhodesian war I suppose.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.TexasLSO.com


----------



## Trouthunter

No joke. Where there is one you can see there are others that you can not.

TH


----------



## Chase4556

I kinda got one.

So the land we hunt on is owned by my dads best friend. And for the longest, the guys we bought the property from(they are kind of wierd), had a story about this tree. The background info is basically that way back in the early 50's, the guys dad was hunting in this tree stand with a friend. His friend dropped the gun out of the stand, it went off, shooting his friend and killing him. This tree was special though in that his dad told him there was a knife sticking out of it, pointing towards the ground, where there were remenants of an old homestead. They believed there was a reason for the knife...like burried money or somthing. Yeah, okay.

So we thought they were just crazy guys, telling a story, not that there really was such a tree, seeing as we scoured the entire property looking for it. So, about 2 years ago, my dads buddy bought the ajoining property, and we bulldoze a trail going through and to the new side. After we get this large trail pushed through, we are up there one weekend, and out of the blue, the guys we bought the property from showed up to see if we were there(they have done this a couple times since). We go out for a ride, and low and behold, on that trail we cut, there is a huge oak, with a knife sticking out, and sure enough, there were the bricks from the homestead. There was even the treestand(rotted of course) still in the tree.


It was pretty cool to hear the story, not believe it, then turn around and by chance, find the tree. We missed bulldozing it by 10 feet, and the only reason it didnt get leveled, is because the guys bulldozer probably wasnt big enough to take such a huge oak down. haha.


----------



## shadslinger

What a great thread. So many arrowhead pics and stories remind me of a man Named Bull Adams from Glen Rose, he was the son of a cedar chopper, and a peer of my grandfather's, who only attended school on Fridays to take tests. he always scored a 100% on every test. In high school he was talked into playing football and gained a full ride to Baylor. Then he went on to Oxford as a Rhodes Scolar and threw the hammer there. He returned to the US and practiced Law for a shot while in Dallas and married.
However he didn't cotton to big city after all and returned to Glen Rose to live in a dugout he made on my grandfather's farm on the banks of Wheeler Branch.
My dad would spend the day often with him and watched as he made arrowheads flaking them on an old Bois De Arc stump. He made beautiful arrowheads and would send then to his wife in Dallas from time to time. She donated them to musems as she did not share his affiliation with indians and certainly did not approve of him living as a hermit.
Many of these arrowheads became labeled as indian artifacts and are still inmusems today.
He was quite an unusal person and livied there on my GF place for many years. Often men would drive into Glen Rose in big sedans in suits looking for him to ask him advice on complex legal issues. They would ask where he could befound and they would be told that he would eventually come to town to buy salt and other basics. they would stay until they had their meeting with him and then leave. Talk around town was that they were possiblly mobsters. 
He often hung out in the tailor shop my GF owned on the square (recently moved onto a historical site in Glen Rose) and ran with many other cronies of my Gf who were avid hound men (fox hunters, no *****) and once built all of the booths for the next door cafe by hand behind the tailor shop for free coffe for the rest of his life. 
I have heard many, many stories of fantastic feats of strength that he did, like once putting a model A engine block in doubled burlap bags and walking 3 miles to town with it over his shoulder to get it welded for 2 brothers who were friends and then back.

Once when a carnival came to town with a strongman who would challenge anyone to first wrestle, and then if no takers the pitch man would up the anty to box with him for 5 minuets for a cash prize. The first night all of the locals put him up to wrestle, he did but asked the strongman not to grab his ankle, which he had injured throwing the hammer. He quickly bested the man who then grabbed his ankle. Bull tapped out, only to show up the next night and waited out the wrestling and stepped up to box. The carnival left town 3 days later with the strongman behind, still in the local hospital.
Later he had a stroke and was disabled and I believe died in a local nursing home. I believe he is one of very few Texas Rhode Scholars.


----------



## Trouthunter

*Ernest "Bull" Adams*

He was the first Rhodes Scholar out of Baylor and found the dinosaur tracks in Glen Rose, TX.

TH


----------



## tinman

Two years ago, I was spring turkey hunting up in Fannin County. TPWD transplanted some eastern wild turkeys in the area several years ago, and the area I was hunting in was very heavily wooded with a small creek running through it.
There was a big tree that had fallen down (about 3 foot around) and I sat down next to it, leaned back against it and let the woods settle down for about 30 minutes.
I put my mouth call in my mouth and made about 3 calls when suddenly I heard a gobbler directly behind me. He sounded pretty close, so I waited for 3 0r 4 minutes, hoping he would come around where I could get a shot at him. I called again on my mouth call, and he answered me, but sounded even closer this time than the last. In an effort to try to see where he actually was, I eased down as qiuet as I could and lay down on the ground. There was about a 6 inch space between the ground and the tree and I looked under the tree to see if I could locate the gobbler. When I couldn't see him, I decided to try to call one more time to see if he would answer me again. When I did, much to my suprise, he was standing right on the other side of the log, and walked up to where I was looking at his feet with 3 inch spurs on both legs. I was in a panic now because if I tried to raise up and get a shot off at him with him being this close, he would be gone before I could ever get in a position to shoot.
I pondered my problem for a few seconds and decided that the only thing I could do was to reach under the tree and grab him by the legs, so I did!
By holding his feet with my left hand, I was able to lay down on top of the fallen tree and reach over with my right hand and grab him by the neck. This allowed me to release his feet and use both hands to strangle him to death, resulting in me bagging the biggest turkey of my hunting carear without ever firing a shot.

What???.............You don't believe that???.............Hell, I'll even take to out in the woods and show you the tree!!!!

Hope all of you have a good hunting season, and be careful out there.
Tinman


----------



## shadslinger

Trouthunter, where did the pic come from? I can't make out the writing on the bottom. BTW, how do you know about Bull Adams?


----------



## 123456

shadslinger said:


> Trouthunter, where did the pic come from? I can't make out the writing on the bottom. BTW, how do you know about Bull Adams?


I think it says "Institute of Texas Cultures" on the bottom of the picture?

Noel


----------



## shadslinger

Yeah I saved it to my desktop and I could read it after that. 
http://www.texancultures.utsa.edu/library/photoArchives.html
Cool site
If you get a chance to go to Glen Rose and see the park with the tracks you should take the kids and go, very educational. I used to ramble down the river where the tracks are with my folks before it was a park, the tracks that are in the river bed are exciting to see. Bull Adams knew more about Texas culture than anyone have ever heard of, he used to tell my mom how any town in Texas she could name got the name.


----------



## Lonestar

1-2-Fish said:


> WoW....At this point I would have stood still & been air lifted out!!!


1-2-Fish It was a dangerous game hunt in more ways than one.


----------



## bobber bob

Palerider, What caliber pistol is that and what scope mount/scope are you using?


----------



## TXPalerider

bobber bob said:


> Palerider, What caliber pistol is that and what scope mount/scope are you using?


WOW! Thanks a lot for that question....I had to search through 36 pages of this thread to find out what the he!! you were talking about. :spineyes: LOL

That is a Ruger Redhawk .44 mag, Leupold rings and 2X Leupold scope.


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

Been running a long time now. Keep it going.


----------



## HillCountryBasser

Wow...just burned about 2.5 hours at work reading all 36 pages! VERY COOL STUFF!!!

I was quail hunting outside Andrews, TX (near Midland) and came across a old rusted shell of a WWII-era bomb. It was about about 3' long, with tail-fins and all. Turns out, the area used to be used as a practice area for the Air Force to drop sand-filled bombs. Was never live, but a cool find nonetheless....

This wasn't found hunting, but was pretty cool. I work for a home builder here in San Antonio. I worked in a small subdivision right by the Medical Center for several months until we sold out. When they were scraping the lot right next to my model, the Bobcats front tire sunk into a hole. They found a very old water well under a huge oak tree...about 3' inside-diameter and lined with hand-cast bricks. 

The city told us that we had to dig down at least 13' feet to make sure it was structurally sound, then we could fill it in with concrete. I took about 15 of the bricks and have them in my garage. I've got hopes of building an outdoor fireplace and incorporating the bricks into it just for the story...


----------



## tigerhead

Back in 1962, my brother and I were squirrel hunting with my uncle in central Louisiana. We were walking through the woods and stumbled onto the site of an old indian village or encampment. There was about a dozen circular piles of rock shards or chips where they had been making stone points and tools. The piles were each four to six feet in diameter and were strung out along the bank of a creek bed. The piles of chips contained hundreds of partial arrowheads that had been broken during the making. I don't know if the circular piles were that way because they were working in some sort of a round teepee or if they just liked to sit in a circle while they worked. But it was pretty easy to visualize the setting as you took it all in. In a couple of places the creek bank had been cut so that there was a ramp like walk running parallel to the bank for easy access to the water. Just on the other side of the creek was the "happy hunting ground". There was several burial mounds that still had a few artifacts laying on top of the mound. We didn't disturb any of that stuff, but we did find plenty of neat stuff around the encampment. We probably found a dozen perfect points, several skinning or scraping tools, a mortar and pestle like set up for grinding grain, and an axe head. The stuff we found wasn't anything rare, but the site in itself was the find of a lifetime. I wish I could show pics of the stuff we found, but saddly it's all gone. We were young and didn't appreciate what we had. Slowly it all disappeared as the years went past, but the memory is still strong.


----------



## activescrape

tigerhead said:


> Back in 1962, my brother and I were squirrel hunting with my uncle in central Louisiana. We were walking through the woods and stumbled onto the site of an old indian village or encampment. There was about a dozen circular piles of rock shards or chips where they had been making stone points and tools. The piles were each four to six feet in diameter and were strung out along the bank of a creek bed. The piles of chips contained hundreds of partial arrowheads that had been broken during the making. I don't know if the circular piles were that way because they were working in some sort of a round teepee or if they just liked to sit in a circle while they worked. But it was pretty easy to visualize the setting as you took it all in. In a couple of places the creek bank had been cut so that there was a ramp like walk running parallel to the bank for easy access to the water. Just on the other side of the creek was the "happy hunting ground". There was several burial mounds that still had a few artifacts laying on top of the mound. We didn't disturb any of that stuff, but we did find plenty of neat stuff around the encampment. We probably found a dozen perfect points, several skinning or scraping tools, a mortar and pestle like set up for grinding grain, and an axe head. The stuff we found wasn't anything rare, but the site in itself was the find of a lifetime. I wish I could show pics of the stuff we found, but saddly it's all gone. We were young and didn't appreciate what we had. Slowly it all disappeared as the years went past, but the memory is still strong.


 Can you still find that place?


----------



## shadslinger

tiger head I came back after weeks of not looking at this post, and that is a cool tale.


----------



## tigerhead

Activescrape, 
It probably wouldn't be hard to find, because the site was only a hundred yards or so from the waters edge at Catahoula Lake. The creek ran out to the lake, so if I could find the mouth of the creek, where it hits the lake, you could follow it to the spot. At the time we were there, the lake bed was dried up and we actually drove across the lake bed from my uncle's fish camp and pulled the truck up on the bank not too far from the creek mouth. 

Now for the bad news. That was 46 years ago. There wasn't any four wheelers, or for that matter, a lot of four wheel drive vehicles. If it hadn't been for the dry lake bed, which I think was somewhat of an unusual condition, we wouldn't have had easy access. But now with all the modern contraptions available to anyone who can afford them, anybody can go anywhere they choose and not even break a sweat. So I feel fairly certain the spot has been sacked. I never went back because my brother and I didn't live in that area. We were visiting my aunt and uncle at the time. Besides all that, I believe those sites are protected by law now. So any digging, which is what it would take to get to the stuff that hasn't been carried off, would be prohibited.

I'm pretty sure my memories are all that remain, and maybe that's the way ir should be.


----------



## activescrape

tigerhead said:


> Activescrape,
> It probably wouldn't be hard to find, because the site was only a hundred yards or so from the waters edge at Catahoula Lake. The creek ran out to the lake, so if I could find the mouth of the creek, where it hits the lake, you could follow it to the spot. At the time we were there, the lake bed was dried up and we actually drove across the lake bed from my uncle's fish camp and pulled the truck up on the bank not too far from the creek mouth.
> 
> Now for the bad news. That was 46 years ago. There wasn't any four wheelers, or for that matter, a lot of four wheel drive vehicles. If it hadn't been for the dry lake bed, which I think was somewhat of an unusual condition, we wouldn't have had easy access. But now with all the modern contraptions available to anyone who can afford them, anybody can go anywhere they choose and not even break a sweat. So I feel fairly certain the spot has been sacked. I never went back because my brother and I didn't live in that area. We were visiting my aunt and uncle at the time. Besides all that, I believe those sites are protected by law now. So any digging, which is what it would take to get to the stuff that hasn't been carried off, would be prohibited.
> 
> I'm pretty sure my memories are all that remain, and maybe that's the way ir should be.


Well, it's obvious to me that you carried some treasure away from there anyway, great post.


----------



## Tommy2000

In December of 1999, my buddies and I were deer hunting in central Iowa and while pushing some deer from the nearby woods, we not only pushed out many deer but also a 7 year old girl. She had her coat on and came out right behind the deer. ***? we thought. She said her name was "Wildflower" and her trailer home had burned the night before and she had been out all night. I scooped her up to take her to the truck and smelled no smoke and realized she was too clean to have been out all night.
Then we see a helicopter flying overhead, LifeFlight out of Des Moines and start to wonder. We called the Sheriff and within 2-3 minutes we were surrounded by Sheriff, police and DNR(game wardens).
As it turns out this little girl, Katlynd Reed, had ran away from her grade school earlier in the day, three miles away. Her mother worked for Mercy Hospital and had the LifeFlight helicopter searching as well as all the LEO's in the area. Were they ever so glad some "Hunters" found her, safe and sound.
I still have the picture of her I took and the newspaper article from the next day. My guess is she's still grounded to this day.


----------



## Big_poppabear

Good story, glad that she was found safe and back with her family.


----------



## HillCountryBasser

Tommy....that has to be one of the most interesting finds in the last 36 pages of posts! What an imagination that little girl had! Good job on getting her home safe!


----------



## BEER4BAIT

I found something this year, it was not a solid object to show although i took some pics. This year before season I had a very large hernia do to trama infact 3 of them. I was not able to pic up a gun, shooting was out of the question. I did have a friend take me out to watch and walked slow so I could shuffle around. I got to watch him drop a big buck and he drug it about 200 yards, to bad I could not help. I basicly sat out this season with only watching my buddies deer and squirrel hunt. This Christmas I was planning on going out to West TX to hunt by myself with a small call auto I still can not handle much recoil. Christmas morning my nephew shows up back from his third and last tour in Iraq with the 1st Tank Bat 29 stumps. I knew he wanted to go hunting and has not had anything to kill that walks on 4 legs in 5 years. I asked him to go with me and got my father to come along also. The end of season can be tough and the wind did not help at 25-40 mph all day long. I would put him on stand after stand and nothing everyone was scouting while he was hunting. Garrett found a good stand where many doe were coming out. Garrett put him out one evening and when the sun fell Luke had called about 25 people to tell them he had shot a deer. I cleaned it for him and he went back out the next pm for 1 more. He had not had that much fun in 5 years. I can tell Iraq had taken a lot out of him working 12- 72 hours at a time. He tells stories of the war things he saw and did, friends and enemies killed, the IED that took his hearing and scared his face he was the only survivor. It's like he has aged 15 years. Well he is finally getting out Feb 14th and he looks forward said he is tired, he had spent 4 years in Iraq. I had a very good time hunting with him and my father, you never know when you will have the last hunt with them. Here is what I discovered, I did not shoot a thing this year and I had a better time than the year I shot the lease record. 

Happy hunting


----------



## BEER4BAIT

I forgot here are the pics

1 SGT McCreary with his doe that I stuck some antlers on LOL
2 yote 
3 chupacabra


----------



## johnmyjohn

In the mid 70's my ex-fatherinlaw and I started to talk about his back ground and where he came from. So he said if you got time I'll show you because he wanted to see it again. It was an area of national forest around Ratcliff in east Texas. He showed me where the r.r. track was built that picked up the people that worked for the TVA (I think that was the group) and there was nothing left of it but a level hill that ran through the woods. Then we came across a pile of wood and tin that he called his home and I'm here to tell you the people in the depression had it tough. He told me people just built shelters where they wanted and lived there. What I liked the most was a pile of what looked like copper tubing and 55 gallon drums of which had slits on them and they were verry rusted. He told me it was a still that got found and as we walked through the woods we saw several of these and he also told me the still guys were the only people making real money back then. I really enjoyed the personal history lesson and the company. There was a lot I left off but that was a few high lights.


----------



## TXPalerider

johnmyjohn said:


> In the mid 70's my ex-fatherinlaw and I started to talk about his back ground and where he came from. So he said if you got time I'll show you because he wanted to see it again. It was an area of national forest around Ratcliff in east Texas. He showed me where the r.r. track was built that picked up the people that worked for the TVA (I think that was the group) and there was nothing left of it but a level hill that ran through the woods. Then we came across a pile of wood and tin that he called his home and I'm here to tell you the people in the depression had it tough. He told me people just built shelters where they wanted and lived there. What I liked the most was a pile of what looked like copper tubing and 55 gallon drums of which had slits on them and they were verry rusted. He told me it was a still that got found and as we walked through the woods we saw several of these and he also told me the still guys were the only people making real money back then. I really enjoyed the personal history lesson and the company. There was a lot I left off but that was a few high lights.


Those are the type of things I love to see. Real, personal history you can touch. I'd love to go someplace like that with a camera.


----------



## Freer Hunter 72

Hey everyone! I'm new to the boards and came across this awesome thread. Here are a few things I've come across personally and others I've heard of.

As a kid I hunted on a ranch owned by Eduardo Benavides near the town of Aguilares, TX. He told me that as a teenager in the early 40's (as best I recall) they were clearing a pasture on the ranch for cattle when he discovered a rusty revolver with the initials S.A. on it. It was taken to a museum where they determined the original owner had been Santa Anna. As I recall it is still on display in a small museum next to the LaPosada Hotel in Laredo.

On this same ranch my step mother found 2 beautiful, pristine spear points while walking down a washout following a hard rain. They are framed on the wall at my fathers' house so I could probably get some pictures.

After leaving this ranch we hunted 1yr. on the Walker Ranch up the old Pandale Hwy north of Comstock. This ranch had some serious history. There was an old dry river bed that ran through it with numerous caves in the cliff face. Several of the caves had Indian drawings in them, unfortunately they ran sheep on the property and many of the drawings in the lower caves were destroyed by livestock. The Walkers knew of the caves and said some artifacts were removed by earlier generations of the family. One particular small cave was way up near the top of the cliff but could only be accessed by climbing up to it. I did so and discovered the skeletal remains of a small Javelina. I quickly came to the conclusion he was most likely dragged up there by a Cougar so I beat feet rather quickly. Now, same ranch, same dry river bed but on the other side of the hwy I found numerous perfectly round holes in the top of the cliff. Most were 7-8" across and about a foot deep. Some had small rocks arranged around the rim. My father guessed they were for grinding up corn and whatnot. They were to perfect not to be man made. Also I discovered a hole approx 2' wide going down into the cliff face. I shined a light in and saw what appeared to be small crystal deposits deep down in there. I really wanted to look longer but we had a storm moving in fast and our Jeep was parked in a spot prone to flash floods. I never was able to return and explore that place.

On our way to the Walker Ranch we stopped at a gas station on the edge of Comstock very near were the road y's off. A man and his wife (very nice folks) owned the station. My stepmother commented on some Indian artifacts they had in the station. The man asked if we would be interested in seeing his entire collection. He took us behind the station to a mobile home that was FULL of Indian artifacts. It was so long ago and I wish I could remember everything. He had hundreds of arrowheads, spear points, tools, grinders, stone art...etc. It was absolutely fascinating. Some of you might have seen this as well. I noticed a few of you hunted in the same area. Please tell me if you have.

During my teens we hunted exclusively in Mexico on numerous different ranches. One was owned by a family that ran a really large bus company ZuesaZuesa (sp?). Anyway on the ranch was a fairly large hill towards the back of the property (4000 acres) not accessible by road. I hiked it one day to the top just to see the view. I sat down and noticed a big flat rock with the initials L.H. carved in it. This had obliviously been done many years past judging by the lichen growing on it. The land owner told me it was probably a makeshift headstone. Maybe, maybe not kinda interesting.

While elk hunting in Vermejo, NM with a guide my father came across an old wagon stuck between to trees. The guide said they found numerous artifacts from old wagon trains but that was the first intact wagon they had stumbled across.

Lastly I was dove hunting on the Peeler Ranch (Macho Creek Lodge) near Christine, TX one morning when I discovered something cool. I was sitting on an embankment under some power lines next to a set on train tracks. This is were it gets odd and take it for what its worth. Something in my mind told me to look down at the ground and then I swear the same "feeling" said, this was my home. Below my feet were thousands of little rock chips in the cut of this embankment. I began looking through and quickly found numerous broken and unfinished arrowheads he and worked on. I even found what I believe was his fracing (sp?) tool. 

Well, I think that's about all of it. I've really enjoyed reading some of your stories. Someone ought to put a book together of this stuff. I'd buy it.


----------



## johnmyjohn

Last year my friend came back from his lease in Freer and he was all excited about an arrow head he found while setting up his feeders. He had it in a what looked to be a jewelry box for a pocket watch. He carefully opened it up and snuggled in a bed of cotton was his find of a lifetime. It was a basic looking arrow head about 2 1/2 inches long and it was collared on the top for tieing and maybe 1 3/4 wide at the shoulders. What made this arrow head different and I've never seen one like it or even heard of people telling stories about one like it was the where it came to a tip it extended another 3/8 inch longer. This extention was like as wide as a #2 pencil lead and as sharp pointed, it's thickness was challenging a utility knife blade. I asked him how wide it was and he took it out the box and handed it to me, there was about 7 of us on shift and as I handed it to the next guy I told him he should put in the box for everybody else to handle and the last guy sure enough dropped it. The guy picked it up and said what was so special about this arrow head? The tip broke and my buddies face dropped. All he could say was this piece of rock laid around for a 1000 years with animals walking around it and hail sleet and snow and I had to bring it to work to get it broken. The guy that dropped it did feel bad but now his name is " Stone Crusher ". I'ld like to know if anybody has seen anything like that one was.


----------



## moondoggie

Hey guys, and gals, new to the forum and after being invited here by some of my friends, decided to jump in and give it a try... 

The most interesting situation that has happened to me on a hunting trip was from a few years back. A buddy of mine owns 120 acres, or so, on the Bosque river near Waco. His family has owned the land for close to a century, anyhow, we were heading out for an evening of chasing hounds after ***** when we came across a newly formed 'hole' of sorts in the ground near the road that heads to the river. This hole formed after a huge thunderstorm 'helped' the hole appear.

After a bit of moving dirt, we discovered skulls... HUMAN SKULLS! They had flat surfaces on their foreheads, but other than that, they were human. My friend took the skulls to the Strecker Museum in Waco and they said they were probably from the Flathead Indians from 8 to 10 thousand years ago! My friend didn't know the history of the land, but he was amazed at the newly learned information. 

The museum said they were not allowed to study 'human' remains no matter how old they are without a permit (I believe I'm remembering that fact correctly) and they told him he would need to return the skulls to their final resting place which he did. 

The 'grave' was marked and the road has be reformed in a different direction... as far as I know, the grave has been undisturbed since then.


----------



## activescrape

Man, that's just crazy!


----------



## richardb200373

Well, after a 6 pack and a half a pack of smokes, I finaly read this whole thread. The Old Lady is gonna be real happy with what I have accomplished today, lol.. Very good stories guys. I have an uncle that lives in Del Rio. My dad and the rest of my uncles and friends used to go up there to hunt every year, they have/had been doing this since the 60's or so, my self, since late 70's early 80's. Anyway, there is a lot of history in that area. We hunted 90, Lake Amistad, Comstock and Devils River. The places I do remember were Hudspeth River Ranch, a ranch just south of Mayfields store, and the last place was on 277 just over the lake on the left. Anyway, I know we found a lot of stuff on those places. Unfortunantly, I was to young, did'nt care or too drunk. 

After 5 years of living in Virginia close to DC, I regret not paying more attention to what I had years ago. I can't stand it up here, but I'm working my way back. I'll be hunting there again this coming season one way or another. 

As Arnold said,... I'll be back!


----------



## JOHNNY QUEST

Well one unusual discovery I have made is while on a 3 day trip camping in the wilderness.. It was a couple buds of mine and myself.. Things were not being very productive and the cooler was full when we got there.. On the last day's morning hunt I went to the cooler for a DR. PEPPER and the only thing left was beer.. So instead of my morning DP. before i head out to the stand, I head out with a beer in my pocket.. I just couldn't bring myself to open it and drink it just yet.... I climb in the stand and get settled in and start to think how thirsty i was.. man its early and I don't want a beer but my lips are crusty from the night around the campfire the night before and I'm thirsty...

So what I learned,, Is that BUSCH beer was named apropriatly.. when I opened that can out in the woods with nothing stirring at all it sounded like " BUSCH ". VERY LOUD !!!!!


----------



## essayons75

Welcome aboard Moondoggie. Good story.


----------



## moondoggie

essayons75 said:


> Welcome aboard Moondoggie. Good story.


 'ppreciate it... glad to be here!


----------



## cloudfishing

I was hunting in the Austin area at El Ranch-Cima (sp) my brother and I were walking around the area and found a wall of fossilized creatures from the bottom of the ocean floor. It may not be that unusual but there were thousands of these shells, seahorses , snails ect.


----------



## TXwhtlHNTR

I don't know about unusual, but...

I have found many things while hunting. I have found agates, fossils, geodes, and arrowheads. I have stumbled across old collapsed Civil War railroad stops and mills, and brush screened caves with old scrapings and drawings on the walls. I have bumped into (and carefully backed out of) active moonshine stills. 

The most important discoveries I have made while hunting have been peace of spirit, and closer bonds with my wife, son, nature, and God.


----------



## catchysumfishy

deano5x said:


> I have hunted Laramie peak with a friend severl yrs back,his best friend lives on the mountain .His grandfather forefathered the land,Man what nice country to walk


I'd be willing to bet that this is the same place!


----------



## barnett77859

I guess some of the best I have found is sheds from bucks I have been hunting 
season after season also a few arrow heads.


----------



## keepneat

I havn't found anything interesting but one time when I was fishing in a pond by spring creek i saw a 8-10ft alligator throw what I think was either a pig or a large dog (too far away to tell) up in the air and caught it on the way down.


----------



## theotherwaldo

One thing that I found out while kayaking on the lakes just north of Tuscaloosa, Alabama: Some canned beers FLOAT! I'd find at least half a case every time I went out on Lake Lurleen. 

Also found: tackle boxes, all kinds of fishing gear, a boat gas tank, and an amazing number of newish tennis shoes.


----------



## RB II

Teal hunting on Livingston one fall, water was really low. Parked the boat on a point of land off of a creek before daylight. After hunting came back to find the ground between the high water line and the water was covered with arrow heads. Probably found 20 just laying almost in plain sight.


----------



## Spiderweb

*Money store*

Back in the 60's I would go to my Uncle's in Red River County for two weeks each summer to work, shoot, bird hunt (larks) and play. It gave my parents a break and I learned what it was like to farm and live without running water. After milking 100 plus Holstein's and feeding the calves we would head out to run a few errands for tractor parts or what ever was needed. There are hundreds of small farming towns with 5 or 6 old stores through out the county. One day my Uncle took me into an old grocery store as we walked to the back there was an old black press just clacking away and money hanging on lines everywhere. I was so little that I did not realize what it was at the time also my uncle was apparently cashing a check. 
Spidy


----------



## justinsfa

I have found a few pieces of the Space Shuttle Columbia while hunting various places in East Texas over the last few years, mostly foam and wiring.... Had one piece of insulation type stuff that had "S.A." printed on it, just missing the "u" ... Its amazing how widespread the debris is. I had 3 huge pieces in my yard when I lived in Nacogcoches too...

Was riding back from the stand in Leggett one year and there was a crackhead asleep in the middle of the clearcut that I crossed.... 

Duck hunting in SW Louisiana and found a new Calcutta on a 7 ft Allstar rod on the bank.... Bank was not accessible except by boat and MILES from anywhere... Didnt have a scratch on it.... 

I was in a climber one morning and watched a trespasser hunt my spot for about 2 hours... He sat down about 20 feet from the base of the tree I was in....I finally threw a stick at him and he left.... only for me to catch him again the next saturday. Gotta love East Tx....


----------



## GoneFishin0670

No B.S.......Though I am Use To People Thinking OtherWise, and for that reason do not speak of it hardly ever. 
While Bear Hunting In NW Washington' Watched what we will call a Very Large, Long Striding, covers ground Walking On Two Legs quicker then I have ever seen Huge Dude In a Hairy Brown Suit. This Took Place about 5 miles from the nearest Road, the road about 30 miles from the closest home. 
Went back to area with a camera and have video of What We Will Call Very Large Foot Prints that are Spaced at 7' 2" to be exact.

Thats All I've Got To Say About That.........
No I Was Not Smoking Any Of The Occasional Plants You Find or Tasteing any of the Mushrooms That Grow there as well.....


----------



## bear hide

GoneFishin0670 said:


> No B.S.......Though I am Use To People Thinking OtherWise, and for that reason do not speak of it hardly ever.
> While Bear Hunting In NW Washington' Watched what we will call a Very Large, Long Striding, covers ground Walking On Two Legs .... Spaced at 7' 2" to be exact.
> 
> Thats All I've Got To Say About That.........
> No I Was Not Smoking Any Of The Occasional Plants You Find or Tasteing any of the Mushrooms That Grow there as well.....


Okay, that beats my "I saw a chicken while bear hunting" story all to [email protected]


----------



## bullred123

a couple of old knives stuck in trees, an old colt revolver old stands and feeders arrowheads flint


----------



## tec

I hate to see this thread die. I enjoyed it.


----------



## Trouthunter

It's not dead, it's just not hunting season. 

TH


----------



## activescrape

I would like to see more pics of some of this stuff that people found.


----------



## Sunbeam

!960 west of Ozona TX. I was blood trailing a deer my buddy had shot. I was working up a steep cedar choked header between two mesas. I began to find what at first looked like pieces of broken wooden furniture. The was shreds of gray colored fabric attached to some of it. Then I saw what certainly was the end of a wooden airplane prop sticking out of a clump of cedar. Close inspection proved there was a rusted and corroded inline engine still attached to the prop. By looks of the way the cedars had grown around and through the parts of the intact wing and other pieces the airplane had been there a long time. 
I took the ranch owner there that afternoon along with a local deputy. 
It was my last day to hunt there so I did not get to poke around at the site. Later my buddy was told it was some type of pre-WWII two place biplane training aircraft. The ranch had just been purchased the year before and the new owner had not seen much except the fence lines. 
I am not sure if the local law ever tried to trace down the source of the plane, when it crashed or if there was any fatalities. There were no bones that I saw but not surprising since the wreck could have been there for 30 years.
PS We did not find the buck which was the real tragedy.


----------



## cc

i have only found alot of old beer bottles and big glass rum jugs


----------



## capt. stealth

While I was squirrel hunting/scouting I found a new nylon strap lying on the ground and as I looked up my picture was taken by a game camera looking me right in the face. I gave it a piece sign and laid the nylon strap on the camera. I guess the other hunter and me where on the same buck and it is a good one. It was in the APH area on the Sabine National Forest.


----------



## McAnulty

My Grandfather owns 1000 acres in Limestone County. About 2 years ago my uncle was cleaning some underbrush getting ready for deer season, about a 10 minute ATV ride from camp. This particular creek bottom he was cleaning is WAY out in the middle of nowhere, with some of the thickest yopon (SP?) bush. In areas you have to get down on your hands and knees to get around. Anyway, he notices a pack of wild dogs and manages to get a shot at one as we have had trouble with dogs chasing deer. The rest of the dogs take off and make a b-line towards something about 50 yards off of the trail into the woods. My cousin goes over to investigat and finds a body laying on the ground. 

Long story short, this guy turned out to be a local mentily challenged guy that had been missing for a couple of months. M/E said he died from a heart attack. Turns out he had been sataying in an old share croppers shack that was on the property. 


On the same place, there is an artesian well up towards the front of the property. My grand dad says people used to come for miles to get water and what not. This past mothers day several of us went out there with metal detectors to see what we could find. We stumbled across old china, cast iron coffee pots, small cilaber bullets, knives. I wished I could remember what all we found, but its a huge list.


----------



## gregg75

Speaking of Artesian wells, We moved to Leon co. in 1981. We own 26 acres just north of Flynn, Tx on hwy 39. There is a natural spring there below the tank dam in the woods. It has never dried up. Anyway, when we first moved there, there was an old barrel downstream and my folks had found moonshine jugs, one of which they glued back together and is still on top of the kitchen cabinets. The previous owner told my Dad that during prohibition there was a still on every spring in that area. Also I remember as a kid there was a constant wet spot in the road, even during summer. Other locals said that our dirt road used to be called artesian rd. Had a concreted pipe in that spot and water gushing 24/7. It was the local source of water. Whole area is on a sand aquifer. Best drinking water ever. I bet that was good moonshine too.


----------



## cjcass

Remains of a murder victim.

I was on a fraternity dove hunt in 1989 near Pearsall. While crossing a dried up drainage wash, I looked down and saw a human skull. Close by were other bones (femur, radius, ulna, ect...) and shreds of clothing.

Unfortunately, it was the remains of a lady who had gone missing from the local area a few years before. The killer was identified and charged.

I will never forget.


----------



## cjcass

An old, silver spur in a thick patch of white brush. 

Several arrowheads, tools, ect...

An what we think are (or could be) meteorites. We have found several perfectly round "rocks" that resembe marbles in their size and smoothness. They do not attract to a magnet but seem to be composed of iron.(?).

All on our place south of Hondo.


----------



## activescrape

cjcass said:


> An old, silver spur in a thick patch of white brush.
> 
> Several arrowheads, tools, ect...
> 
> An what we think are (or could be) meteorites. We have found several perfectly round "rocks" that resembe marbles in their size and smoothness. They do not attract to a magnet but seem to be composed of iron.(?).
> 
> All on our place south of Hondo.


 You could take the "meteorites" to a college or a museum and see if they could put a positive id on them.


----------



## iwanashark

*surveying*

nothing while hunting but as a land surveyor i've dug up several old graves. the thing that stands in my head the most is surveying this old farmer's land down 59 south aways. he was 87 and while finding one of his corners he stoped to talk to us. we found the recent corner and then informed us the real property corner was about 5 feet south east of the one we had. he said they set it when he was a young teenager. we had a faint signal there from our locater. after about nearly an hour of digging a five foot deep whole and about the same width we came across an old wagon wheel! they had set it there many years before. the look on that old mans face was priceless. we explained to him he was missing a good bit of property because his neighbor had put that fence where it was years before and he could get it back. but he quickly dismissed that idea and was just happy we had found it.


----------



## Outlaw Mo

About fifteen years ago while deer hunting in south-central Alabama, I came across empty graves in the woods. The former occupants had apparently been re-located and the graves were filled with pine needles.


----------



## Encinal

While hunting deer with a camera this last Friday night right before dark after camera light I saw a badger hunting in a group with two coyotes. They were running together with the same purpose... really pretty interesting.


----------



## TXDRAKE

Encinal said:


> While hunting deer with a camera this last Friday night right before dark after camera light I saw a badger hunting in a group with two coyotes. They were running together with the same purpose... really pretty interesting.


WOW, I never seen that type of cooperation for sure! I bet that was something to see! What is it that they were hunting together?


----------



## Costadecajuntejas34

hahahahaha


mjmaxwell8 said:


> after a deer-less morning, i walkied my buddy, (we will call him craig) to tell him i would be walking up to his stand from the south, so not to shoot that way. with no reply and no shots fired, i figured he was waiting on a particular shot so i figured it best not to bother him. after a while had passed, i got on the four wheeler and headed over with quite a bit of hunters orange on figuring he had fallen asleep. what i found when i started walking up the steps was my buddy and some **** woman scurrying to pull their pants up- in the deer stand! the kicker of this whole story is that- i swear to god- the girl had something of a mustache, not to mention a few extra pounds! to this day he wont tell us the full story, but i think she lived not far from the lease, and this wasnt their first rendezvous. he politely gave her a ride home.


----------



## listos?

Encinal said:


> While hunting deer with a camera this last Friday night right before dark after camera light I saw a badger hunting in a group with two coyotes. They were running together with the same purpose... really pretty interesting.


I saw the same thing last year and just thought it was a freak occurance...


----------



## 22fish

While planting oats last year on my friends ranch in Limestone county we found a very old horse shoe. He took it to a musem and they told him it dated back to the mid 1800's. It now hangs at the ranch cabin for good luck.


----------



## tiger

Well I found a little 20' looking bomb? its kinda bent but we dont beat on it!Here let me go take a pic I have always wondered about it maybe someone will know what it is.


----------



## tiger

*Bomb>>>*

Well here you go!


----------



## Fishin' Soldier

That is a Mortor. Not sure what size but it is a mortor...Drop in the tube and cover your head...Might be live..be careful.. looks homemade...Where did you find it??


----------



## 24Buds

Fishin' Soldier said:


> That is a Mortor. Not sure what size but it is a mortor...Drop in the tube and cover your head...Might be live..be careful.. looks homemade...Where did you find it??


BE CAREFUL for sure. It look like a practice bomb they use for aircraft. 25lbs? If so, you need to get rid of that. bad news if so! then again, it looks welded by a kid......


----------



## old chief

Looks alot like a practice bomb. If so the only explosive was the marking charge which was similar to a shotgun shell and located in the nose.
Still probably shouldn't play with it.


----------



## Trouthunter

Man you found it. The Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator. About time. Please return it to Marvin ASAP.

Looks home made to me but it could have been ordinance made and used as a hand dropped practice bomb from WW-1 fighter planes. Looks that old to me.

TH


----------



## whodad

I was a hunten up round Utopia in the late 70's decided to take a break and headed over to where Lost Maples Park is today. When walking up a dry creek spotted a birds head bout the size of a chicken. All but tail laying on left side. very large teeth, fish catcher I believe, all the bone structure was there. very large, man size finger bones. looked to be a climber and glider type pre historic. marked location so as to be able to locate before I go under.


----------



## activescrape

whodad said:


> I was a hunten up round Utopia in the late 70's decided to take a break and headed over to where Lost Maples Park is today. When walking up a dry creek spotted a birds head bout the size of a chicken. All but tail laying on left side. very large teeth, fish catcher I believe, all the bone structure was there. very large, man size finger bones. looked to be a climber and glider type pre historic. marked location so as to be able to locate before I go under.


 Let's go.


----------



## Big_poppabear

Nothing unusual, but I did stumble upon a few cow carcasses while pheasant hunting in Dalhart.


----------



## Pistol58

Can you guys end this thread so I can get some work done!! LOL!! Just joking...great topic and excellent read! Keep it up.


----------



## keener guide services

While Ducking hunting saltwater Ive had both a cayote and hog swim across the bay right towards me. The cayote didnt survive.


----------



## Seeker

I found a bunch of rocks full of gold on the river that flows down behind Teluride Colorado. Right below Bridal Falls. The old house that is at the top of the mountains there at black bear pass. Someone was kind enough to round them up and put them in a pile on one of the rocks there. It looks like they just ran off and left them. I was taking a jeep ride down black bear pass and stopped for pictures and ran across them. I took the rocks to a gem store there in Ouri and had a geologist look at them to see if it was fools gold. He scratched the gold streaks with a tool and the gold smeared across the rock. He said yep, it is real gold. Took a look at it through a loop and sure enough I saw the gold. I ask him what it would be worth and he told me he could not tell without extracting the gold from it. He asked me if I wanted to sell them and I told him no. I wanted them for keep sakes. He then spoke up and said, "wise choice lad, the rock is worth more with the gold still in it". Collectors evidently would love to get a hold of them. He said, you just can find these just anywhere without digging deep in the sides of the mountains. He said it would be just like finding a metorite out in the middle of the ocean. I can take pictures and post them if anyone wants to see them. Sorry for the spekking, shot this one out quick. It's 5:00 pm on Friday so I am headed home.


----------



## tec

I would like to see the pics.


----------



## IsleSurfChunker

While fishing in East Bay better then twenty years ago, the fishing had slowed so a buddy of mine walked up on some discarded oyster shell mounds and found quite a few pottery shards. They had some concave to 'em and were black on one side. No doubt from the Krankawas in this area, no telling how old exactly, but we guesstimated a minimum of 400+ years.


----------



## Sea Aggie

I've found a bunch of arrow heads and pottery shards while hunting East Texas for ducks & squirrel over the years. Always cool to see the stuff the "old timers" used.

They just found a whole bunch of artifacts along one of the creeks in NW Harris County. I live close to it and work my dog along it often, but have not found anything there yet.


----------



## C'est Bon

Unusual discoveries? Human hair spread around the deer feeders, pieces of green carpet tied to the trees near game trails, camoflauge painted mini soda cans with a stinky liquid in them wired to the trees near the feeders, "sachets" (perfume scented balls of material) tied to fence wires near game crossings, a dead racoon on top of the camp trailer, nylon string criss-crossed through brush, an extremely stinky fluid sprayed onto the deck, woodpile and picnic table at the camp and into the deerblinds (which we now keep locked!), and a game camera set up to monitor the gate entrance to my lease!!
Apparently the neighbor has a long standing feud with the landowner and doesn't want deer hunters out there...
The guy was caught on another leasee's game camera several years ago pouring molasse into their feeders, but the mask and camo he wore acquitted him of charges...
Yeah, it sucks, but the hunting is still decent! Still, would love to catch him in the act!


----------



## Bukkskin

*First Timer*

Very Cool Topic, It made me register just to reply.
Last year in Mexico. While tracking a deer for another hunter I found some large spent brass out in the middle of nowhere. They were marked L S 4 and L S 4.3 My fellow Mexican tracker said they were from US helicopter training missions from a long time ago. I read some earlier replies to this thread of similar finds along the river.
Next. Three of us were walking up the river bank rattling every few hundred yards. We came across a wooden headstone marked 3-?-08. The ground beneath it was recently disturbed and had not recovered enough to look like the ground around it. The errie part is, I had been there in March filling feeders. I was driving down the river that day and the water was wayyy up. I came across a group of men sitting in the mesquites and eating their lunch. I stopped and talked for a while and gave them some sodas. I remember telling them the water was too high and they shouldn't try it for at least a couple of days. Anyways, after we finished rattling, I asked the cowboy about it. He said sure enough one of them didn't make it. Being hundreds of miles from home and on foot, They just buried him right there. Pretty Wild. Makes you wonder just how many graves of this kind have been dug thru the years down in the brush country.


----------



## Boneheads

*strange find*

I was in Roosevelt this past weekend hunting and came accross a camp where some illegals hade been. I dont know what happened to them but they left in a hurry. I found where they had built a fire for cooking, cans still there with all there silver ware. I started looking around and found their back packs still zipped up with all their clothes, blankets and everything. Includung a half full bottle of Brandy. There were four back packs, one duffel and peices of plastic that they slept on. Pretty strange that they left all their wordly belongings behind and split. One had what appeared to be a birth certificate in it, all in Spanish. It was pretty deteriorated but still in tact.:question:


----------



## RB II

We were hunting in a high rack truck in Brewster Co. (25 miles from nowhere), probably 15 years ago. Came up on two javelinas side by side, both recently shot, both showed signs that some one was carrying one over their shoulder and dragging the other. Must have scared him off because we never saw him. I am sure he saw/heard us and laid down to keep from being seen, probably closer than I care to imagine, especially knowing that he had shot two javelinas, pretty good shooting.


----------



## txbigred

Boneheads said:


> I was in Roosevelt this past weekend hunting and came accross a camp where some illegals hade been. I dont know what happened to them but they left in a hurry. I found where they had built a fire for cooking, cans still there with all there silver ware. I started looking around and found their back packs still zipped up with all their clothes, blankets and everything. Includung a half full bottle of Brandy. There were four back packs, one duffel and peices of plastic that they slept on. Pretty strange that they left all their wordly belongings behind and split. One had what appeared to be a birth certificate in it, all in Spanish. It was pretty deteriorated but still in tact.:question:


You scared them away!!

DAve


----------



## randygonehunting

I also registered just to reply to this thread. I suscribe to every hunting, fishing, and gun magazine out there and this is by far the most interesting read I have had in years. Anyway, I used to be one of the producers on a show called "Hunting With The Judge" on The Sportsman Channel. We where filming a show with me hunting mule deer on a 50,000 acre ranch in the Glass Mountains between Ft. Stockton and Marathon. Shot a nice mulie and also shot a huge free range bison with a handgun. I was guided by the owner and he showed me the most amazing collection of indian artifacts. All kinds of arrowheards, spear heads , scrapers , jewelry, etc. He also showed me an indian camp that was so well preserved with a rock fire ring, tools, and a couple of mounds that they made for some reason. He left everthing as is and the camp looked to be 50 yrs old instead of 200 years old...or more, who knows. He also had an Indian skull on the mantle of the fireplace. But believe it or not it gets better. There was also a cave on the ranch but the only way in was to repel down into the opening. Now I did not do that but the owner has done it may times when he was younger and says it opens up into a huge cavern. The first time down he found the skull of a sabre toothed tiger. His guess was that it fell in. When he showed it to me I was shocked at how big it was. I am sure it shrunk over the thousands of years but it was bigger than that of a lion or tiger. Now here is the worse part. He would not let me film any of it! He said he was afraid if officials knew about any of this, they would get some kind of court order to come on his land to escavate and do digs and such, and he wanted no part of that.


----------



## activescrape

randygonehunting said:


> I also registered just to reply to this thread. I suscribe to every hunting, fishing, and gun magazine out there and this is by far the most interesting read I have had in years. Anyway, I used to be one of the producers on a show called "Hunting With The Judge" on The Sportsman Channel. We where filming a show with me hunting mule deer on a 50,000 acre ranch in the Glass Mountains between Ft. Stockton and Marathon. Shot a nice mulie and also shot a huge free range bison with a handgun. I was guided by the owner and he showed me the most amazing collection of indian artifacts. All kinds of arrowheards, spear heads , scrapers , jewelry, etc. He also showed me an indian camp that was so well preserved with a rock fire ring, tools, and a couple of mounds that they made for some reason. He left everthing as is and the camp looked to be 50 yrs old instead of 200 years old...or more, who knows. He also had an Indian skull on the mantle of the fireplace. But believe it or not it gets better. There was also a cave on the ranch but the only way in was to repel down into the opening. Now I did not do that but the owner has done it may times when he was younger and says it opens up into a huge cavern. The first time down he found the skull of a sabre toothed tiger. His guess was that it fell in. When he showed it to me I was shocked at how big it was. I am sure it shrunk over the thousands of years but it was bigger than that of a lion or tiger. Now here is the worse part. He would not let me film any of it! He said he was afraid if officials knew about any of this, they would get some kind of court order to come on his land to escavate and do digs and such, and he wanted no part of that.


Great post, thanks. The rancher probably had good reason to keep his privacy. Especially in regard to human remains. I have a good friend that runs the Floyd County Historical Museum. About 15 years ago a rancher discovered an Indian grave in a rock ledge, very well preserved. I got to inspect it in private. Some of the arm bones were still articulated. The teeth were very worn down. In the box with him were hundreds of turquoise and coral necklace beads and steel bands that he wore around his biceps. He also had a bow with arrows and a leather quiver. Word got out and the Feds came and confiscated it. Eventually it was given back to the Commanches for proper burial. One thing I found interesting is that he was agen at his early 30's. Mighty young to have such worn teeth. Lots of sand in the bread, I guess.


----------



## txcowpoke

activescrape said:


> Great post, thanks. The rancher probably had good reason to keep his privacy. Especially in regard to human remains. I have a good friend that runs the Floyd County Historical Museum. About 15 years ago a rancher discovered an Indian grave in a rock ledge, very well preserved. I got to inspect it in private. Some of the arm bones were still articulated. The teeth were very worn down. In the box with him were hundreds of turquoise and coral necklace beads and steel bands that he wore around his biceps. He also had a bow with arrows and a leather quiver. Word got out and the Feds came and confiscated it. Eventually it was given back to the Commanches for proper burial. One thing I found interesting is that he was agen at his early 30's. Mighty young to have such worn teeth. Lots of sand in the bread, I guess.


Early 30's from what I have read was old for the average Indian and I would imagine that they used their teeth for more than just eating. Thanks for the post very interesting,


----------



## tycaden

*Land heritage*

Not something i found, but the home and land where my dad lives has been in the family since the 1800's. the house started off as an old dog run house and the two main rooms are still together and in great condition. through the years an extra bedroom, kitchen and indoor bathroom were added to the home. The open run between the two original rooms was closed in and made into a long hallway conecting all of the rooms. The old outhouse is still there as is the original water well shaft. The house and land were recognized by the Texas land hertigae act as beiing in continuous operation by the same family for over 150 yrs., probably 20 years ago. As a child i found an early settlers grave on the property that is to this date taken care of. house Many more things found and unexplained things seen and heard on the property and in the house.


----------



## Leather

*sober as a judge*

About 15 yrs ago me and a hunting buddy were filling a feeder and working on a box blind when out of nowhere a 1.5 yr old spike walked out of the thicket and came straight to us. I noticed he was wearing a dog collar that had become so tight it was about to choke the life out of him. I loosened the collar and put it on its last hole while he ate corn from the tailgate of my truck. He walked over to the feeder with the both of us and stood there as we hit the test alarm and never flinched when the corn started slinging. We told the story to some locals and they informed us that this deer had been a pet about a year earlier at a nearby deer camp but no one had seen him in a long time. They put the collar on so no one would blast him. We never saw the deer again.


----------



## 032490

Leather said:


> About 15 yrs ago me and a hunting buddy were filling a feeder and working on a box blind when out of nowhere a 1.5 yr old spike walked out of the thicket and came straight to us. I noticed he was wearing a dog collar that had become so tight it was about to choke the life out of him. I loosened the collar and put it on its last hole while he ate corn from the tailgate of my truck. He walked over to the feeder with the both of us and stood there as we hit the test alarm and never flinched when the corn started slinging. We told the story to some locals and they informed us that this deer had been a pet about a year earlier at a nearby deer camp but no one had seen him in a long time. They put the collar on so no one would blast him. We never saw the deer again.


Just about the same thing happened to me. This happened about 20 years ago, I was hunting on a lease a little nw of Columbus. I had not seen a deer all weekend. We were finishing up a hunt Sunday morning, I get out of my blind to go check my feeder when a doe walks up right behind me. She had a bright orange sweat band on around her neck. I put some corn in my hand and she ate out of my hand. She walked off and I never saw her again that season.


----------



## davidluster

i lived on the side a huge hill in Meridian Mississippi for about 7 years. I have found several sharks teeth in the creek that flowed through my property. Meridian is about 400 feet above sea level and about 150 miles from the nearest coast.


----------



## tycaden

Could be from a bull shark. They have been located several hundred miles up river in fresh water in the past.


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

I found seashells ALL OVER the top of the highest mountain (hill) in Blanco county when I was about 10.

I suppose they were fossilized, but they were perfect. 

Lance.


----------



## fox1

Found were a cypress tree branch had grown through a oak tree while hunting in Saratoga.

Found 2 buttons that are marked C.S.A while on a search team after the shuttle crashed in sabine county.


----------



## sweenyite

S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain) said:


> I found seashells ALL OVER the top of the highest mountain (hill) in Blanco county when I was about 10.
> 
> I suppose they were fossilized, but they were perfect.
> 
> Lance.[/QUOTE
> Laid down by Noah's flood.


----------



## txbigred

fox1 said:


> Found 2 buttons that are marked C.S.A while on a search team after the shuttle crashed in sabine county.


Cool, where did you find the CSA buttons? I found the shuttles front landing gear off of Six Mile and Miles creek.

Dave


----------



## Eastern Tackle

S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain) said:


> I found seashells ALL OVER the top of the highest mountain (hill) in Blanco county when I was about 10.
> 
> I suppose they were fossilized, but they were perfect.
> 
> Lance.


I found a bunch of seashells back in the Appalachian Mountain, near Christiansburg, Va. Its 5 hours from the coast and way up in the hills.

The strangest thing I ever found though was a NOAA weather balloon. There was a process for sending it back, which I did through the post office. They sent me all kinds of cool weather geek stuff in return.


----------



## nhampton

Found my sanity one time, but then I had to go home. 

Another time I came across a tree that looked like someone had cut into perfect fireplace log size pieces. Which was odd because it was between Freer and Encinal about a hundred miles from the closest tree of that size. Went over to check it out and it was petrified. Told a guy back at the camp house and he thought it was rose palm. We went back to look for it, but never did find the right place. Ah well, probably would have been in trouble if I had taken some. Doubt the lease covered minerals.


----------



## activescrape

nhampton said:


> Found my sanity one time, but then I had to go home.
> 
> Another time I came across a tree that looked like someone had cut into perfect fireplace log size pieces. Which was odd because it was between Freer and Encinal about a hundred miles from the closest tree of that size. Went over to check it out and it was petrified. Told a guy back at the camp house and he thought it was rose palm. We went back to look for it, but never did find the right place. Ah well, probably would have been in trouble if I had taken some. Doubt the lease covered minerals.


 I have a couple of very nice arrowheads made from petrified palm.


----------



## davidluster

.[/QUOTE
Laid down by Noah's flood.[/QUOTE]

thats where i believe the shark's teeth I found came from. The 'creek' I am talking about is about 2 inches deep after a flood. It is more of a run off for the hill its coming down.


----------



## slmc

#1 Found this along the shores of Lake Travis many years ago.
#2,3,&4 Rock embedded in rock. This is on the lease in Bracketville. Of the 3000 acres this rock is only found on one small (maybe 50 acre) area. Anything from finger sized to several tons. Any ideas what it is?


----------



## activescrape

That is some strange rock. I've never seen that before.


----------



## reelthreat

slmc said:


> #2,3,&4 Rock embedded in rock. This is on the lease in Bracketville. Of the 3000 acres this rock is only found on one small (maybe 50 acre) area. Anything from finger sized to several tons. Any ideas what it is?


I think the rock in rock is cave formations surrounded by limestome... could be a collapsed cave???


----------



## activescrape

reelthreat said:


> I think the rock in rock is cave formations surrounded by limestome... could be a collapsed cave???


 Is there a geologist in the house??


----------



## garybryan

Just spent hours reading this awesome thread. Amazing what all you can stumble on in the middle of nowhere.

Early 80's was working for a super that grew up in Bryan Tx area on family acreage and 
went out there to help him fix a cattle guard in exchange to hunt that season and the place was loaded with petrified wood. While out hunting a dry creek bed I ran across the largest piece of petrified wood I'd ever seen, a whole tree laying on it's side in the creek bed. The old man said it had been there longer than he had been alive. Wish I had been smart enough to take pics back then.

I've found buckets of indian artifacts all over Tx/N.M. broken & whole arrowheads, fit axes, drills, scrapers, beads etc... 2 cannon balls {pipe creek area}, loads of fossils mostly hill country [kerrville, medina etc...] even a fossil that looks like the facial part of a human skull.

Found a rock fireplace on the side of a hill in mountain home that I couldn't figure out where the house could hane been, it was just standing there all by itself.

A friend found a large meteorite around government crossing in center point tx that is about the size of a basketball, wieghts a ton.

thats all I got. keep it goin. it's great readin 
.


----------



## Barrett

Slmc that guy is most likely from this time period- 
The Tertiary in Texas has a rich vertebrate fossil record. Mammalian diversity exploded as new species evolved, filling niches left by the extinction of the dinosaurs. Massive amounts of sediment washed down from the rising Rocky Mountains of the northwest into the Gulf of Mexico. Much of the High Plains and the modern Texas Coastal Plain is covered by rocks (the Ogallala Formation) formed from that sediment. Extensive volcanic activity poured lavas across the landscape in far western Texas.


----------



## tdgal

As a kid my fathers family deer hunted up in the Southeast part of Arkansas. They ran dogs back then and as we were following dogs down thru the woods right down in the one of the biggest briar patches I found a Liberty Chief 38. revolver pistol. It was pitted up,rusted, and the wood handles had been gnawed up. It still shot !!!

We tried to turn it in to the GW's but they told my dad to let me keep it.
It was a big treasure for a 10 year old boy, I dreamed it was from a gangster, outlaw, or moonshiner.


----------



## LoneKro

This is some great reading, and the education is free. I was playing cedar chopper in the hill country, just south of Borene, and stumbled upon two clam beds about 10 yards in dia. each. I stood there on top of that hill looking around and could see for miles. This was all under water at one time! It made me realize, in the BIG picture, our lives are just a grain of sand. 
Some of these stories and images are just 2cool.


----------



## TomCat

*Bediasites*

About a zillion years ago a meteorite crashed into Chesapeake Bay and ricocheted in two directions. Some of it went to Georgia but most of it landed in Grimes County near Bedias. The fragments are known as Bediasites and are scattered all over the Grimes County pasture lands. The Indians called the small black rocks Moon Tears or something like that and we now call then Tektites. I didn't pay much attention to them as a kid but I'd sure like to get back there and find a bunch now. Those things are like gold these days. Google Bediasites and have a look. 
Anyway I'm walking by a fresh grave in a local cemetery and there's a nice Bediasite lying right on top of the grave. I thought what the heck he doesn't need it anymore so I slipped it into my pocket and took it home.


----------



## txsnyper

TomCat said:


> Anyway I'm walking by a fresh grave in a local cemetery and there's a nice Bediasite lying right on top of the grave. I thought what the heck he doesn't need it anymore so I slipped it into my pocket and took it home.


That ain't right! You can't be serious? You took something off of someones grave? You better be watching out for that lightning.


----------



## monkeyman1

gotta stop on page 12 and do some work...will be back tonight tho. great stories...best thread i've ever read on 2cool.


----------



## tjpoole

one time when i was helping my friend find a deer on my grandpas ranch i came across an old mine out in the middle of the brush.


----------



## jt2hunt

i have some rock inside of rock formation. i think we pulled it off our lease in uvalde


----------



## Ron Tedder

*Skull ID needed*

Maybe someone can ID this skull for me. I found this while on a friends property last month in LaGrange. It's only about the size of my fist, so I figure it's a Bobcat, but i've done some internet searching and the closest image i've found it looks like a Black Bear, and that's just not possible. I know it shouldn't but this is driving me nuts.

Thanks,
Ron


----------



## activescrape

Ron Tedder said:


> Maybe someone can ID this skull for me. I found this while on a friends property last month in LaGrange. It's only about the size of my fist, so I figure it's a Bobcat, but i've done some internet searching and the closest image i've found it looks like a Black Bear, and that's just not possible. I know it shouldn't but this is driving me nuts.
> 
> Thanks,
> Ron


 Maybe a badger.


----------



## Bukkskin

I say a racoon.


----------



## nasakid

For sure a badger.

Here's one off Google for a comparison:


----------



## RogerB

I keep coming back here and re-reading some of the previous posts. Great thread - I hope it stays around for awhile. It's too bad they didn't make digital cameras 50 years ago. Nowadays I always take a digital with me, you never know when you'll get a good pick of sunrise, sunset, animal, etc.
If they had made them back then I could show you pics of the stage coach trail on a ranch I used to have free run of. Found an old horseshoe following the ruts of that trail (ruts cut into limestone). Or I could show you the pics of the dinosaur tracks in the creek bed we found, or the place on the hillside that had a vein of flint running through it - looked like an arrowhead factory from all the arrow heads, partial and imperfect that we found. 
sure wish they had those cameras back then. Y''all need to remember - take one with you - you never know when you'll see something you wish you had taken a pic of. 
Great posts - keep 'em coming.


----------



## mike1970lee

When I was a kid growing up in Clear Lake Shores we found a lot of stone tools used by indains, we also found arrowheads made of gar scales. there was lots of open shoreline that wasnt bulkheaded back then.


----------



## MLK

This is an awesome thread. I am sure someone will find my sunglasses that I left on a rock on the side of a hill when I left after dark on the place my in-laws sold, or my sunglasses that are on the side of the mountain where I killed my first elk. One of my finds was an old cast iron fence staple puller that was laying in the pasture on a piece of land that my in-laws used to have, along with about 25 window panes out of the original Ivan TX. school house that I plan on making picture frames out of or maybe a wine cabinet. 
A friend of mine who invited me to hunt axis on their place in Harper found several petrified trees on their place while tracking an Axis that I shot. These were nice I have a couple of pieces about the size of cut firewood full of old worm holes. he came back at a later date and some of the trees were in excess of 20 feet tall including branches that he picked up at a later date. He and his brother have found boxes of arrow heads from bird points to addle-addle points, scrapers and knives. They even tried out one of the flint palm held knives to skin out and quarter up a hog, it worked as good as a conventional knife. 

I have spent about three good evenings reading this thread, it is great. Keep up the post and threads on findings.


----------



## kelley350x

Pocboy said:


> My father-in-law had a lease outside of comstock that I was able to hunt on for several years. There was a canyon that had been washed out in the bottom so that the walls were rounded and smoother than most and they were full of picotgraphs of people and animals and some really strange looking objects. There was a painting of a man with a halo and if you had an imagination you could say that some of the strange objects looked like UFO's. On the way down to the bottom of the canyon there was an old rock house that I'm sure was built sometime in the 1800's.


The very day you were leaving this post i was in that same canyon, i had dozens of pictures before my computer crashed....


----------



## tinman

*They don't care*



txsnyper said:


> That ain't right! You can't be serious? You took something off of someones grave? You better be watching out for that lightning.


Back in my much younger women chasing days, whenever I had a date with a new lady, or it was a special occaision, I would just stop by the cemetary and pick up a bunch of fresh flowers for her.
WTH, worked every time, and I sure had more money to spend showing her a good time.
I hate to see things just go to waste, and I promise you, they ain't gonna miss those pretty flowers.

Tinman


----------



## activescrape

kelley350x said:


> The very day you were leaving this post i was in that same canyon, i had dozens of pictures before my computer crashed....


 Please post them, we would all love to see them.


----------



## OLD-AG

This thread has been such a great read! I think I've got something that fits in the "unusual" category. Several deer seasons back I was on a morning hunt in an area of our lease we call "the bottoms". Old creek bed, dense hardwoods, thick brush. Lots of deer , turkey, and hogs in the vicinity, we've even had 2 mountain lion sightings in this area. So I've got a few does and a young eight going after the corn when they all go on alert and bust out at the same time I hear something coming through the brush about a hundred yards out. Pretty quick out steps a very large, 300lbs.+ boar. I let him settle in for a minute before putting a round in him. Thankfully, so I don't have to drag him out, he puts on about a 50 yard dash before I hear him crash in the brush. I head on back to camp and tell my buds about this big stinker and one of them wants to go have a look. We load up, head out, and locate the recently departed piled up under an oak tree. I'm looking him over and notice something shiny on the lower part of his foreleg, pull back some fur and...WTH!! He's got a handcuff on! Check the other foreleg, and there's another cuff!! They'd obviously been on him for quite a while as the skin had started to grow around the metal. We could only guess that at some time in the past he'd been trapped and someone had, unsuccessfully, tried to hobble him with a pair of police issue cuffs! Plenty of jokes about the hog that was such a bad*** he broke out of jail.


----------



## mikozz

Many years ago, my uncle was duck hunting in the marsh near Anahuac. He was walking along a bayou when he stumbled on a human skull. After cleaning out his pants <G> he walked around and found some clothes scattered around near the skull, but didn't see any other bones. He went back to the boat ramp, drove home and called the Sheriff. They took him out there in their boat so he could show them where it was. The Sheriff told my uncle that a guy who lived up the river had been reported missing about a year ago. It was presumed he had drowned, but the guy's wife had been calling the Sheriff every day asking if his body had been found, because the insurance company wouldn't pay until he was found. My uncle said that all the way out there, the Sheriff was saying "I hope it's that guy.....I hope it's him.....BOY I SURE HOPE IT'S THAT GUY! Turns out, it was!


----------



## kelley350x

activescrape said:


> Please post them, we would all love to see them.


i lost those pics when my computer crashed but my Dad emailed me pics from his camera, from a few years before. I am shocked he knows how to email them. I am the smallest guy thats way over dressed to be hunting. (why wear camo when you sitting in a stand?)

























this one was actually in the roof of the cave


----------



## activescrape

Thanks, Kelly, I would love to witness something like this in person someday. thanks again.


----------



## akw96

I would submit my experiences with my best friend John and his children on a lease near Thorton, TX.

On this lease was an old farmhouse with funny papers on the wall as wallpaper for the kids. Also some old Sears Catalog pages glued to the wall in other rooms. Most dated back to the 1920's.
We also found a hand-dug water well with bricks to hold the top surface together. This was not covered and we had to keep the kids away from it. 
Also going down the road to the lease was an old cemetery with graves dating back over a hundred years. It was humbling to know that we stood on the same ground, and overlooked the same scenery that the family must have scene so many years ago. 
Can you imagine that you sometimes are driving to a place where only horse and carriage could go?


----------



## kelley350x

activescrape said:


> Thanks, Kelly, I would love to witness something like this in person someday. thanks again.


no problem, the lease manager told us where it was at but all she could say is that it was at the water level and that if we parked by the three stones we could hike to it. so we found the three large boulders and go off of our quads, then we hiked for about three hours to get down to the water level. once we explored the cave for a while we stated hiking back to the quads. it took us 4 hours to get to the bottom abd 15 minutes to get back to the top. Its funny how when you know where your going and you at the bottom the path to the top is real clear..


----------



## Danny Jansen

About 30 years ago, hunting on what is now part of the Tecomate ranch, I found a piece of petrified wood about 18" long that had the markings on it where barbed wire had been wrapped around it. Lost it in one of our moves. 20 years ago, hunting white wings, I kicked a clump of grass looking for a dead bird. Instead of a bird I found an old beer can with the Falstaff label. The can is not alumunum and had to be opened with a church key (can opener for you younger folks). I still have it in my bar. It's actually in pretty good condition for being out in the weather for so long.


----------



## golfer47

Hunting near gonzales tx, I found a tombstone under a hunting cabin. It was for a young boy. No one on the ranch knew where it came from.Also, on a hunt near valentine tx I came upon a fort that had a plack from the state that told that it was the sight of the last raid by indians in the state. The most interesting thing about the fort was that everything was still intact, from desks in the school to items in the buildings. I asked the rancher about this and he said that the fort was so far back in his property that the only way to get to it was on horseback or to walk.And he allowed only certain people to go there with him.


----------



## tec

Golfer that fort sounds interesting. Do you remember it's name or did you take pictures?


----------



## whodad

Frozen Mexican Nationals in deer blinds, in the Golden Triangle are common. Five sleeping in one blind is uncommon


----------



## potro

Wow...just burned about 3hours at work reading all of these great posts...

Grat job keep it going!!!!


----------



## Trouthunter

*Fort Holland, TX*



tec said:


> Golfer that fort sounds interesting. Do you remember it's name or did you take pictures?


My guess is it is Fort Holland near Valentine.

*NAME: *Fort Holland 
*COUNTY: *Presido 
*ROADS: *2WD 
*GRID: *2 
*CLIMATE: *Cold in winter, hot in summer 
*BEST TIME TO VISIT: *Anytime 

*COMMENTS: *No residents. Located about 6 miles west of Valentine, Texas on the Chilicote Ranch road. Old Fort Buildings and site of the last indian battle in the US. Located on private property, but owners will allow visits. 
*REMAINS: *Old Fort buildings still standing. 

Fort Holland was built in the early 1900's to defend against Pancho Villa and his bandits. Fort was closed after the end of World War I.Also the State of Texas installed a historical marker, marking the site of the last indian battle in the US between the US Cavalry and the Commanche indians. Submitted by: Clarence Louviere

Information from: http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/tx/fortholland.html

TH


----------



## activescrape

Trouthunter said:


> My guess is it is Fort Holland near Valentine.
> 
> *NAME: *Fort Holland
> *COUNTY: *Presido
> *ROADS: *2WD
> *GRID: *2
> *CLIMATE: *Cold in winter, hot in summer
> *BEST TIME TO VISIT: *Anytime
> 
> *COMMENTS: *No residents. Located about 6 miles west of Valentine, Texas on the Chilicote Ranch road. Old Fort Buildings and site of the last indian battle in the US. Located on private property, but owners will allow visits.
> *REMAINS: *Old Fort buildings still standing.
> 
> Fort Holland was built in the early 1900's to defend against Pancho Villa and his bandits. Fort was closed after the end of World War I.Also the State of Texas installed a historical marker, marking the site of the last indian battle in the US between the US Cavalry and the Commanche indians. Submitted by: Clarence Louviere
> 
> Information from: http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/tx/fortholland.html
> 
> TH


 Very interesting.


----------



## JDawgog

*Bear Skull*



Ron Tedder said:


> Maybe someone can ID this skull for me. I found this while on a friends property last month in LaGrange. It's only about the size of my fist, so I figure it's a Bobcat, but i've done some internet searching and the closest image i've found it looks like a Black Bear, and that's just not possible. I know it shouldn't but this is driving me nuts.
> 
> Thanks,
> Ron


It's a black bear skull. I have one on my desk that my grandfather shot back in the 80's in Montana. It's surprisingly small for the size of the bear it was. Apparently bear heads are mostly fat and muscle.


----------



## tCassidy

Well I've only had two that don't sound like everyones elses.

My first was when we where in Tennesse my Dad and I where looking around and decided to hike to the top of one of the tallest hills in the area. When we got to the top there was an old stone wall about 100 ft long and about 4 ft tall. There wasn't a gap between any of the rocks, and a few trees had grown up through the wall. We decided to walk along the wall and at the base of the wall there was two cannon balls. We later found out that many skirmishes happened in the area because of Blountsville.

My second was in the Jasper area, me and my Uncle where squirrel hunting and we decited we where going to sit under a big Oak tree. So I sat down and right in front of me there was what looked like an old piece of aluminum sticking out of the ground. So I started pulling at it and came up and on the outside of the metal piece it said .30 Cal. in yellow paint and there appeared to be more pieces so I started digging. I eventualy ran into two containers of .30-06 ammo on belts! I guess it was for a machine gun or something. I don't have a clue why it was out there!!!


----------



## Trouthunter

I wonder if the .30 caliber machine gun was buried around there too?

TH


----------



## tCassidy

Not a clue...I couldn't find it again if I tryed!


----------



## PHAT_BOI

well the weirdiest thing i ever found while hunting with a family friend was 5 pot plant and gardining tools we went to town and told police what we found.. they came and harvested the plants for drug busts... thats what they told us anyway lol dam west texas cops


----------



## barleydog

*More info on Fort/Camp Holland*



golfer47 said:


> Hunting near gonzales tx, I found a tombstone under a hunting cabin. It was for a young boy. No one on the ranch knew where it came from.Also, on a hunt near valentine tx I came upon a fort that had a plack from the state that told that it was the sight of the last raid by indians in the state. The most interesting thing about the fort was that everything was still intact, from desks in the school to items in the buildings. I asked the rancher about this and he said that the fort was so far back in his property that the only way to get to it was on horseback or to walk.And he allowed only certain people to go there with him.


Per another website...

*Camp Holland (1918-1921)* - Also known as Jackass Camp, the post was built in 1918 after the Brite Ranch and Neville Ranch raids by Mexican bandits, the fort was named for the J. R. Holland Ranch on which it was built. The post included two barracks, that could house up to 400 men, four officers' houses, a mess hall, a guardhouse, bakery, blacksmith shop, and a quartermaster store. The post was responsible for supplying pack trains for the United States Cavalry as it patrolled the Mexican border against Pancho Villa and his bandits. By 1921 the army began phasing out border patrols in Presidio County and Camp Holland was closed. The buildings were initially leased to civilians, the Texas Rangers, and to customs and immigration border patrols. Later, they were sold.

Situated in Viejo Pass about 12 miles west of Valentine, Texas the site is also known as the site of the last battle in Presidio County between the U.S. Cavalry and Apache Indians, which occurred June 12, 1880. A historic marker designates the battle. Some of the old fort buildings still stand on the privately owned Miller Ranch. ​


----------



## mattc

just finished reading all of the stories it sure would be nice to see this one keep going


----------



## POC Troutman

Bringin it back to life!


----------



## Trouthunter

It's here for someone to post in...let's not clutter it up with other stuff. 

TH


----------



## flashlight

For some unknown reason I just found this topic. I have just spent two days off and on reading every post. This has to be the most interesting post ever.

Well here is my story. It was 1988 and I was in the US Airforce and stationed in England. I was working the main gate one day when an old man pulled up. He told me that he was retired in the AirForce and had been stationed there during World War II in the Army Air Corp. He related to me that he was shot down by a German ace and went down over the Sherwood forest near a town called Derbyshire. 
He told me he was messed up pretty bad during the crash, was in the hospital for months and finally went back to the states. 45 years later he come back over to England to find where he had crashed. He said he looked for it for 2 weeks and finally found the site with some help from some towns people. Some of the planes cockpit was still lodged in the ground. He had found some of his harness from the cockpit. He showed it to me and I just stood there in awe. He was bringing it back to the states to show his family.
I hope these stories keep on going!


----------



## brazman

This is a response to a story Johnmyjohn wrote on post #357 about the national forest area around Ratliff Recreation Area in East TX. My father in law grew up in Lufkin, not far from this area, and has hiked portions of the Four C's trail that runs 21 miles between Ratliff Lake and Neches Overlook. I have hiked 4 or 5 miles in from the Neches end with my wife and her dad, and that put a bug in my wife's heiney to do the whole thing some day.

Now, you have to think about this: backpacking in East Texas. You're pretty much a fool to try to do this anytime between April and October or so, soooo humid and thick, and you almost can't stand to carry any gear on top of the huge amount of drinking water you'll have to bring.

Well, my wife and a couple from the Midwest that we'd been introducing to the various regions and highlights of Texas decide to take advantage of the long weekend and drive out to go backpacking on Easter weekend two years ago. We drove out from Abilene (approx 6 hours), to start on the Neches end and hike down to the Ratliff end, leaving a vehicle at both ends. Our plan was to camp on the trail about halfway, thus taking two full days to make the full 21 mi. 

We get to the Neches Overlook, there's safety tape across the entrance and the trail's closed for the day due to controlled burns in the area! Pooper! Well, there's a number on the notice to call the Forest Service so we call and ask if there's a way to get around the burn area and still hike the rest. The lady doesn't seem very knowledgeable about what we're asking, so we decide to just head down to the Ratliff side and hike from the other end.

Well, we get down there, and in paying to come in to the park and leave our vehicle, we mention the burn to the attendant. She is surprised, has no idea that they were doing a burn, and thanks us for letting her know.

We park at the trail head, get loaded up, and start towards the bulletin board/start of the trail, when we see the EXACT SAME burn notice/trail closure pinned to this bulletin board, only no safety tape. We figure that the area that's being burned is way up on the other end, and we should be fine, so four adults make the decision to hike into a forest that, somewhere, is having a controlled burn that day. Everything is fine for the first couple of miles, everything is nice and green, but there's a random cold front sitting on the area for the weekend so it's cool and relatively dry. Aaaahhh!

Then the trail crosses a highway. We hike on, and start noticing that it's decidedly less green, more brown fading into gray and black...uh oh. This place has been burning, and fairly recently. We all exchange looks, and press on. Then we walk through a pocket of warmer air...and see a little bit of smoke hanging on the ground far off the trail...and see a large stump still smoldering...eek!

Basically, we hike the first afternoon about 7 miles in, find a nice space in the middle of many acres of trees and green, fresh grass to camp on, and wake up early the next morning with the prospect if hiking the other 14 miles today. As we hike we see lots of cool parts of the national forest, Big Slough area, some logging, some wildlife, and alot of the trail along an old railroad grade which looks really cool stretching off into the forest for miles. 

And, as we near the other end, we basically walk into a forest fire. It's not "raging", but stuff is burning everywhere and the ground is black and gray. The girls think it's hilarious, and we actually took a picture of them roasting marshmallows over a stump in the middle of the trail that's blazing. We never felt imminent danger, mind you, though I personally was on high alert! We crossed a few Forest Service roads that had been safety taped to prevent folks from hiking into the area we were hiking out of, which reinforces my thought that we were stupid and lucky, but again, never really in serious trouble.

We made it up the hill and to the car at Neches by about four that afternoon, meaning that we had hiked 21 miles with full packs in about 26 hours, with a good night's sleep in between. And we probably escaped a pretty painful death to boot.


----------



## mullethead00

A cave (entrance hidden my catcus, cedars). There was indian art on the roof, worn rocks used for grinding grain, and a few arrowhead. Found it while hiking in remote west texas.


----------



## Trouthunter

Pictures mullethead00?

TH


----------



## steb4680

I hunted for 15 years on a 1400 acres in Spicewood and we had a Historical Marker at our front gate for the Town of Rockvale. The cemetary was on the property and but was fenced in because we did not own it and it was still in use. There were only 5 of us on the ranch so there was alot of unexplored land. One day I was walking the land and found an old well with tin covering the hole, an old fire burning oven and a Studebaker pickup cab in a tree that I guess was used as a stand. Also found some home foundations made of stone from around the ranch and a stone fence that was about 3 feet high in places. Went over it the area with a metal detector and found some old tools, horseshoes, shell casings, a bed post and lots of nail and scrap. Nothing real exciting but it was neat to know there was a community on the land in the mid 1800s to the early 1900s. There is probably more out there but there is just so much you can cover with a metal detector before you are tired of digging and finding mostly nails.


----------



## southtexasreds

A very old mortar shell (it was broken in half) in a wide-open pasture on a ranch outside Pleasanton. Old army training ground probably? Or the most unique hunting weapon ever?


----------



## jag11741

This thread is great. Love reading all the stories.
Always found the coolest stuff hunting with Dad when i was a boy.
whether it was a cave in campwood on one of the lease we hunted. Or old Amry horse trailers and old cars. We also found a womens purse in a creek behind are house. Most likey had been robbed and the thief through it in the creek. 
This summer my boys and I found a cave at Garner state park and not "icebox" or "Crystal" the boys wanted to climb a different hill that doe snot have a trail so climb up the side of this hill which is to the left of the very first entrane road to Garner State park we find a cave.


----------



## USMCBay

I stolen Car, a field full of Marijuana (both in Alvin), and the coolest thing was a Cow Skull with the horn curled and growing back INTO the skull - the other was obviously growing into its jaw as the end of the horn was polished! Cool for me - NOT the cow. Sorry no good Rancher take care of yer CATTLE! Oh yea - and a Model A body... 

There's just not enough time to read all of these... How cool!


----------



## ATracker

I have always found the normal things like arrow heads, fossils, old remains of homes and the contents, old wells, caves, spent brass, etc. I would have to say the most unusual thing I every discovered or ran across was an old Indian burial ground that had been exposed by a recent flood. I spoke with the land owner and he told me the site had been reported to the authorities and an expedition crew was coming out to examine the area. I never did get any details since this was the end of the season and my lease for this place.


----------



## ATracker

Now that I think about it I do remember running across dead, bloated migrants in the summer months where I guided on ranches in South Texas. Do not drink the water!


----------



## ADub in T.C.

I was not able to read all of the posts in this thread and it is possible that the discovery I made along with hunting buddies has also been seen by someone else however I highly doubt it and I will give details. At a location in Trinity Co.TX , seated not far from our hunting property, there is an old abandoned bank safe that has had the back of it blown out and all of its contents removed. The front of the safe is still locked. Best we could tell it was built in the early 1900's possibly the late 1800's. There is very little marking on it that is still legible. However, it was obviously stolen and dragged out there. There are no roads leading to this location and it had to have been dragged by horse or some other method seeing as how the location is barely accessible by foot now. I guess it is possible it could have been hauled there by car back in the day but this SOB is heavy. When we found it about 12 years ago we were able to make it almost to the area on 4 wheelers but it is far to thick now.We were just out scouting when we came across it. We have questioned county offices to see if there is any record of roberries in which bank safes were stolen or business safes were stolen and no such record has matched what we found. However, we do know ole Bonnie and Clyde roamed east TX for a while so who knows. Pretty neat though. We have some pictures we took of it when we originally found it and I know as of two years ago it was still there. I will try and scan some of the old photos I have of it and see if I can get them loaded on here.


----------



## sofa king

The story above this one reminded me of my safe find. Unnamed landowner purchased a 100 acres that ajoined his property. I scouted the new 100 acres and came across a safe laying face up, this safe was very large 3'x3' x5' maybe 6' tall, the handles and knob were all beat off and the hindges looked like they had been worked on also, but they did not get into it. I had to get three buddies to help me just roll it over to see what was underneth, thinking maybe they had cut a hole in the back side. No hole but water started coming out all around the door once we rolled it.
Well the plan was made to go back that night with cutting tourch and sledge hammer and any thing eles we thought might help.
All we could think of was gold coins, jewles, cash, what ever you would keep in a safe that big, it had to have come from a large store, or bank being as big as it was. it looked very old. Had been laying there for years and years and years.
I have to admitt wwe were better safe crackers than who tried the first time. took us about two hours, cut about a 18"x18" hole in back, then had to beat concrete and wire mixed, that was about 3" thick, then had to cut throught the last piece of metal, this time about 12"x12". The addritalin was running strong when we made the final cut.
Could not beleive what we found inside, nothin, absolutlly nothin!!!!
We went from the biggest rush of all times to wanting to cry.
Sorry about the long read and nothin to show for it but a story.


----------



## haparks

god i started reading this last year and its still goin --so awsome


----------



## Grif-fin

haparks said:


> god i started reading this last year and its still goin --so awsome


No kidding. I'm waiting for some [email protected]$$ to ask if we don't know how to start a new thread.

Seriously though, I have read this entire thing and can't wait to find something unique enough to share.

Keep the stories coming and bring on more pics!


----------



## curtisd

*Jamaica*

I was on a study abroad program for marine sciences, we spent summers in Jamaica. We were snorkeling in the mangrove swamps and found the ribs of an old wooden shipwreck sticking out of the mud. We continued to dive down and follow the ribs, at some point we found a plastic bag with marker tags from the acheology excavation. We had stumbled upon a new shipwreck find that they were in the process of un-covering from the mangroves and had been abandoned. We dove on it for hours looking around.

Near that site was the ruins of one of the original camps from the Colombus era. The walls had been built out of ships balast as well as the pathway they built from one of the grounded ships. The area was covered by land crab burrows, every morning we would go look around the burrow entrances and find artifacts from that era that the crabs had dug up. The most common was ceramic pipe stems and bowls. The sites are not protected by any kind of historical group, just a few local caretakers. They had a hiding spot they kept all of the goodies the crabs brought up, it was pretty odd to see things from the original discovery of Jamaica hidden under some rocks to show people instead of a museum.


----------



## Fishon21

*Unusual things*

We had a lease on the top of a hill in leaky tx , my GPS said it was 2160 ft above sea level and we found sea shells that were imbedded in the rock .
i though that was pretty cool. :texasflag


----------



## dog

This was my wildes find to date.


----------



## scooter79

You must be down near the border.


----------



## salth2o

I stumbled across this old car last week while doing a little scouting on a piece of our property that I have never hunted.

Any idea on what kind of car or year it is? I could not find any identifying marks.


----------



## RB II

Looks like a '20s or 30's era convertible car. Probably has some value.


----------



## Trouthunter

Looks like the frame of a Model A and yea the doors and fenders are valuable to those who refurbish the old cars.

TH


----------



## goatchze

Trouthunter said:


> Looks like the frame of a Model A and yea the doors and fenders are valuable to those who refurbish the old cars.
> 
> TH


Yep, looks like a model A to me too.


----------



## Mike.Bellamy

Best thread ever, has really helped get through this mundane Monday. Nothing to add myself but awesome stuff to read.


----------



## Buscadero

A few East Texas points mostly found around creek beds and a stone "grinder" of some sort I found just off the Perdnales River about 1962.


----------



## greenhornet

Just read all 51 pages, simply awesome.


----------



## nightgigger

While looking at google maps for a fishing spot, I saw the old streets of Virginia Point.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sou...536,-94.902198&spn=0.008064,0.021973&t=h&z=16
You can see the grid layout of the old streets in the marsh North east of the railroad.


----------



## gloveboy

I stumbled across this old car last week while doing a little scouting on a piece of our property that I have never hunted.

Any idea on what kind of car or year it is? I could not find any identifying marks.

That is a 1925 - 1927 Model T "Touring Body"...just sold mine a few months ago!


----------



## daddyhoney

Thanks to all who have posted. These reflections have brought back memories I had not recalled for years. 

I have always been an arrow head hunter and while on adventures in the woods kept my nose to the ground looking for such. I hunted in the late 60's on a large goat ranch along the Rio Grande between Del Rio and Lang Tree. In those days the Amasted dam was still backing up the river thus making the lake. Way up where we hunted there were cliffs and bluff shelters with lots of indian remains. Because the river was becoming deeper the artifacts were in danger of of being covered. A little university in Austin was advised of the potential loss but little interest was shown. One day while exploring one of the deeper bluff shelters, i had a surprise. The shelter walls were light colored limestone I guess. The floors were covered in years of goat poo which had to be shoveled aside to uncover the bones, stone implements and what appeared to be remains of nets. As was common in caves and shelters was a black smoke stained over head. In this particular case the ceiling was only about four feet from the floor. I was on all fours exploring and bumped my head on the ceiling and was immediately covered with a blanket of about a million grand daddy long leg spiders. Talk about get the heck out quick, I hate spiders. The dark over head in this case was them along with the smoke stain.

Down the river a short distance was where a trail crossed from Mexico to the Tx side. This trail was known as the Elephant Trail because of the volume of people using it. The river had been shallow there and a man could wade across without much trouble. That is before the dam was built and now with the increased depth the occasional person would drown and wash up on the shore where an eddy swept the body into what we began calling dead mans pool. 

Once while stationed in San Diego, Calif. a friend and I would take predator rifles into the desert area east of San Diego across from Tecate Mex. where we would shoot long range at jack rabbits and yotes. We had spotted a pile of boulders a couple of hundred feet high that looked like a good sniper's hide to bush whack some game. Once on the top looking in all directions I wondered who else had used this look out. A small depression in the top looked like a great place for a natural fire pit so I got to poking around in the sandy soil. I uncovered three gold colored calvary jacket buttons and several button hooks. Still have them.


----------



## WildThings

daddyhoney said:


> I uncovered three gold colored calvary jacket buttons and several button hooks. Still have them.


Those are some great stories. Would love to see some pictures of the buttons and hooks!!


----------



## pwrstrkr

I just spent the last two nights at work reading this thread off and on, and i am not a reader by NO means but this one really caught my attention. It is amazing to see the discoveries that many of you have made out there and was really how supprised how many of them are from my area or places that i go often. I know that the couple of the things that I have found are not near as interesting as most but im goin to keep this thing going with what i got. 
#1 while fly fishing in NM my cousin and I stumbled across an old Model A in the middle of the woods while hiking to one of our fishing holes. Wish now that i would have taken pictures cause we could never find it again after trying for 2 days!!
#2 I have fished, hog, duck, squirrell hunted the river bottoms and river for my entire life being that i grew up not even a mile from the sabine river. But was fishing one day around an island that i have shot many hogs off of when the water gets high, but something caught my eye. So i pull the boat up to the bank and walked up to what was looking like just an old shack or something. As i got closer i could see stuff hanging from the walls, when i get up there i noticed it was probly around 100 furs on all the walls of this "shack". I did some research and it was an old trappers shack. I know this area has a lot of Indian artifacts so now when i go hunting or fishing grom now on i will deffinately keep my eyes open. This thread is amazing lets keep it going!!


----------



## pwrstrkr

I have no idea how i forgot about this but I did but it will always be stuck in my head. It was December 13, 2008 my brother and I were going duck hunting in Sabine Pass, TX one morning. On the way there we were talking about the helicopter that had crashed off of the coast a few days before. But as we were driving the 4 wheeler down the beach something caught my eye and I had to turn around. Sure enough it was the entire tail piece to the helicopter that had crashed and also one of the passengers lunch box still neatly packed with sandwhich, snacks and water. Needless to say there wasnt much duck hunting that went on the morning just chasing my dog down the beach while the other choppers were landing thru-out the morning. Im going to have to find the pictures and post them up. Oh yea and later that evening the last missing person from the crash was found about a mile down the beach from where i had made my discovery.


----------



## lucas_shane

i cant mention the name of the ranch as i was asked not to years ago when this all came about. i was working on a lil 5k acre ranch in thurber tx. it is known for its mining past. we was out scouting places to put up some blinds on the edge of the lil mountain and found this "hole". we got to clearing a lil brush and found it was about 7 ft in diameter and a cave. we got to going in a lil at a time and got scared so we left and got lights and ropes. tied the rope to myself and to the 4 wheeler and went in. about 50 ft in we found a small set of train tracks and about 100 ft in there was three lil carts on the rail !! we knew we had found one of the old coal mine shafts and was excited. all in all there was the tracks, 3 carts, a miners hard hat with the lil carbide lantern on top and double sided pick and some other hand tools. never got any deeper in than about 125 to 150 ft. 
went back and reported it to the owner and demanded us to keep it quite and close the intrance. 

i have kept my promise and not mentioned any names but this is something i will never forget !!!



this is a great thread and enjoy everybodys stories


----------



## aggie2013

Great thread!!! Wish I had some stories to share!


----------



## vickark

Tommy2000 said:


> In December of 1999, my buddies and I were deer hunting in central Iowa and while pushing some deer from the nearby woods, we not only pushed out many deer but also a 7 year old girl. She had her coat on and came out right behind the deer. ***? we thought. She said her name was "Wildflower" and her trailer home had burned the night before and she had been out all night. I scooped her up to take her to the truck and smelled no smoke and realized she was too clean to have been out all night.
> Then we see a helicopter flying overhead, LifeFlight out of Des Moines and start to wonder. We called the Sheriff and within 2-3 minutes we were surrounded by Sheriff, police and DNR(game wardens).
> As it turns out this little girl, Katlynd Reed, had ran away from her grade school earlier in the day, three miles away. Her mother worked for Mercy Hospital and had the LifeFlight helicopter searching as well as all the LEO's in the area. Were they ever so glad some "Hunters" found her, safe and sound.
> I still have the picture of her I took and the newspaper article from the next day. My guess is she's still grounded to this day.


I remember seeing that story in the news. There was also some video coverage on it.


----------



## -D

Back in the early seventies while my Dad was in Law School he went hunting at my grandfather's lease in Bracketville (T.W. Winters Ranch) In one of the back pastures he shot a buck and forgot his leather handle knife on the rock next to the deer.(I was about 4 then) He and I were hunting the same pasture when I was in high school and he droped another buck, walked up to the deer and there was his knife still sitting on the rock where he left it. Handle was gone at this point. He took a section of antler from the buck and made a new handle for the knife - uses it as a letter opener in his office to this day.


----------



## -D

This one is fishing.........a buddy of mine and I were going to school up at TAMU and decided to go catch some white bass on Livingston. We were seriously broke - enough money for gas, beer,and 2 hellbenders and 2 spoons. We hung the hellbenders up and lost them right off the bat off Pine Island. I was a little lit and grabed a knife and dove in. By the time I got done cutting lures off the snag we had 45 hellbenders and I can't remember how many spoons. Pretty stupid move I guess but you think you are bulletproof at 19.


----------



## Fish Doctor

I hunted a lease once in El Indio back in the day. I had a few weird encounters with illegals. i wouldnt call them discoveries though. I shot a deer at the same exact time a group of mexicans were crossing a field in the opposite direction. that probably scared the shat outta them. another time i saw a family of them crossing the road and about 5 minutes later i saw a cougar following the tracks, didnt get enough time to get a shot though. hope it was a happy ending for the family


----------



## Fish Doctor

forgot about this one, i was hunting public land a long arse time ago i was just about to get out of my tree stand when i heard crashing coming from behind me. and it was no small animal. turned around getting ready to draw my bow and lo and behold a black panther was sprinting straight under my stand. i dont remember where i was exactly but what i do remember is that i hauled arse back to my truck.


----------



## kelley350x

-D said:


> and there was his knife still sitting on the rock where he left it.


Thats awesome...


----------



## teamgafftop1

My dad found a fossilized buffalo skull in Wyoming a few years ago. Said he was walking in a creek bed and saw something white sticking out of the creek bank. He just thought it was a piece of bone and started digging it out with a stick. He said an hour-and-a-half later he had the entire skull out and it was completely fossilized. It's just sitting in his basement on top of a gun safe. Not sure what else to do with it though.

He has an eye for that kind of stuff. He finds things almost everywhere he goes and has quite the collection of native artifacts from just about everywhere from Montana to Texas back to N.C. and Fl.


----------



## Trouthunter

Cool on the buffalo skull...I'd figure a way to display that!

My Dad was the same way; I'd walk over arrowheads and he'd pick them up 

TH


----------



## teamgafftop1

Trouthunter said:


> Cool on the buffalo skull...I'd figure a way to display that!
> 
> My Dad was the same way; I'd walk over arrowheads and he'd pick them up
> 
> TH


I know...next time I go home I'm going to try and figure out something to do with it. I'll have someone take a picture of it and send it so I can post.

He found an arrowhead three years ago while we were pheasant hunting at Santa Anna Hunting Area up around Coleman. It was on the mowed edge of a field that I bet hundreds of people have walked over through the years and never saw it. Some people just have an eye for that stuff.


----------



## fillet

*not usuall for a texas boy*

While in colorado mule deer hunting I was scouting the day before season riding my fourwheeler up through a mountain creek/road felt like there was no other people on earth at the time, and while riding along I met up with a cougar/moutain lion/etc. he was about the same size a my wheeler and alot bigger in real life than I espected he was about twenty yards from me well I was unarmed except for binos and a cantene but I was on a wheeler so I figured I would run it at him and scare him off well the reving of the engine and the move towards him did not impress him none and he just stared at me like I was a fresh grilled Tbone and the look on his face was enough to tell me to let him be so I rode away and decided to never go scouting in the mountains again unarmed. Dont know if many have been that close to one and looked eye to eye with one like that but if you have most would agree its not too comfortable.:walkingsm


----------



## johnmyjohn

It's been a while since I looked at this thread, can't believe this thing is still going and still has some good reads.
I'll add this one from my teens. I would on occasion **** hunt with my ex-wifes grandfather. He would drive around during the day to show me the area we were to hunt so I wouldn't get lost at night. He was up in age and for the most part just sat in the truck and smoked while I or his grandson chased down the dogs and *****. We got permission to hunt a piece of land that bordered the Trinity river around Centerville. He drove us across a field to the river bank. The river seemed wider there and swifter. He said the river was shallow there and it was an Indian crosssing up until his father's life time. It was also the crossing travellers took going east to west and back before true roads were around. He walked up the hill on the bank and pointed at a stand of huge oaks and said the Indians had a camp here like he saw it himself. I just listened and we walked back to the truck and left not thinking that much about it. 
A few years later his grandson and I came back to fish that same spot on the river bank. We got our rods and started wading across feeling for the river to start getting deeper and it didn't. The bottom was like sandstone. We were half way across when the story the old man told me came to my mind and I started talking about it. We finally found the channel because I fell into it, it was about three foot deeper and about as wide as my shoulders. I had to climb out of it because the sides were like someone cut it with a saw, but it was shin deep all across except the small channel. We fished and brother in law started saying he was told basically the same story. He said he went up to the stand of oaks and found a mess of arrow heads once. So I said show me where. We walked a short ways and he pointed at the ground. He said he would just look on the surface after the cattle walked around and pick them up. He was talking and bent over and picked one up right at his feet. It was whole and perfect. 
We turned around and went back to the truck. You have to remember I was a kid and a piece of rock was interesting but digging for earthworms as bait was more important to me and him. We got some dry cloths on and he pointed to a large kitchen match box in his glove box. I pulled it out and opened it to find it almost full of arrow heads from that spot. I said they were cool and closed it and put it back in the glove box.
Almost 40 years later I'm still threatening to go back by river and find that spot just to look around the bank to see what erosion has left behind. I've even romanced the idea of that area being part of the old spanish trail.


----------



## kray59

great thread. i said when i got to the end i would post my finding if i didn't repeat to many. anyhow,once when dove hunting a spoils area off the neaches river by beaumont i found a brass rifle case that was about 30 cal. and had german eagle from ww2 on base of it and while hunting the big thicket near saratoga i found a pair off channel lock about head high that a tree had grown through that were almost rusted down to nothing . still have both items and will try to take pics and post.look forward to next chance i get to get caught up on thread . i don't think it will ever end.hope not.


----------



## Larry Pure

While working on the DFW airport, we were cutting a drainage channel and were down 20 -25 ft. in some black shale. We noticed some focils that looked like short fat aligator gar. There were several that appeared to be covered by a mud slide or something else that trapped the fish alive because you could see the scales, eye sockets, and the grains on the fins. We dug them out and the airport board claimed them to put on display.


----------



## activescrape

Larry Pure said:


> While working on the DFW airport, we were cutting a drainage channel and were down 20 -25 ft. in some black shale. We noticed some focils that looked like short fat aligator gar. There were several that appeared to be covered by a mud slide or something else that trapped the fish alive because you could see the scales, eye sockets, and the grains on the fins. We dug them out and the airport board claimed them to put on display.


That is so cool. I would love to see those.


----------



## roninrus1

CentexPW said:


> I hunted the Colorado Rockies for Elk and Mulies in the 70's and found a lot of Mining and Prospecting stuff. Found it in the deepest darkest parts of the forrest. Most of the stuff was overgrown and hidden, Cabins, Huts, Shacks, Mine shafts, Mining Equipment, bottles , cans, tools. A lot of writing on trees from miners and sheep herders. Stuff you wondered how they got it there. The coolest thing was a complete Elk Bull skeleton. The Bull had stepped between a root on the side of the hill and it was now straddling the root trapped. It died right there. It looked like the ceyotes had'nt gotten to it because it was intact and bleached out. The interesting thing was the back leg was broken and had healed side by side making one leg shorter than the other.


Lived in CO a few years ago and worked with a geologist who grew up in CO. According to him when WW2 broke out most mining was shutdown and people left to work in war plants, etc. They just abandoned everything where it was. According to him there is still a lot of gold in many of the old mines as they were producing when shut down. Guy was pretty sharp - had a sack of nuggets he had found and a few rough diamonds from NW CO where there was an old diamond mine.


----------



## roninrus1

mjmaxwell8 said:


> after a deer-less morning, i walkied my buddy, (we will call him craig) to tell him i would be walking up to his stand from the south, so not to shoot that way. with no reply and no shots fired, i figured he was waiting on a particular shot so i figured it best not to bother him. after a while had passed, i got on the four wheeler and headed over with quite a bit of hunters orange on figuring he had fallen asleep. what i found when i started walking up the steps was my buddy and some **** woman scurrying to pull their pants up- in the deer stand! the kicker of this whole story is that- i swear to god- the girl had something of a mustache, not to mention a few extra pounds! to this day he wont tell us the full story, but i think she lived not far from the lease, and this wasnt their first rendezvous. he politely gave her a ride home.


Similar thing happened to me on lease in Jackson county. Only it was the best friend and the wife of the guy who ran the lease. Ain't going into any detail about how long it took them to get their britches up but thet weren't in a hurry. Other stories about her but nuff said.


----------



## roninrus1

When a kid I was squirrel hunting near Votaw and crossed an old dirt road and there was .22 Remington with a Weaver scope on it. Had a coat of surface rust so it hadn't been there for more than a couple of day. Cleaned up real nice and still have it. There have been a small mountain of rabbits, squirrels and even a few hogs killed with it.

Neighbor and I hunted early teal around '82 and when we got back to ramp at Fort Anahuac there were two women sunbathing topless.
Had similar thing fishing Lake Livingston when jungle was still green trees. Guy bass fishing with back to us and a girl laid out across a ice chest sunbathing topless. Spoil sport wife just had to clear her throat and then tell me that I didn't have to stare. Quit taking her because of this.
And another time drifting and flyfishing a creek off Lake Norfork in SW MO in late 60's when brother and I floated up on two college age girls sun bathing in the nude.
Yes, I have been blessed!!!

Mid-80's squirrel hunting Davy Crockett Nat. Forest with an ex-Army Ranger buddy and I found a large dope patch. Had boobie traps protecting it. Told JJ about it and he just had to see it. Bet they were pretty upset when they returned and found the traps stripped.

Wasn't hunting but scuba diving Offats Bayou in Galveston and found a sawed off double-barrel 12 ga with one live round and one that had been shot. Was assistant instructor doing a search and rescue class of police officers, so had to turn it in to Galveston cops.


----------



## RogerB

roninrus1 said:


> Neighbor and I hunted early teal around '82 and when we got back to ramp at Fort Anahuac there were two women sunbathing topless.
> Had similar thing fishing Lake Livingston when jungle was still green trees. Guy bass fishing with back to us and a girl laid out across a ice chest sunbathing topless. Spoil sport wife just had to clear her throat and then tell me that I didn't have to stare. Quit taking her because of this.
> And another time drifting and flyfishing a creek off Lake Norfork in SW MO in late 60's when brother and I floated up on two college age girls sun bathing in the nude.
> Yes, I have been blessed!!!


can I tag along next time you go hunting or fishing?? 
I do love this thread.


----------



## jiginit

*One that sticks in my mind*

The only time I found something of relevance was in my teen years on a lease my family had years ago. I remember the old lady that owned it on the Rio grande river always told us of a pasture that could only be reached by horseback or walking the river bank which could take all day and maybe a night. But warned us og the hazards going into that part of the ranch. My cousin and I could not stand it we had to veture into the unknown pasture against the advise of the elder men on the lease. So off we go and discover a massive canyon wall with several small caves. We are only able to scale to a couple of the caves, But in one we find a gun belt with a 45 and a 30cal carbine both rusted beyond repair a skull with remants of a felt het of some sort. Of coarse we leave it in place and report back at camp of our find. My uncle puts us in the truck the next morning off to the landowners, Turns out it was a ranch hand working for the family who they thought quite and never came for his pay. He was last seen in 1912.


----------



## RogerB

Gawd I love this thread!


----------



## Trouthunter

> But in one we find a gun belt with a 45 and a 30cal carbine both rusted beyond repair a skull with remants of a felt het of some sort. Of coarse we leave it in place and report back at camp of our find. My uncle puts us in the truck the next morning off to the landowners, Turns out it was a ranch hand working for the family who they thought quite and never came for his pay. He was last seen in 1912.


Wow! Did they contact the sheriff and get the body removed?

TH


----------



## Hogpaw

What an awesome thread!


----------



## Hydrocat

Couple of cool finds for me- I have found plenty of arrowheads but this one was pretty unique. I have looked online but really cant find anything looking exactly like this one with the long shaft and wide tip.

Also this rock with a fossil in it- on the back side is just a regular old rock but either a shell or a plant is fossillized on the front. Wild thinking sea water may have been all over Brackettville, Tx.


----------



## realwrangler

old headstone and a cave


----------



## Agwader

I had a buddy of mine who was hunting golf balls on a golf course pond (that had been around since the 20's). He found a wallet that belonged to a Doctor and noticed his drivers license in it had expired in 1980. He found it right under a golf cart bridge, so evidently it had bounced out of the cart as he drove over the bridge. The wallet had 6- $100 biils in it, he went to the pro shop to ask if they knew who the Dr. was and they said he had passed away about 10 years ago. Needless to say it was a good day for my Bud.


----------



## Squid94

Stumbled upon these petroglyphs while hunting Mexico.


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

Forgot one. In '99, my brother, my son and I were fishing the Guadalupe river at the new bridge to His Hill camp, which was built after the busload of kids went into the river in the fall of '87. A lot of those kids died. One was never found.

My brother started hollering and running back upstream with something in his hand. It was part of a human jawbone.

I walked back up to where my truck was parked and climbed on the roof to get a signal and called the sherriff's office, which was 20 miles away. Hugo Boehm, one of the deputies involved in the original rescue, and later searches for the missing kids, arrived in ten minutes!

There were a bunch of deer bones on top of the spot where the jawbone was and Boehm remembered the cadaver dogs hitting on that spot, but the handlers thought it was a mistake because of the deer bones. 

Turns out the jawbone wasn't from the missing kid, but from an unknown female.

Didn't get to do much fishing, but had a memorable trip anyway.

LF


----------



## Nitroexpress

*Bulverde Point?*

I think your unique point is a Bulverde. I am no expert, but one of my hunters is a fanatic and indicated that.

Check out - http://www.texasarrowheads.com/type-gallery/pages/bulverde-t0729.html



Hydrocat said:


> Couple of cool finds for me- I have found plenty of arrowheads but this one was pretty unique. I have looked online but really cant find anything looking exactly like this one with the long shaft and wide tip.
> 
> Also this rock with a fossil in it- on the back side is just a regular old rock but either a shell or a plant is fossillized on the front. Wild thinking sea water may have been all over Brackettville, Tx.


----------



## Gamblinhand

Hunting in Tanzania we ended up climbing this really tall peak to do some scouting and we discovered an old German outpost. Found some old bits and pieces of pottery that I brought back. I looked all over the place trying to find something besides those pieces of pottery, but to no avail. It was an incredible view point, you could see for a thousand miles it seemed. It was also quite the hike getting up there.


----------



## Outlaw Mo

While deer hunting on public land in north Louisiana back in the 1980's I found this small, glass medicine bottle lying on the ground in the pine needles. I researched a little about it and learned that it was made in the 1870's and contained "medicine", but was really more of a snake oil type stuff that was prevalent at the time.


----------



## brokenpole

I think that arrowhead is was a andice that has been resharpened down to nothing, it definitly been used a great deal


----------



## CLuton

Bulvedere! Andice was a good guess, but flaking looks wrong!! Nice find!


----------



## JayTray

Back in the early 80s I was deer hunting in Coryell Co. Mid day I was cruising around and noticed something tangled in a mesquite bush. It was a small box with what was left of a defalted balloon. At the time I didnt know what it was, just threw it in the cab of the truck and kept rollin til the evening hunt. Come to find out it was a meteorological weather balloon. Later on I notice some printing on the box there was a warning... RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL blah blah... Great! Nothing like having PLUTONIUM riding shotgun with ya. No ill effects so far... Except my daughter was born nekkid!


----------



## pesurf

Out on a Black/Brown Bear hunt across "the ditch" (Lynn Canal) from Juneau when stationed out there a few military tours back. I was hunting the grass meadows of St. James Bay. Climbed up a tree to glass. Looked across a moss covered branch and spied the perfect skeleton of a salmon. I figured an eagle must have taken it & stashed it. Pretty cool


----------



## TexasBlood

My family has a house on Richland Chambers, south of Corsicana, about 100yds off the retaining wall there is a old indian camp ground which is visible when the lake levels drop, found lots of arrowheads, our neighbor found a human skull, we have found femurs and what not so it is most likely a burial ground as well

My body owns a ranch about 30 southwest of Gatesville, i went hog hunting and he showed me indian burial grounds where rocks were laid out in shape of the human there were 5 or 6 of them....he has found spears, hatchets, knives, and buckets of arrowheads and I believe a headband but Im not to sure

Keep them coming!


----------



## EagleOne

Once when I was about 10 or so I went hunting/fishing with my Dad and brother at Calaveras Lake near San Antonio.I had just set my rig in the water and was about to go look for some rabbits when I seen a black object across the water about 60-70 yards.I raised my rifle to shoot it while alerting my Dad of the dog.(note:My Dad never allowed us to kill something for fun but in case of dogs it was more mercy killing because if they were out there it was that some one abandoned them and they would die a miserable death) At the moment I sighted him in. i noticed to a long thick tail whirling around(it was drinking water) and my Dad told me not to shoot.After a few seconds my dad realized it wasnt a dog but a black panther.Im not trying to pull any legs here.Im serious.Apparently, we found later through friends property that some one had it and it got loose and no one thought it to be alive.But it was.We high tailed it back and told our friends and came back with bigger guns but it was gone.It was out there for some time until some hunters dogs chased it up a tree and killed it.


----------



## ATE_UP_FISHERMAN

EagleOne said:


> it wasnt a dog but a black panther.Im not trying to pull any legs here.Im serious.Apparently, we found later through friends property that some one had it and it got loose and no one thought it to be alive.But it was.We high tailed it back and told our friends and came back with bigger guns but it was gone.It was out there for some time until some hunters dogs chased it up a tree and killed it.


Good story with a sad ending. You should have left the last part out..


----------



## Bottomsup

Ok guys here are a some of my cool finds while hunting. I found this while walking the top of a header around the rimrock in Bakersfield,Tx. It appears to be a sea urchin of some sort. I wish I would have collected more because they were all over this one area and I have never seen them anywhere else in all the years of West Texas hunting.


----------



## Bottomsup

This one looks like the hind leg of a small critter but also appears to be flint inside. Any ideas?


----------



## Bottomsup

This one was found in Bakersfield also. Its round, smooth rock and has a whole through the middle.


----------



## Bottomsup

My daughter found this fossil when she was 7 in Bakersfield.


----------



## Bottomsup

My recent arrowheads from around Waco,Tx.


----------



## Bottomsup

Old Keys from all over Texas. Old ranch houses.


----------



## Bottomsup

Most unexpected find inside a deer. I shot this nice 10 point whitetail while rifle hunting in Sheffield,TX. around 1993. At the camp we would quarter up our deer and put them in coolers. The law says that the ribs are part of a quartered carcus although useless to me I would keep them just to be legal. When I was removing the ribs I noticed this knot in the back bone. I though to myself this deer broke its back or it has been shot before. As I carved away at all the cartilage around the mass I noticed ther was metal inside. What I was expecting to be a bullet turned out to be broadhead and part of a grey arrow shaft. I removed the section of back bone and boiled it in water to remove all the tissue. If you can see in the pics the bone grew through the vents in the broad head blades so it had been there for some time. Also the way the broadhead was positioned being a three blade just missed the spinal cord. If one blade had been down it would have cut the spinal cord and the deer would have died. We talked to the guys that hunted this lease 5 years earlier and one of them remembered shooting a 8 point high in the back and loosing him. I asked him what broadhead and arrows he was using and he said. Rockey Mountain heads and Jim Doughtery grey arrows. What are the odds? I dont know if this deer was lucky or unlucky but they sure are tough.


----------



## activescrape

Bottomsup said:


> Old Keys from all over Texas. Old ranch houses.


These are all neat posts. How did you come up with all those keys though?


----------



## Bottomsup

Some my dad collected and some from looking around old fallen down ranch houses. Not many left anymore


----------



## teamgafftop1

teamgafftop1 said:


> My dad found a fossilized buffalo skull in Wyoming a few years ago. Said he was walking in a creek bed and saw something white sticking out of the creek bank. He just thought it was a piece of bone and started digging it out with a stick. He said an hour-and-a-half later he had the entire skull out and it was completely fossilized. It's just sitting in his basement on top of a gun safe. Not sure what else to do with it though.
> 
> He has an eye for that kind of stuff. He finds things almost everywhere he goes and has quite the collection of native artifacts from just about everywhere from Montana to Texas back to N.C. and Fl.[/QUOTE
> 
> I was in N.C. last week so, as promised, here are some pics of the buffalo head. I was mistaken about the "fossilized" part. According to the archaeologist in WY who looked at it, only the ends of the horns are fossilized. I guess dad found it before the whole thing could fossilize. He also said they think it was a buffalo cow and not a bull.


----------



## Cable

Came across a feeder and stand on public hunting grounds in Denton County. Funny thing was it was waterfowl only


----------



## Deriso

I saw a coyote "molesting" a hog. It was a sight. Lol


----------



## CaptDocHoliday

I once found a duck band off of a hen mallard while shed hunting. It was in a pile of feathers that was a **** or varmit kill. The band has a set of teeth marks on it from where the killer had chomped down on the it while eating the bird.


----------



## cglenn

*Amazing artifact that I have had for almost 40 years*

First off this wasn't found hunting so I don't know if it qualifies for posting in this thread but I have always wanted some help identifying this artifact.

A little about the piece. It was found in Carson City, Nevada in the late 60's by my late uncle. My uncle was a great man, a celebrated war hero, a public servant by means of serving on the bomb squad and fire department and later on once again serving our great country in several capacities. He is sorely missed. This was unearthed during some gardening work at his house while tilling up the eart. It was given to me in the early 70's. I have tried, albeit 10-15 years ago, to identify it by posting pictures and even by taking it to a local museum. I received little of no help as it seems as if I either posted it in the wrong place or talked to the wrong people. This thread immediately renewed my interest in solving this family mystery.

Here it is in all it's glory. It is made of a clay type material and looks to have an arrowhead partially embeded in the side. If anyone can steer me in the right direction, all help would be greatly appreciated.


----------



## activescrape

It looks Mayan to me. What an incredible find!


----------



## kinja

That's Greg Brady's tiki doll. He reburied it on their Nevada ghost town adventure.


----------



## Gamblinhand

Antique Road Show and its worth MILLIONS!!!!--------------cool piece


----------



## Mt. Houston Marine

Is this it. I have never found anything, this has been an amazing read. How about unusual sightings ???


----------



## sir catches alot

While hunting out near Sanderson I found a cave full of Indian paintings on the walls.


----------



## RogerB

sir catches alot said:


> While hunting out near Sanderson I found a cave full of Indian paintings on the walls.


yup, I believe that - there's lots of indian paintings out that way. From Del Rio going north. Along the Devils River, the Pecos and just almost anywhere - wonder if Ancient Indian parents had the same problems today's parents have - with kids writing graffiti on everything that had a bare spot.


----------



## 2lazy2fish

I'll play. but only with stories I can provide pictures for.

buddy of mine has a place down kinda between hondo and bracketville. for his middle kid's birthday, couple of dads took the daughters. he kept talking about this "crystal cavern" cave on a neighbors place. saying how cool it was, etc. after a pretty aggresive 4wd trip to get there and scraping my 4 door down tiny jeep trails, we climbed up a hill and dropped into this cave. it was probably the coolest thing I've ever seen. the first room was about 15x30x10 with a crawlspace to a second room a little smaller. cave? big deal. I've been in several big caves over the years. what made this interesting, was it was like standing inside a geode. every square inch of the walls/ceiling/floor (except for the broken junk/dust/etc that accumulates on the floor) was a crystal. pictures dont even do it justice. most of the crystals were the size of a football. simply amazing.
funny thing about it, for a bunch of 8 year old girls, its cool but no big deal. for the dads who realize you'll never see anything like it again....it was amazing.


----------



## activescrape

WOW!


----------



## Trouthunter

There is a lot of area between Hondo and Bracketville lol...but man that's probably the coolest cave I've ever seen pictures of.

Thanks for sharing.

TH


----------



## skniper

I posted this find numerous pages back, just got back from the lease where its been and thought to bring it back this time and put up a pic.

Found this in a less traveled part of the property near Sonora a few years ago while we were setting up a new blind. I wandered off, as usual, to look around the area and found this gun lever sitting on the surface of the dirt. I assume its a Winchester (30-30?) it matches the lever on my old Winch 30-30. Its real dry out there and the rust pitting is pretty heavy in spots so I'm assuming it's pretty old.
Always puzzled me how the lever out of a lever action rifle happened to be there, by itself, they dont just fall out...and nothing else appeared to be around. I did not mark the exact location, but have walked through there a couple times trying to re-find it for a closer look.
Theres a couple known homestead sites out there i'd like to get a metal detector on...


----------



## skniper

WOW! 2lazy, i'd love for my kids to see that...the off road trip sounds like fun too.



2lazy2fish said:


> I'll play. but only with stories I can provide pictures for.
> 
> buddy of mine has a place down kinda between hondo and bracketville. for his middle kid's birthday, couple of dads took the daughters. he kept talking about this "crystal cavern" cave on a neighbors place. saying how cool it was, etc. after a pretty aggresive 4wd trip to get there and scraping my 4 door down tiny jeep trails, we climbed up a hill and dropped into this cave. it was probably the coolest thing I've ever seen. the first room was about 15x30x10 with a crawlspace to a second room a little smaller. cave? big deal. I've been in several big caves over the years. what made this interesting, was it was like standing inside a geode. every square inch of the walls/ceiling/floor (except for the broken junk/dust/etc that accumulates on the floor) was a crystal. pictures dont even do it justice. most of the crystals were the size of a football. simply amazing.
> funny thing about it, for a bunch of 8 year old girls, its cool but no big deal. for the dads who realize you'll never see anything like it again....it was amazing.


----------



## mullethead00

2lazy2fish said:


> i'll play. But only with stories i can provide pictures for.
> 
> Buddy of mine has a place down kinda between hondo and bracketville. For his middle kid's birthday, couple of dads took the daughters. He kept talking about this "crystal cavern" cave on a neighbors place. Saying how cool it was, etc. After a pretty aggresive 4wd trip to get there and scraping my 4 door down tiny jeep trails, we climbed up a hill and dropped into this cave. It was probably the coolest thing i've ever seen. The first room was about 15x30x10 with a crawlspace to a second room a little smaller. Cave? Big deal. I've been in several big caves over the years. What made this interesting, was it was like standing inside a geode. Every square inch of the walls/ceiling/floor (except for the broken junk/dust/etc that accumulates on the floor) was a crystal. Pictures dont even do it justice. Most of the crystals were the size of a football. Simply amazing.
> Funny thing about it, for a bunch of 8 year old girls, its cool but no big deal. For the dads who realize you'll never see anything like it again....it was amazing.


winner!


----------



## willydavenport

Here's a weird one. I found these earlier this week along one of our fence lines. There were two of them. Both the same size probably 24-30 inches deep and 12-18 inches across. The insides of both looks to be about half full of every color of melted plastic you can find and rubber bands. When I google "Binks", the name on one of the buckets, I get results for painting and fluid handling supplies. I even found a link to one of them here. 

http://binks.com/Products/FluidHandling/TanksPressureCups/GalvanizedTanks/5GallonGalvanized/tabid/288/Default.aspx

I bet they weighed close to 60 pounds. The only thing I can figure is someone from the neighboring ranch couldn't find a good place to throw them away so they donated them to us. We're in southern Zavala county, for what it's worth.


----------



## Trouthunter

I would contact the SO in that county and let them have it. They take a dim view of littering.

TH


----------



## austinfishman

Will echo how awesome this thread is, and will chime in with my historical finds.

My grandparents had a large ranch outside of Jimenez, Chihuahua when I was a kid. I'd go rabbit hunting with my dad, and he would look for game while I looked around on the ground. At one time, I had a box full of 7mm shells that I had found over the years (no idea what happened to it, by the way).

Apparently, there had been numerous skirmishes in the area, including a large battle against Pancho Villa in 1917 when the Villistas were routed, and the Battle of Jimenez during a revolt by insurgent troops who had launched an attempted coup in 1929. In that fight, US aircraft were "loaned" to the Federales, who used them to squash the uprishing -- apparently the air raids made quite an impact, and merit a mention in any history of the use of air power in the Americas. I was just happy to pick up all the shell casings, ignorant of the history.

Another time, was flyfishing with a buddy in Northern New Mexico, near Tres Piedras. We were fishing a very small creek, and hiked a good ways upstream. I spotted what looked to be a line shack and stuck my head inside. The inside was in good shape, and the walls had been layered with magazines and newspapers for insullation. I looked at a few of them, and recall seeing car ads from the mid 1940s.

Have plenty of old medicine bottles and similar glass items from the ranch house area of my uncle's old place near Bigfoot. Such artifacts were everywhere, and not really remarkable -- I think stuff like that (probably from the 1890s to 1930s) can be found on any ranch that has been occupied long enough.

Wish I could find that box of 7mm casings -- I've tried explaining it to the kids, but they don't get what I'm talking about.


----------



## Bass_assassin

Been hunting on a deer lease in Pipe Creek, Tx since I've been alive. 5,000 acres in Bandera and Kendall counties. Used to have what was left of a small airplane after it crashed into a ravine sometime long ago. The owner had it removed a few years back. Never found any arrowheads or anything too interesting. There is a grave right underneath a hunters deer stand. Hunted in the stand for 3 years before he dropped his flashlight from the stand and while picking it up found the grave. Moved his stand about 10 ft out of respect.


----------



## TBAGN

While duck hunting in Missouri, a guy shot a duck that landed in my field about 200 yds away from me. So being the nice guy that i am, i went to pick it up. Much to my surprise it had a $100 reward band on it. I then hollered at the guy to ask if he wanted the duck, he never said or did anything. (i actually didnt try that hard to get his attenetion) So i cashed in the Band. lmao


----------



## That Robbie Guy

This thread is a great find. 

... makes me want to go exploring. Somewhere.


----------



## Fishon21

*strange findings*

We found sea shells enbeaded in the rocks at 2160ft above sea level on top of a hill out of leaky texas. make's you stop and think.:bluefish:


----------



## Hunt-Fish-Die

Lonestar said:


> My ph found this landmine while we were hunting cape buffalo on the border of Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
> Left over from the Rhodesian war I suppose.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.TexasLSO.com


 We found the another land mind, in the same area, on the Border of Zim and Mozi. One the the natives we had working for us was a scout for the Rhodesian army and was there when it was planted.


----------



## Sgrem

I lived in Aberdeen Scotland 1988-1991. I was 13-15. Walking the woods around our house i found a very old Obelisk(?sp) about 15 ft tall with huge base. It was a memorial or something but it was deep in the woods and in very thick cover. no trails in or out. You could be within about 20 ft of it and miss it. Im sure it was known about but of course i liked to believe i discovered it.

Also hunting some of the ranches out there was invited into a "Hall of Horns". Basically was a huge barn that looked like an airplane hanger. There was just enough room for maybe two people to stand side by side and walk from to back of this long barn. Otherwise it was SOLID red stag horn. They had all the sheds from centuries and centuries piled together where it was just about a solid structure. imagine at least 20 ft thick of solid horn knitted together to your left and right and about 10 ft overhead.... you could hang from or climb it. it was like walking through a tunnel in the horns. and no way could you see all the way to the end. I have seen a car size pile of sheds on some texas ranches that are impressive......but simply nothing compared to that hall of horns. Interesting how some of our history goes back to early 1900's and we are fascinated. I have been in some churches and buildings with stone graves in the floors and walls dated back to the 1200's....America was just discovered in 1492....gives you a perspective.

Was fishing with my daughter in cold pass a few months ago and snagged a line by that long pier....my daughter said that would be cool if it had a rod and reel on it....well it did! Looks like a 7ft homemade or custom with a red ambassadeur 6500. If its yours PM me and describe the rod and can get it back to you. I know i get kinda sentimental about personal made stuff like that so if you are like that too im glad to get it back to you.

Was launching at that boat ramp at christmas bay and churchill bayou and saw a wallet about a foot under the surface. It had about $200 cash and $300 in BPS gift cards and $100 in academy gift cards. No license but did have credit cards and such and an insurance card. I called insurance agent and gave them the name on the card and they contacted the individual. They called and told me a gas station to meet them. I was standing in the parking lot and they pulled up, showed me their license through the window and rolled down window just enough to grab wallet and then left. Not a word. No thank you or hand shake or fishing report or nothing. Im kind of a recluse myself and dont need any praise or credit but i have consideration for my fellow man and especially usually go out of my way for fellow sportsman. Was just dissappointed i guess to be treated that way ... i sure could have been fishing and not chasing down the owner. but still happy to have done the right thing because i know it is a sickening feeling to lose your wallet like that.....pay it forward.

I was told stories as a kid of friends in Louisiana that caught HUGE turtles in thier nets (they got 90 pounds of cleaned meat from one turtle).....anyway they caught one that had an indian arrowhead stuck in its shell. Cant confirm as it is a second hand story but this was in about 1980 and turtles can live over 100 years so that is certainly possible.

Also buddy of mine was on a guided offshore trip in florida and they found a floating duffle about 11am.....well captain scooped it up....went below...came up and told my buddy they would give him $5000 to end the trip right now and go back with dont ask dont tell about the bag. 

Brother caught a bass that would have been about 13 pounds but was sick from the carolina rig AND the spinner bait AND another bare hook that he already broke off prior to my brother hooking him on a buzzbait. Weighed about 8 pounds as a skinny skinny body and giant head. We freed her of her accessories and released.

I have a very high end digital predator caller. Was set up in south texas with my caller about 60 yards away....called for about two minutes when a mexican eagle swoops down and grabs my caller by the handle. I was frozen with what to do as my $700 caller gains altitude....i quickly changed the sound from squeeling rabbit to howling coyote and he dropped it about 400 yards from me. was still pretty cool considering.


----------



## Sgrem

also found these two dead on land i used to hunt. killed the buck in my avatar there also....


----------



## Bukkskin

I went for a hike the other day, just before the evening hunt. I was walking what looked like an old, old road, down below an old washed out tank dam. Anyways I was probably a 20 min. walk from any driveable road or sendero. Walking along picking up points in the gulley and saw something round. 1944 20 Centavos coin. I looked around for another 20 minutes, thinking i had found the burial site from a train robbery, LOL. This one probably just fell out of one of Pancho Villas' saddle bags.


----------



## lordbater

Man, some really amazing stuff in here. I'll have to read the thread in closer detail. I just happened upon it because it showed up on my Facebook page...

Anderw


----------



## EagleOne

Awesome stories. Except for the one about the wallet(nothing to do w you though).


----------



## rrp

I found a old massey furgsion (sp?) maintainer in the nueces river valley. Its looked like it had been there for 100 years because the trees around it are large hackberry and mesquite. The tractor is about 3 miles from the hwy and about 500 yards from the river.


----------



## FishinCowboy

*WOW*

Read the entire thread in one day, Amazing stories.


----------



## Jimmydean

Guess I was around 16 or 17 fishing a medium size tank way off a road around Splendora Tx. While fishing I saw what appeared to be two human legs with shoes on the feet. Long story short... Call authorities.... Police.....FD show up with divers... Turns out to be a store mannequin. Whewww. That was 15 years ago. Still fish with the same buddy and laugh about good times!


----------



## shhhh...ducks

I have been on this board for awhile and I can't believe that I am just getting around to reading all of the posts. It is a great thread and I hope it keeps on going!!!
I am from the Baytown area as has been my family for generations. At one point my family ( the Sjolander's are mom's side) owned from all the land from what is now Archer Road- east to Cedar Bayou and north to where Sjolander Road turns into Wallisville. It was quite a few acres to be sure. It has unfortunately over the last 160 years or so have dwindled down to just a few acres here and there.
As a youth growing up it had been split numerous times but was mostly, south of I-10 still family owned so I had access to squirrel, rabbit, fox, ****, and sometimes deer woods to hunt in and Cedar Bayou to hunt wood ducks.
It was on one of the eleventy billion excursions while squirrel hunting with my cousins that we found an old rundown shack/building of some sort. It had a wide assortment of tools layin around, shackles, chains, and bricks........bricks everywhere. I picked up one or two and brought them back to my great grandmother Ida Caroline house who was in her 80's at the time and asked if she knew, since she had been around just short of forever, where they came from and about the building, tools, etc.....
She told me that her grandfather, my great great great grandfather, John P. Sjolander owned and operated the Cedar Bayou Brick yard and that many of the OLD building in Pelly and Goose Creek ( Now Old Baytown) had been built with those bricks. I asked her about some of the other things and she told me that tools were obviously tools of the trade............. it was said that that the chains and shackles were there possibly because she thought that slaves were used as labor at the brick yard. She didn't know for sure and I would like to think that my family had nothing to do with slavery. Anyway, she told me that she new where the old homestead was but had never seen that part of the brick yard. I am sure we were quite a site, a teenage boy leading an 80+ year old woman through the woods late in the evening to just to show her a dilapidated old ruin. I never until now appreciated the history. When we got there, I will never forget the way my grandmother gasped and then just sat there and cried for a bit while telling me stories of my families past


----------



## Captn C

Went hunting up near Comfort Tx this past weekend...we were looking for pigs and Axis...

I ended with some cool stuff even though we didn't shoot anything.


Several snells and a bunch of clams...these were the best ones:


----------



## Trouthunter

The hill country is full of those to be found Captain C..ain't it cool?


----------



## Phinest Phishing

Incredible thread

Nothing beyond arrowheads and a few fossils, my mom grew up in virgina and she would walk the beaches and find tons of shark teeth, her aunt and uncle found a mastodon vertebrae which from old pictures is HUGE! They moved and literally just left in the shed, would have lived to seen that

I grew up south of Dallas and had a creek run through our property, lots of clam fossil some are up to 2ft across and lots of shells. It's just cool to think this land was underwater years ago- its a shame we have a big ridge which would've been great for swordfish 

I'm at Baylor so I might have to get out and look for a mammoth skeleton!


----------



## crashboatbasin

these things came from a ranch in colorado i didnt find them and the rancher wasnt very talkative but some cool stuff anyway !!!


----------



## crashboatbasin

some indian etching


----------



## Hydrocat

crashboatbasin said:


> some indian etching


What an awesome find! That is on my most wanted list when I am out arrowhead hunting for sure.


----------



## scuppersancho

WOW! Amazing read for sure. Dissappointed I don't have any myself . . . . but I hope to change that soon, thanks to you guys


----------



## masto

ive hunted all over texas, funnest part was west texas were i belive GOD hated that part and made everything with a thorn even rocks lol. well there are plenty of indian caves out there used to find bowls and all kind of tools type stuff, always very interesting when a kid to find stuff like that made me a treasure hunter for life every where i hunt now i look on the ground for something that is out of place, but one of the weirdest things i found was an antler from a buck that must of been doing a rub but it was inside the tree, the tree grew all around it and just swallowed the antler it being an oak tree there was very little showin left so it must of been years and years ago, my dad has it still, i love the fact of knowing something so old that u see every day like a tree but brings out the real age of it when something is molded in it.


----------



## Reloder28

reelthreat said:


> I have also spooked up a Jagarundi (sp?). I thought that was one of the coolest things I have ever seen.


I have seen one in the Hill Country back in 2003.


----------



## Blackhawk Blake

While cow hands where digging holes for a well at my lease in the panhandle next to lake mackinze they found a whole crate of old revolvers and lever action rifles, I found Dino bones arrow heads and petrofied wood


----------



## smokinguntoo

*Badger and coyotes*



TXDRAKE said:


> WOW, I never seen that type of cooperation for sure! I bet that was something to see! What is it that they were hunting together?


Was hunting with Lee Trevino and his son Daniel near El Indio outside of Eagle Pass and we saw a Badger followed by two coyotes. The badger started to dig in a varmint hole with the coyotes circling nearby. Badgers don't move too quickly and if whatever it is they are digging for escapes and runs, the coyotes are usually able to opportunistically catch the meal. Lee shot one of the coyotes.


----------



## smokinguntoo

*J. Frank Dobie*

If you have enjoyed this thread as much as I have, may I suggest a book you might like that is filled with old stories of lost gold and silver collected by J. Frank Dobie and published in 1939 under the title Apache Gold & Yaqui Silver. It is a good read. Enjoy!


----------



## Uncle Doug

smokinguntoo said:


> If you have enjoyed this thread as much as I have, may I suggest a book you might like that is filled with old stories of lost gold and silver collected by J. Frank Dobie and published in 1939 under the title Apache Gold & Yaqui Silver. It is a good read. Enjoy!


Great book, I also enjoyed it.


----------



## smokinguntoo

I used to ride my bike past J. Frank Dobies' home on the way to junior high in Austin. At the time I thought he was just a nice old guy working in the yard that also wrote history books.


----------



## Jaytoke

Ranch manager showed us this the other day on a ranch in Oklahoma, rock dugout in the ground, perfect arch.


----------



## Trouthunter

That's pretty cool! Did you go down inside and look around?

TH


----------



## TXDRAKE

Thats Cool!!! How old is it and do they know who might of used it?


----------



## Jaytoke

The ranch manager said it had to be some immigrants from overseas in the early years due to the perfect arch, dont think the indians could have done that. It was about 18 feet long, alot of dirt had fallen into the area. I dont like snakes to much and it looked like a perfect place for them so i did not go in. You can see the two smokestacks on one of the pics. Interesting thing was there is not a lot of rock in the area at all, just scattered around the dugout.


----------



## TXDRAKE

Jaytoke said:


> The ranch manager said it had to be some immigrants from overseas in the early years due to the perfect arch, dont think the indians could have done that. It was about 18 feet long, alot of dirt had fallen into the area. I dont like snakes to much and it looked like a perfect place for them so i did not go in. You can see the two smokestacks on one of the pics. Interesting thing was there is not a lot of rock in the area at all, just scattered around the dugout.


To me it has the appearance of actually being a root celler, Food Cache, or a Meat drying/Cold Smoker.


----------



## Trouthunter

Or even a tornado shelter.

TH


----------



## TXDRAKE

Trouthunter said:


> Or even a tornado shelter.
> 
> TH


Or that to!!!


----------



## *waterdog*

In Baytown, TX about 15 years ago we lived about a mile back in the woods down a dirt road. Earlier that day we had planned to go out for a family dinner. Before we left we caught the news issuing an alert for a escaped convicted that was heavily armed in a an unknown stolen vehicle. After enjoying a nice dinner we headed home. As we pulled into the drive way I saw a reflector of a car at the tree line in the woods about 100 yards away. The alarm in my head when off from hearing earlier about the escaped convict. My dad and I grabbed some guns and a spot light. After inspecting the area closely we checked out the car. As I shinned my light into the car I found a stun gun in the front seat and a sawed of shotgun in the back. We called the cops and sure enough it ended up being the one stolen by the convict. The cops said not to worry that he is probably long gone. Needless to say we didn't get much sleep the next two nights. They found him two days later in another town.


----------



## justletmein

Jaytoke said:


> The ranch manager said it had to be some immigrants from overseas in the early years due to the perfect arch, dont think the indians could have done that. It was about 18 feet long, alot of dirt had fallen into the area. I dont like snakes to much and it looked like a perfect place for them so i did not go in. You can see the two smokestacks on one of the pics. Interesting thing was there is not a lot of rock in the area at all, just scattered around the dugout.


The original "Doomsday Bunker." haha


----------



## FearNoFish

I was backpacking solo in the Great Smokey Mountains about 15 years ago and I bushwacked off trail to reach the top of a mountain just as it was getting dark so I was quickly setup my tent and while cleaning the area around my tent I discoverd I had just made camp on top of an old family plot! There were 4 headstones under and around my tent and all were from the "Wiggins" family with dates were in the late 1800's & early 1900's. Now I am not superstitious (just a little stitious!) but I packed up & moved to a much less sutiable campsite as quickly as possible; did not want any of that Wiggins Hillbilly JuJu to haunt me! Reading up on the history of this National Park it seems there were a lot of "hillbilly folk" who's land had been taken/purchased when they made the area into a National Park so the place if full of old homesteads and artifacts. Also found the rusted out remains of an old whisky still, not unusual for the area even to this day.


----------



## bayou assassin

pilar said:


> while hunting on the hopper ranch in brooks co , we had been driveing cross country bird hunting . we found a car " about 5 miles from any road " and next to the car hanging from fishing line was a dead guy " he looked like a mummy / leather " we called the cops they could not tell us what or why the guy was doing that far from a road


must have been braid cuz that is some strong fishing line.


----------



## Deersteaks

I have hunted the "Big Thicket National Preserve" for alot of years,and while on a scotting trip,I came across a baseball sized rock, just laying in the pine needles on a dim trail, where no other rocks were located. Strange thing was,it looked chared or burned on one side of it.It was a rust colored rock and didn't look that out of place for east Texas.Seen it there for the few years that I hunted the area and eventualy stopped hunting there all together.Well,a few years ago, I was watching a program about a couple of guys traveling the country finding "Meteorites",and a cold chill went over me when I realized that what I had really been seeing laying on the ground all that time was indeed, a "Meteorite". Worse thing is,apparently they are worth some bucks. I need to make one more trip down there and find it,just hard to find the time to do it.


----------



## rapnrod

Just finished reading the whole thread. Wow!! Really interesting!! Can't add much but on my lease was walking around and saw an old looking concrete monument that had Travis on one side and Blanco on the other. Rancher said it was an old county marker they used to use back in the day. It won't touch half the stuff I read here but it's something.


----------



## topcat5

:flag:A few years back after hunting I was looking for spot to place/build a ground blind. Walking along a small creek bed that was almost dry I noticed a black ball that looked like it was moving. As I got closer I could tell that it was actually a group of several cotton mouth snakes in a big wad. I tried to count them but could not tell where one snake ended and the next one began. One thing about a huge ball of snakes, they are an easy target and you don't waste shotgun shells. I left them there for the hogs to take care of. Someone said that they were mating.


----------



## topcat5

:flag: This is not really all that weird or even interesting as much as it is funny. (funny now but not funny them) 
A buddy and I returned to the truck after deer hunting one morning. It was really cold and was raining fairly hard. Did not even see a deer, or a squirrel, or even a bird. He pulled the truck out side the gate, and we both jumped out to lock the gate back. It did not take two people but we both went to lock the gate at the same time. As I ran to the gate to lock it I heard a sickening noise. It was the noise of an automatic door being locked. Out of habit he had locked the truck. 
Now we are locked out, it is raining and I AM COLD! The truck was still running. To make matters worse, we looked up and saw deer walking not a hundred yards from where we stood. Yes the guns are inside the truck. Good thing too beacause I just wanted to shoot him. We tried a few things but finally had to break the wing glass out of the front window. Food for thought, carry an extra door key on your person or hide one somewhere just in case.


----------



## G&C BUCKS

While hunting at out place in Zapata my cousin said he had seen a wierd cat after he descibed it we found it ti be a jaguarandi. The next week we saw an ocelot at my buddies ranch down the road on one of the senderos.


----------



## chapman53559

Jaytoke said:


> The ranch manager said it had to be some immigrants from overseas in the early years due to the perfect arch, dont think the indians could have done that. It was about 18 feet long, alot of dirt had fallen into the area. I dont like snakes to much and it looked like a perfect place for them so i did not go in. You can see the two smokestacks on one of the pics. Interesting thing was there is not a lot of rock in the area at all, just scattered around the dugout.


It looks like a kiln.


----------



## mrvmax

Good thread, I will add a couple although it was not while hunting. I was stationed at Hill AFB in Utah in the 90's. The govt had over a million acres of range land that we had access to and were responsible for clearing of unexploded ordnance. It was a changing landscape, it went from mountains to an area of sand dunes in the middle of nowhere. Depending upon the weather you could run across stuff that had worked its way up to the surface that was not there a week before. When we had time we would explore some of the smaller mountain areas. You would find caves that were pretty narrow and mine shafts from people in the past who were looking for gold. Anyway, a co-worker found the remains of a box of dynamite in one cave. It made a really neat conversation piece. I ran across a mine shaft and I lowered my buddy into it via the winch on our truck. We ran out of line before he hit the bottom so we never found anything. I little while after that our NCOIC gave out an order to not go into any more caves so that ended the exploration. The local college would send archeological students out for the summer to look for artifacts and we would have to escort them (it was on range land and there was the possibility of running across live ordnance). They would routinely find pottery, arrow heads and other artifacts. One of my co-workers found a tomahawk when he was escorting them and turned it over to them. I never found anything good but other guys were always running across the indian artifacts.


----------



## mrvmax

Another non-hunting find, by my brother. I was born in Texas but my parents moved to Illinois when I was 2 so I grew up there. We lived in an area where supposedly the Mississippi was way back when, eons ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth. It was really a massive area that was once the bottom of the Mississippi and there were what we called "bluffs" that would have been the edge of the river where the water wore away rock. It really amounted to looking live cliffs and there were paths across the length of the cliffs where people would walk. There was even a waterfall in one area and it was a pretty common area for people to explore. My brother was in the Cub Scouts at the time and the leader took my brother and one other kid exploring the bluffs. My brother stumbled across a cave nobody knew was there (it was only about a mile from the Cub Scout leaders house). In the cave were Indian artifacts and bones. The leader ended up claiming that he had found the cave and stuff in it to the local paper. If I remember right some archeologists removed everything from the cave.


----------



## Boonebros

Hunting in SOuth Texas a few years back I opened my door to my blind wondering what that smell was and a dead mexican was inside. Scread the living **** out of me. We guessed he was trying to get out of the heat and didn;t have any water. His group probably left him there thinking someone would find him and he could get out of the sun. Well he did but he died. Ruined my hunt that weekend poor guy!


----------



## peckerwood

I opened the door on my blind near London Tex. to find the foam seat of my chair had been cut out and rolled into a pillow,tied with the cords that I pulled my window covers up with.After the sun came up,looking out the right side window,I see 2 big Mexican coins about the size of our silver dollar.I think one was a 20 pesos piece.Reckon he thought it was the right thing to do.Some of the sorry bastardos would turn over our feeders for the corn,boil it like you do red beans,and leave the feeder on the ground.We thought animals were doing it until we found the campfires and tennis shoe tracks back in the brush.The ranch owner told us about them cooking the corn.


----------



## southtexasreds

Boonebros said:


> Hunting in SOuth Texas a few years back I opened my door to my blind wondering what that smell was and a dead mexican was inside. Scread the living **** out of me. We guessed he was trying to get out of the heat and didn;t have any water. His group probably left him there thinking someone would find him and he could get out of the sun. Well he did but he died. Ruined my hunt that weekend poor guy!


----------



## larrymac1

Absolutely a great thread. I will keep it going with a couple of stories.
Back when I was about 17 or so my brother got permission to hunt on a huge ranch property between Clairmont and Jayton. We got their early and just sort of we out separate ways to see what we could chase up. I found an old farm house and looking around outside I found what turned out to be a 1930's Lincoln Zephyr tear drop headlight cover. It was in my Dad's service station when the station caught fire. It just sort of disappeared in the confusion. BTW I didn't get a deer I did get a stomach virus that made me stop at every little podunk town all the way back home. 

The second story is more personal. In 1970 I entered basic training for the army. One of the trainings we had to complete was to low crawl under barbed wire, With live 60 caliber over our heads in a long "pit" filled with mud. When we got done and back to the barracks I noticed my Zippo my uncle had given me was no longer in my shirt pocket. I was just sick. My uncle had passed and it was the last one of it's kind in the family. About two weeks later we had to run the same exercise and I counted out bodies so I would get the same lane although I knew it was pretty hopeless. I was in position and they ran two other guys in front of me because they didn't like the way they did their run so it put me two lanes over from where I was. Now I thought it was really hopeless, but I did my crawl and as I neared the end of the pit my hand hit something harder than the mud. I just wrapped my hand around it and crawled out. It felt like the right size but I figured some other poor dogface had losts his. When I found a clean spot on my uniform to wipe the mud away it was my lost lighter. Not many lighters from Texas wound up in California with the inscription "For Insurance See Buzz" It now sits in my trophy case at home.
By the way, I am a part time rockhound and Texas has more petrified wood than Arizona. Just that most of it is buried pretty deep.:texasflag


----------



## larrymac1

2lazy2fish said:


> I'll play. but only with stories I can provide pictures for.
> 
> buddy of mine has a place down kinda between hondo and bracketville. for his middle kid's birthday, couple of dads took the daughters. he kept talking about this "crystal cavern" cave on a neighbors place. saying how cool it was, etc. after a pretty aggresive 4wd trip to get there and scraping my 4 door down tiny jeep trails, we climbed up a hill and dropped into this cave. it was probably the coolest thing I've ever seen. the first room was about 15x30x10 with a crawlspace to a second room a little smaller. cave? big deal. I've been in several big caves over the years. what made this interesting, was it was like standing inside a geode. every square inch of the walls/ceiling/floor (except for the broken junk/dust/etc that accumulates on the floor) was a crystal. pictures dont even do it justice. most of the crystals were the size of a football. simply amazing.
> funny thing about it, for a bunch of 8 year old girls, its cool but no big deal. for the dads who realize you'll never see anything like it again....it was amazing.


Very cool indeed. Looks like Citrene but hard to tell with the oxydized coating on the points.


----------



## larrymac1

Bottomsup said:


> This one looks like the hind leg of a small critter but also appears to be flint inside. Any ideas?


Not to be a bubble burster, but it looks like a pseudofossil. When it comes to flint for some reason you get a lot of those. The coating on the stone gets creek tumbled until it looks like something that was alive at one time. It is a strange occurance but it does happen pretty often. 
The give away is the ripple down the side. Most often associated with running water.


----------



## larrymac1

Squid94 said:


> Stumbled upon these petroglyphs while hunting Mexico.


If you run across this one again you might get a rubbing. It will be much easier to see that way and will pick up minute cuts that may not be visible to the eye or the camera. Looks very interesting.


----------



## fishin_magician

While hunting Antelope just outside of amarillo, we came across an old school that was built on the land. The land owner is in her 90s and said that is where she attended elementary school. It is still standing from its original build from somewhere in the late 1800s, No one has touched it trying to restore it. 

***Yes my antelope has a bullet in its face! I shot once at 325 yards and missed, he stumbled around then when I was about to shoot again he started to take off so i put scope in front of his trout with him just out of the scope and pulled the trigger, he dropped and was less than 2" from being a trophy antelope (My first ever). Such an awesome hunt, and trip!


----------



## larrymac1

*Old School*

It would be interesting running a metal detector around that area.


----------



## Beaux

Amazing stories here. Long time lurker, never really had much to add. Had to join up so I could add to this thread. Been hunting and fishing my whole life and I thank my father every for sharing his love for the outdoors with me. I have found the usual arrowheads, old bottles, old tools, some old mine stuff. The one I will never forget was discovering a gruesome murder scene, it goes as follows.

Dec 24th, 2005. In Ft. Bend Co. My father and I had just finished up a duck hunt on our private lease. We have several tracts of land leased out to the club, the land is separated by county roads and other tracts scattered throughout that part of the county. We are headed out and decided to go look at the rest of the property, so we start on down a county road that divides some of the lease. Long straight white rock road. Getting close to the only bend in the road. I see something up ahead, big black lump on the side of the road where there is an old gate entrance to another field. From the distance I couldn't make out what it was, it looked like a big hog carcass. 

Pulled up to it in the truck and realize that it is a human body. It's in an unusual position and has been set on fire where laid. It was a very disturbing site. It was fresh, no more than 12 hrs old. I'll leave the rest of the details out. Called it in and spent the rest of my day standing on the side of this Cr freezing my arse off with the police. This was the year it snowed hard on the coast, and that northern was blowin in. Details found out afterwards were that the man had been beaten, shot, then tried to burn the body. We had to be interview by the police several times about the whole situation. 

That never set right with me, hunted that lease most of my life, many times I was out there by my self. Always wondered what if I woulda showed up at the wrong time out there. I had just been out there 2 days earlier and had been hunting about 500 yards from that spot.

No pics for obvious reasons lol


----------



## Bull Fish

Not unusual but I found a shed off an 8 point with the left front tire of my ranger the other day. 2 miles from camp. 

On another note. I used to hunt Sam Houston NF. Rarely ever saw a deer. One afternoon I had a herd move through followed by a "Farmer". I was stopped that evening coming out of the woods by one of the rangers. He asked if I had seen anything. Told him the story. Next day they found 4 acres of home grown in the woods about 500 yards from the tree that I always climbed. Could have been a bad deal had I stumbled up at the wrong time


----------



## activescrape

I saw a hawk dead on the road today and it reminded me of this. My brother and I were on a deer hunt in central Texas a few years ago and went to town during the middle of the day. We liked to take dirt roads and stuff there and back and look for game. Well, we spotted a red tailed hawk on the ground off the side of the road. It didn't fly when we went by and we noticed it had a "kill". We decided to stop and check it out. The hawk finally flew when we got to close for it and we were shocked at what it left. That hawk was eating another red tailed hawk, ALIVE! The other one had a big hole in it's side, all bloody, where the first one had been chowing down on it. Weird. We left it there to let nature take it's perverted course.


----------



## cajun4396

that after trekking miles and miles day after day in the mountains, a BULL ELK will walk up 10' from you right in the middle of squatting to do your business... while 4' from your gun... yea... true story...


----------



## fishingguy00

*antler fossil?*

I found this close to one of my deer stands. Fossilized tree branch or deer antler?


----------



## crawdaddct

*Finding family*

My wife's family. Years before I even knew my wife, I was hunting the Sabine National Forest with my uncle. I was living in Orange at the time and had driven up. My uncle took me down a creek to introduce me to a friend of his named Burt. Burt was up in a deer stand with beer cans all around the bottom. I said hi, but moved on quickly. Later that same day while walking a game trail I came across two guys in overalls, running dogs. They were twins and had beards down to their waist. I said hi, but they just looked at me. The movie deliverance went through my head and I hurried down the trail. Years later after meeting my wife, I went hunting with my future father in-law. When we arrived in Llano, there is Burt, my wife's uncle, sitting on the porch. Derril and Jerril, the twins, my wife's cousins, were in the cabin already cooking up a deer. I will tell you one thing, those boys could hunt. Burt didn't even leave the cabin and killed more deer than me. It truly is a small world.


----------



## crawdaddct

Found a dog once. I was hunting a peanut farm one season. Went out the week before hunting season to top off the feeders. Spent a couple of hours watching deer, including one big buck digging up peanuts. Was pumped for the season. Onening day came and nothing. After several weeks of nothing I was wondering if someone had ran dogs on the land. One morning while in the stand I kept hearing something. After the sun came up across the field I saw a Beagle. I raised my gun to kill the dog, but as I sighted him in, I notices his leg was hung in bobwire. I got down and untangled him. He followed me back to the truck, so I bandaged up his leg. Seemed like a good dog, so I called the owner listed on the tag. Dropped him off, the guy didnt even say thanks. He just said he had been gone a week and had given up on him. I should have just kept him.


----------



## ntezbnchz

excellent thread.


----------



## fishingwithhardheadkings

Wow, I am very impressed with this post. The only things I have found in the woods were illegals and drugs, pretty scary, just don't know who is watching you at times.


----------



## Rancher86

As for myself, when I was about 9 years old, I was walking to the deer stand in the dark in the morning with my brand new pair of Zeiss binoculars. Something spooked on the way to the stand and I stopped, knelt, and put down the binoculars. For some reason I got up and forgot the binos. I didn't notice until later that morning and went back and searched countless hours but couldn't find them.
17 years later I was walking to that same stand in the afternoon and noticed and glint of light to my left. When I went to check it out, sure enough I found my long lost binoculars that had fallen into a slight depression from which cactus was not growing out of. They still seemed to be in pretty good shape and I sent them back to Zeiss and they completely refurbished them for 40 bucks. I still use them to this day.


----------



## Trouthappy

Back in 1968 we were camping by the Sabine Pass lighthouse on the Louisiana side of the channel. Next morning we checked out the lighthouse keeper's house, which was huge but deserted for a few years at least. The closets were full of True Romance magazines going back to the 1950s, if I remember correctly. We tried climbing the lighthouse stairs, but a couple of big barn owls flew right past us then outside, scared us out of there. The entire facility was donated to Lamar University in Beaumont, who did nothing with it. Then, in September 1975, I was launching my boat across the channel, and noticed that big house was a towering inferno. Some Cajun trapper was burning the march nearby, and it spread to the house. No telling what old artifacts are in the marsh around that marshy site. The lighthouse was built in 1857 and is now owned by the Cameron Preservation Alliance. They hope to repair foundation damage after Hurricanes Rita and Ike. The site must have been more than a dozen feet underwater during the storms.

My brother was stationed in the Navy in Bermuda, and rented a little house below the fort they have there. One day he found an old bottle in the sand pile at the base of the fort, so he went poking around in there with a long screwdriver. Found lots of old bottle from the 1700 and 1800s, different colors and shapes. What does he do, but donates it to the Navy museum on the island, who finally got tired of it and donated it to some other group.


----------



## for the love of fish

I have found lots of arrow heads knives and other cool things but the coolest was a 1918 liscense plate in the middle of no where in west texas while looking for a hog i had shot


----------



## Camo

*Woman's Shoe*

Had a hunting lease in Val Verde County, west of the Pecos River. One afternoon we walked one of the big canyons down toward the river. Found a small cave with an overhang. Under the overhang there was an old woman's dress shoe that looked like something from the old west era. How it got there is a mystery but I hate to even think about what happen to that woman. Had to be at least +20 miles from Langtry. Back in history it would have been about 70 miles to Del Rio. This was no place that a lady dressed in those shoes would willingly go.

About 10 years back at the same ranch I was sitting at camp having lunch. It was a real nice crystal clear, bright sunny day. Saw buzzards circling off to the north, toward the river. Hoped on my ATV and drove out to see what they had. Got to where I though they would be but no buzzards and no sign of anything dead. I was not far from a big cliff over looking the river so I drove closer and then walked out to the cliff and sat down for about 15 minutes to enjoy the great view. After awhile I noticed an old white Ford truck off in the distance coming toward the river on the other side. The truck came to a narrow trail that could be driven to the bottom. About 200 foot, or higher, steep walls all along the river. This truck slowly drives to the bottom and I watch it for about 15 mintues as its sat there. Then I notice two guys in camo with back packs come walking up. They all get in the truck and drive off. All of this in the middle of the day but a long way from anywhere.


----------



## ComalClassic

Im a home builder in New Braunfels. One of my customers bought an old barn off a property near St. Hedwig (just East of San Antonio.) They wanted me to tear that barn down and use the weathered wood inside their home. I spoke with the owner of the property and they explained the barn was built by their great-great grandfather as a home. It had since become a place for storage.

Day 1 we tore apart all the roof structure and cleaned up all the pigeon mess. Didnt find much as the structure had already been raided by family multiple times

Day 2 we tore down all the walls. Found 2 old bottles in between studs that were covered by wall material. That got me pretty fired up.

Day 3 we started pulling up the floor. Things got interesting.

Apparently their great-great grandfather or great grandfather exported corn husks to Mexico and brought back with him pottery and other items made in Mexico.

When we pulled the floor up we found the space was filled solid with sacks of corn husk mush. Most of the sacks were rotted up and flattened out. Some of them still looked full. We started pulling the sacks out and found the sacks that looked full had something heavier inside. They were full of glass jars and jugs. At the time we didnt know there was any significance to it.

Once we had pulled all the sacks out we started to empty them all. There was one sack we new had something different in it because it was a different color and was heavier. That sack contained the travel journal from the trips of the great grandfather. Turns out he was running booze out of Mexico and would hide the stash under the house. 

We quickly gave everything over to the owners. When I went down to pick up the last of the lumber, I asked the owner if he had read the journal and what was in it. He said "my great grandfather was a great man, he only did what he needed to do to make a living for his family." He then told me he had burned the journal so there would be no evidence to tarnish his family name.

I often wonder what all was in that journal and really wish I would have read it all before handing it over! Guess I did the right thing though.

Of about 300 pages I managed to read about 25 pages. Unfortunately, dates were only month and day, not year. There was an entry from almost every evening and morning. Morning was an entry about dreams he had that night or how they woke up from the coyotes, ***** or cold from fire going out. Evenings were about the river they crossed, horse they lost or the people they met along the way. 

In the pages I read they had lost three horses and bartered for another. They were hoping to find another as they were taking turns with one person having to be on foot. (they had one extra horse apparently)

He also spoke about one of the other guys traveling with him and how no one in the group got along with him. Said they were thinking of leaving him in Mexico (dont know if that was a joke or not).

The last few pages I read were about the trip back to Texas with their haul. Seems they didnt have as much free time then. Writings were much more brief and mush less descriptive. Still cool stuff though!


----------



## YAKATTACK-ZAK

Went hog hunting this passed weekend in South Texas at the family ranch. After I was tired of sitting in the stand from the morning hunt I decided to step out and take a walk around. After walking for a few hundred yards in some thick brush I found some old handcuffs. I was off the beaten path, but I knew exactly where I was. I thought it was a pretty cool find.

Zak


----------



## Colorado Trailblazer

Was hog hunting on a Parks and Wildlife lease in S. Texas a few weeks ago and stumbled across this grave site from 1868 in a grove of trees. A teenage boy buried with an infant shortly after the War of Northern Aggression. Wow, I sure would like to know what happened. I am in contact with the county records folks, trying to track down relatives.
If anything interesting happens, I'll post it.


----------



## TXPalerider

Colorado Trailblazer said:


> Was hog hunting on a Parks and Wildlife lease in S. Texas a few weeks ago and stumbled across this grave site from 1868 in a grove of trees. A teenage boy buried with an infant shortly after the War of Northern Aggression. Wow, I sure would like to know what happened. I am in contact with the county records folks, trying to track down relatives.
> If anything interesting happens, I'll post it.


I found a woman's grave site on a ranch several years ago with the same inscription "Gone but not forgotten." it was from the same time period...around 1855 if i remember right.


----------



## Trouthunter

Ditto for me. On 1800 acres south of the Shell plant in Sheridan. Three graves in the middle of nowhere; gone but not forgotten. Same date range.

TH


----------



## lapesca67

Back in college, I went duck hunting with a couple of buddies in the lower laguna. We launched out of the Arroyo and set up our decoy spread on a shoreline in the marsh. After sun up, I noticed a white lump about 10 feet off the shoreline some 50 yards to our right, but didn't think anything of it until we finished our hunt. I walked over to it and initially thought it was a rock, but then realized it was a skull....dug it out and it looked like something straight out of Aliens. Turned out to be a perfect bottlenose dolphin skull. We thought we had the coolest trophy ever, until the game warden that checked us as the ramp informed us that we were committing a felony having one in our posession. He confiscated it and we went on our merry way....wish I still had it as it was one cool looking skull.


----------



## lapesca67

This one belongs to my father-in-law. He was quail hunting with a couple of buddies in college and they kept running into rattle snakes. They decided to play a prank on some of their fraternity brothers and shot one, put it in a bag and were going to stick it in someone's bed back at the house. They piled in the car, threw the bag on the floor board under the seat and headed back to Austin. Halfway there they suddenly hear it light up and start rattling. Everyone picks their feet up and start yelling at the guys in the back to find the snake....the top of the bag is open and the snake is no longer in it and my father-in-law (who is driving) is swerving all over the place and won't put his foot down to hit the break. A DPS officer pulls up with lights on trying to pull them over, but they could only coast to a stop. Finally, he throws it in park and they all bail out. By this time there are three DPS cars in pursuit and they pull their pistols thinking these guys are all nuts. At first they didn't believe the snake story because the snake stopped rattling and thought they were all drunk. They were putting them all in the car to take them to Gonzales when one of the officers took one last look in the car....there on the passenger side floor board way a 4 ft rattlesnake.....they all got citations for being dumb **ses.


----------



## Reloder28

Once found a fishing pole deep, deep in the East Texas woods. There was not a fishing hole around for miles.

My best find was a hand made Native American hide scraper among other artifacts.


----------



## firelt

Here is a nice arrow head I found while dove hunting. In the pic is what I thought was a fishing line or net weight, as I found it in the San Gabriel River. I have also been told it could be something worn around the neck on a string or a weight which was placed on a leather string along with others and thrown to trip animals. I also found a nice knife and scabbard under a cedar tree. The scabbard had been eaten by mice and the handle of the knife was bleached out. I oiled the handle back into great shape and my dad made a scabbard. My son now has that. Other than that all I have found is boring.


----------



## ted8541

Blue Indigo slithering under me after pausing to glass some Nilgai on a stalk. I was on my hands and knees, glassed, paused, glassed again, then went to continue my stalk when I looked down and YIKES. I just kept telling myself, these are the good guys. But it kept going and going and going. Pretty trippy.


----------



## TroutThis

Holy smokes that was a long read, just found this today and had to read all the way through. My favorites are: the one of the deputy badge, the hog with handcuffs, and the swords in the creek. I'm only 31 years old but fortunate enough to have heard some good ones and experienced some myself so here it goes in no particular order.

1) First semester at SWT I became friends with a guy out of San Antonio. His dad had just bought a place and they were fixing it up so I jumped at the opportunity to go one weekend upon invitation. The place was near Lost Maples and we found at least two caves that you could access by sliding through small fissures in the ground. One of the caves had carvings from either late 1800 to early 1900s on the Stalagtites.

2) Had a fraternity brother who is from Perryton Texas. His father a well known author of children's books bought their large ranch of many sections from success through his earlier works. One day while riding the bluffs on their property they found some smaller caves with stills from the prohibition that spawned the writing of another book in his series, Hank the Cowdog.

3) One spring break in College a group of us were extremely broke so we decided to take what money we had, head to Acuna, Mexico and crash in Del Rio at my buddies old friends house. Went to Acuna that night and the next day we rode out to their ranch which bordered the Devils River. As we made the crossing the family member told us it was an old wagon crossing. Above it was a flood check tower. Basically two booms anchored on either side of the bluffs 30 ft plus off the river. We managed to get up in the cart that suspended from this and zipped over the river only to see at that height the actual carvings of the wagon feels shaped into the bottom of Devils River. Later that day I went and explored the bluffs and found a many Indian drawing.

4) I have snuck up on two occasions two sets of wets in South Texas. 

5) Found a hefty well made Buck Style Knife a wet dropped on our Family Ranch in Rocksprings

6) Was wading barefoot in a very low drought stricken cove in Buchanan and fell into and old storm cellar/basement. I apparently was fishing amongst a strip of homesteads that were originally there before they impounded the lake. This particular area was usually 20+ feet of water.

7) This is funny, I actually had a buddy catch a black laced up boot out of Taylors Bayou, just like in the cartoons

8) Went on a two day river trip. Within the first 2 hrs of the first day we flipped three kayaks. Of those two flips we lost fishing poles and on two occasions later on found two other Rigs that were of higher dollar value still in good shape haha

Well these are just a few. I'm sure I will think of more.


----------



## S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain)

A woman I know found this about 2 miles from the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass. Looks like a bronze belt buckle with Army insignia, but we have no idea what era it's from.

Any ideas or maybe point us in the right direction to find out?

Thanks,

LF


----------



## scwine

S.O.B.(Salt On the Brain) said:


> A woman I know found this about 2 miles from the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass. Looks like a bronze belt buckle with Army insignia, but we have no idea what era it's from.
> 
> Any ideas or maybe point us in the right direction to find out?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> LF


identical to this one http://www.ebay.com/itm/World-War-1...675?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27d2fbb883


----------



## nasakid

It's WWI vintage on that belt buckle.


----------



## Quepos1

Growing up in Georgia I found many arrow heads, really too many to count. Many, many times while rabbit hunting I walked up on stills usually built in a creek bed and covered by tin onto which brush was piled to hide them. Only once did I ever come up on one when anyone was running it and I beat it away as fast as I could. If the wind was right you could smell a running still from a great distance.


----------



## DCAVA

*30/30*

In the late 80"s, we had a lease in Falfurrias. One night after the evening hunt, all the hunters were around a fire we started on the ground drinking beer and trying to warming up, since we seemed to have colder winters then, when suddenly an explosion occurred under the dirt below the fire. We moved the mesquite coals around and found an old 30/30 casing that blew with the heat of the fire, maybe 6-8 inches down. Luckily noone was hurt by the projectile. And there was an old cemetary maybe 1000yards from our campsite, kinda spooky.


----------



## cwbycrshr

I've done a lot of hunting in West Texas around Sheffiled area. Found numerous Wets hold up areas, articles of clothing, old camp fires, places where they cut our water lines and plugged the cut with a Soto stick, Indian burial grounds, caves with old drawings, etc. 
Everytime I go out I fully expect to find a bag full of dope or a dead Wet. It's bound to happen in that country...still the wild wild west in most cases.


----------



## Category6

Once while stalking javelina on a bow hunt in Webb county, where there was barely a tree in sight in any direction, only giant prickly pears except maybe a few scrub mesquites, I ran across a giant stone which I thought was strange. Looking at it more I realized it was a petrified section of a giant tree, it would have been probably a 5' diameter tree. Anyone else ever seen this in south Texas? I was told by a professor at A&M that entire region was swamps and old growth forest when the dino's were around, interesting to see it in person juxtaposed with the current landscape.


----------



## rangerfab

they are pecos river deposits.....when webb county and other counties south were under water millions of yrs ago alot of the petrified wood you see in the area are from the pecos river deposits. Thats why you see alot of gravel and petrified debris, and sometimes some mammoth bones of mammoths that drowned or died during floods. we have a 15' x 3.5' log in a creek and many 5' diameter sections. the log on our ranch is worth about $100K if you find the right collector. our place is in san roman area. You also find alot of oyster mounds in that area to when it was once under water.

If you ever go to roma tx on the main drag there is a house with a fence made of petrified logs that came from our family ranch back in the 1920s and 40s.


----------



## larrymac1

One of my many hobbies is being a rockhound. Estimates are that we have more petrified wood in Texas than Arizona has. Only difference is that ours is mostly buried. There is a boy scout ranch out of Bastrop that had a dry creek bed running through it. There are at least five complete petrified trees buried 6 - 10' below the surface. Occasionally the run off will expose parts of the trees. A fellow from Houston has written several books on identification of the tree species of petrified wood in Texas.


----------



## JPoole5

We had a lease in Comfort, TX when I was a kid and there were fossils in the limestone bluff that me and the landowners kid would chisel out. Some were 8"- 10" in diameter. The landowners kid also showed me some Dino footprints in the creekbed.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free


----------



## Caughtonacrab

Sweet thread. I hunt arrowheads, agates-rocks, fossils,metal detect, prospect, all of it and its my joy in life to find things. Have found scores of items like everyone else including mammoths, meteorites, fulgerites ( lightning glass ), but one of my favorite finds was last year. Out in west texas was be bopping around as i always do and came across a fairly large draw start walking along the upper ledge and spy a fire pit, lots of chips and flint, heres an arrowhead, ugly but intact. I look up to take stock of the bigger picture. I see over the next 50 yards or so probably 7-8 firepits and i realize ive stumbled into a camp of some kind. Come to find out the sand is being stripped away by the wind and gradually exposing the camp faster than the rim of the bluff is eroding down. The entire camp abd its sattelites stretch for several hundred yards on both sides of the draw. Some better preserved than others. One section nearly pristene with firepits, rock piles i suspect to be ovens of sorts. One can really see how they lived just by looking. No teepee rings as i suspect they had brush type structures. But you can tell where the cooking was done by the size of the firepits and the ovens and flat grinding stones- tables stones. ( god knows a glat hard surface was tough to come by). Then away from there you can definately tell where the flint knappers had their fires. Scads of flint chips, and cores, blanks,bifaces, broken points. Small groupings of raw material, caches? Every time i go there i see more and more. I have pulled a few arrowheads, really nice ones but for the most part left it intact. Different sections of the lip seem to be different ages . Some seem to be quite old as i have found broken dalton type points, nothing clovis, folsom, or firstview, ( what im really looking for!) dont want to get all sappy but its a special place. I have some pix, but the scale of it all fies not cone through, it just looks like west Texas. 

Love this thread


----------



## WADER13

Not a hunt, but on a golf course..

Was in Kansas over thxgiving 2005 visiting a long time childhood buddy. On the day of my return flight to Texas we decided to squeeze in a quick 18 at a course between KC and Lawerence, Kansas. Course was out in the sticks. Got the first time of the day so we showed up and it was still dark. As it got light a guy came into the pro shop saying there was 2 deer fighting on the 18th green. We ran to the window and sure enough there was 2 monster bucks goin at it. We watched a few minutes before they finally quit. When we got to the 18th there was a sign on the tee saying 18th green closed. We took a look at it and it was torn up pretty good. That was pretty cool to see. 

BTW it was freezing cold that day and golf was a terrible idea.


----------



## metal man

I found a Shilo .45 rim fire on the Brazos river bottom in Albany near fort Griffith. Sorry not real exciting but I didn't figure we needed to be stuck on the # 666 post. Hope everyone has a great thanksgiving weekend and go ahead and hand out a dirt nap or two.


----------



## rattelsnake

I found what they call a rosetta stone at lake merideth.


----------



## CarlHigh

I hunted on a ranch in Uvalde Tx we had an indian camp site on it, I found bird points, spear heads,and real good arrow heads, also hunted a ranch in San Angelo that the Butterfield stage line ran through we found old forks, knives, broken plates, and a old lantern. also found some dam big rattle snakes out there.


----------



## activescrape

rattelsnake said:


> I found what they call a rosetta stone at lake merideth.


What does that look like and what is it supposed to be used for?


----------



## Surfradmatt86

I found this old combine hunting in Wilbarger county a few weeks ago.


----------



## fishinfool

We hunt between Castell and mason just south of the llano river. There are several large granite outcroppings. Their is an old creek that the Indians used to stay along. One of the flat rocks has a perfect wore down about 8 to 10 in. About the size of a car tire. Original land owner tells us it was where the Indians ground corn and wheat or other stuff.


----------



## fishhawkxxx

*better lost than found*

found a pole cat once that i thought was dead, but wasn't! Got me good!


----------



## firephil

Captn C said:


> This has me abit worried. Does TNT become inherit from exposure or just become unstable?!?!?


unstable


----------



## firephil

This has been a great thread for me as I am home with the flu.
I found a grave marker in a brush thicket that only said "Baby Girl". Lots of horse shoes, a few arrowheads, a license plate from the year I was born. The best would be a porcelain door knob that I still use today to pound the seats into the saddles I make.
Oh yeah, then there was in Terlingua about 200' into a mine shaft a mattress and Juan loves Maria painted on the wall


----------



## smokinguntoo

firephil said:


> unstable


As I seem to remember if gets old and "sweats" it is really dangerous. The sweat is nitro glycerin leaching. You can safely dispose of it by burning it.

Several of us were cleaning up a piece of property an in law bought in Pipe Creek. The previous owner left all kinds of stuff including a table saw covered with a tarp. When I looked under the tarp there were half a dozen sticks of dynamite. Sweating dynamite. One of my in-laws worked on a blasting crew at McDonough Brothers, where Fiesta Texas is located now. He gently picked it up and put it into a fire we had for burning trash. No problem.

SG2


----------



## rangerfab

Here is some photos from my dads place at san roman.

an old pretrified log and a peyote cactus they are all over the place over there.

An old stone building at cuevitas tx and falcon place off 649 used to be an old beer joint workers from san antonio veijo from the east ranch would go there alot and drink....used to be a popular place for hunters and ranchers back in the days.


----------



## LD

I have to add to this as it's the best thread ever!
South Dallas County about 1978 or so shooting 22's with my son and a friend and his son in a watery swampy area near the Trinity. Shooting at a "stick" in the water that would go under and come back up that turned out to be a body, we were shooting at the fingers! We reported it and never heard anymore.
Jack County deer hunting found a cannonball (empty), 10ga brass casing, 16 ga single shot gun just the metal parts and a cartridge lifter from a Winchester rifle.


----------



## ems1100

Riding my 4 wheeler back to camp saw some buzzards sitting on some open ground between some heavy brushy area. Went over to see what they were sitting on and under a canopy of thick briar surrounding a mesquite tree with all kinds of tunnels going into the thick briar was a dead doe that was partially covered up with brush. Probably dead for a day or so. Saw some wounds on its hind quarter but no bullet holes and only 2 people on our lease and we didnt shoot anything in that area of the property. Several people I've talked to say it is probably a big cat. This is in Dewitt County north of Cuero. Alot of Oil field workers in that area and I have a hard believing a Mountain Lion can be in that area and not be seen by anyone. Any insight?


----------



## smokinguntoo

A bobcat can and will take deer. Saw a doe near Pipe Creek that was dead with claw marks on back and neck and am 99% sure it was a bobcat that had been seen nearby. It looked like it ambushed it from above in a grove of oak trees.

Same tract of land where we found the dynamite in my post above, and it might have even been on the same weekend. Family was there cleaning up property my BIL & SIL had purchased.

SG2


----------



## rapnrod

ems1100 said:


> Riding my 4 wheeler back to camp saw some buzzards sitting on some open ground between some heavy brushy area. Went over to see what they were sitting on and under a canopy of thick briar surrounding a mesquite tree with all kinds of tunnels going into the thick briar was a dead doe that was partially covered up with brush. Probably dead for a day or so. Saw some wounds on its hind quarter but no bullet holes and only 2 people on our lease and we didnt shoot anything in that area of the property. Several people I've talked to say it is probably a big cat. This is in Dewitt County north of Cuero. Alot of Oil field workers in that area and I have a hard believing a Mountain Lion can be in that area and not be seen by anyone. Any insight?


Cats do cover up their kill. Bet it was a cat! Cats everywhere in Texas and they can be very elusive.


----------



## 22Triton

Found this in south Texas close to Encinal. Looks like it was made by a blacksmith but I have no idea what it was used for. Can anybody tell me what it might be?


----------



## big john o

Looks like a fire poker to me


----------



## 22Triton

that's probably what it will be used for but I thought it might have been a brand for cattle. found it on what used to be a working cattle ranch.


----------



## Waymore

ems1100 said:


> Riding my 4 wheeler back to camp saw some buzzards sitting on some open ground between some heavy brushy area. Went over to see what they were sitting on and under a canopy of thick briar surrounding a mesquite tree with all kinds of tunnels going into the thick briar was a dead doe that was partially covered up with brush. Probably dead for a day or so. Saw some wounds on its hind quarter but no bullet holes and only 2 people on our lease and we didnt shoot anything in that area of the property. Several people I've talked to say it is probably a big cat. This is in Dewitt County north of Cuero. Alot of Oil field workers in that area and I have a hard believing a Mountain Lion can be in that area and not be seen by anyone. Any insight?


 Wounds on the hind quarters sounds like coyotes to me! A mountion lion takes its prey down by the neck.


----------



## flatscat1

22Triton said:


> Found this in south Texas close to Encinal. Looks like it was made by a blacksmith but I have no idea what it was used for. Can anybody tell me what it might be?


Looks like an old strap hinge to me.


----------



## Ready.Fire.Aim

22Triton said:


> Found this in south Texas close to Encinal. Looks like it was made by a blacksmith but I have no idea what it was used for. Can anybody tell me what it might be?


In J. Frank Dobie's classic treasure hunting book " Coronado's Children" he mentions in one story of *BURIED TREASURE* being marked by an iron stake in the ground similar to yours.

If you go back and find lost treasure, a small, gold, piece of eight would be appreciated for the advice.

It is possibly a digging bar for post holes. Although the old one I have is twice as long.

Good luck,
RFA


----------



## 22Triton

Ready.Fire.Aim said:


> In J. Frank Dobie's classic treasure hunting book " Coronado's Children" he mentions in one story of *BURIED TREASURE* being marked by an iron stake in the ground similar to yours.
> 
> If you go back and find lost treasure, a small, gold, piece of eight would be appreciated for the advice.
> 
> It is possibly a digging bar for post holes. Although the old one I have is twice as long.
> 
> Good luck,
> RFA


thanks rfa I hope your right.


----------



## 22Triton

Looks like it might have been an anchor for a steel trap this is the closest thing I can find.


----------



## TXPalerider

22Triton said:


> Looks like it might have been an anchor for a steel trap this is the closest thing I can find.


That would be my guess.


----------



## rem44mag

22Triton said:


> that's probably what it will be used for but I thought it might have been a brand for cattle. found it on what used to be a working cattle ranch.


Could be a running iron
Used to change the brand


----------



## Trouthunter

The curved tip which looks like it was forged that way tells me that it was a fireplace poker.

But if you use your imagination it could be most anything. 

TH


----------



## Big Fish

*Elk Carcass*

I was elk hunting in Colorado last year when I came across this elk carcass. One of the other hunters in our group had put out a game cam when we got to camp. An got a video clip of a mountain lion about 300 yards from our cabin. The carcass was probably 500-600 yards from camp.


----------



## Old sailor

Two years ago I was turkey hunting in Michigan at my friends camp.It had snowed about 2''the night before. I heard a turkey gobble behind me so I unzipped the door of my blind a little and looked out, I didn't see anything.Then I looked in front of me and one of my hen decoys was gone.
After 20 min. I couldn't stand it anymore I had to go out and see what happened to my decoy. The stake was there and that was all there were no tracks in the snow at all. All we could figure out is that an eagle thought it was lunch.


----------



## Old sailor

flatscat1 said:


> Looks like an old strap hinge to me.


That was my first impression also. But it looks like there are no holes in it.


----------



## Really

Trouthunter said:


> The curved tip which looks like it was forged that way tells me that it was a fireplace poker.
> 
> But if you use your imagination it could be most anything.
> 
> TH


http://ancientpoint.com/inf/110862-...poker_antique_wrought_iron_w_curled_tail.html


----------



## Trouthunter

Well there you go...mystery solved.

Thanks.

TH


----------



## MLK

rem44mag said:


> Could be a running iron
> Used to change the brand


I agree with this, it looks like a running iron that was used by cattle thieves to change a brand. they had to be long enough to keep from getting to hot to hold and short enough to carry.


----------



## TxBrewer

Old sailor said:


> Two years ago I was turkey hunting in Michigan at my friends camp.It had snowed about 2''the night before. I heard a turkey gobble behind me so I unzipped the door of my blind a little and looked out, I didn't see anything.Then I looked in front of me and one of my hen decoys was gone.
> After 20 min. I couldn't stand it anymore I had to go out and see what happened to my decoy. The stake was there and that was all there were no tracks in the snow at all. All we could figure out is that an eagle thought it was lunch.


My father had a similar situation in northern illinois. Set up his hen decoy and climbed into a blown down tree, after about twenty minutes a hawk came down and tried to take his hen decoy. It was hard plastic so it couldn't grip with its talons so it hit the ground, flew up to a low branch and was giving it the head twitch *** look.


----------



## rambunctious

*Found*

My son and I were Elk hunting on Comisary Ridge in Wyoming. Walking along I noticed a bag. Picked it up and it was a zip-lock bag full of Elk ****. Wierd
Terry


----------



## shooterstx

Definitely a running iron. Not always used by thieves. In the old days, it was common to have 'community pastues' - a cowboy just could not feasibly carry 6 or 8 different custom branding irons. Cowboys 'back then' were expert in 'mammying up' calves to their mother cow to identify ownership. It was easy to be honest in those days; the hands that weren't often suffered accidental GSW's.


----------



## arogler

Growing up in deep southwest Georgia, I had a friend with several family plantations. We were much younger at the time and would hunt (very unsuccessfully) from our bikes. These were very large plantations in very rural areas. No one around for many miles. While riding down a path alone one day, I came across a 60's style pool lounge chair with a very realistic paper skeleton laying on it. I was literally miles from anything and the trail was a footpath at best (no motorized vehicle could get back there). I booked it all the way back to the main road, and then headed straight to the farm house. We talked with the farm hand and he swore he knew nothing about it, and knowing him, he didn't. There was no plausible reason for "that" being there.

To this day, I don't ever remember being that freaked out. Never went back that way again.


----------



## BeansNnopales

*I too found a nude woman bathing*

I was about thirteen or fourteen and was hunting in Laredo when we came around one of the Senderos there she was naked as a J bird she was a illegal immigrant taking a bath in a cattle trough to cool off... Well needless to say for the young man that I was at the time... My jaw dropped and I was speechless at the sight of the first woman I had ever seen nude


----------



## BeansNnopales

*fire in the sky*

I was thinking what else to post when I remembered and don't know how I could forget about this one in November 2013 deer season I was hunting a deer lease I had just joined that same year I had my wife and two small children with me the lease is located in the Bandera Texas area one night after dinner we were getting ready to go to bed and I was thirsty so I stepped out of the old camper trailer to get a water from the ice chest by the door and when I looked up about a mile or so over the horizon all I could see were these lights blue green purple white red pink they were flickering violently and it appeared to be coming from the ground up.... Definitely was not lighting it was way too colorful also don't think that there are arora lights this far south...it lasted for a minute or so long enough for me to call my wife from the trailer so that she could witness it to and I'm glad she did because it was like nothing I had ever seen before in my life her either. I told my dad about it and he said it was probably a meteor that had crashed to earth and was still on fire or reacting...... I thought of going to look for it as it may possibly be very valuable but. The country is very rough and I don't own it so I would not have any rights to my find... But I definitely know in what direction to start looking.. I will never forget those lights in the sky that night and am glad my wife was there to see them too or else nobody would have believed me...


----------



## Kenner 23

My dad was on a directional drilling job two years ago in south east Ms when he found a cross cut saw against a tree. He told the land owner what he found and the landowner then told him the rest of the story; landowner was a teenager clearing the family property on December 7th 1941 when his mother came and got him from his chores. Never went back and retrieved the saw leaning against that small tree.


----------



## BeelinerGuy

Was about 3 miles from the border near Laredo. Nothing came into my blind. I walked out and see a bloody ripped shirt piece, with very fresh blood all over it about 50 yards away. Must have been an illegal that cut himself on the fence or something.


----------



## Bankshot

*The most amazing thread I've ever read*

Back in the early 80s I had a running buddy named Tinker. Tinker was honest as the day is long and he was a wheeler dealer in the ranch business, he would buy and sell ranches make a profit and just keep going. As a result I got to hunt all over Central and West Texas on some of the most fascinating properties I've ever seen. One was down by Sanderson along the Rio Grande and it had a natural crossing, the only one for 50 miles in either direction. The canyon country in that area was filled with caves with black ceilings and pictographs. One day after a serious rainstorm we must of found 50 points one of which sticks in my mind as the most perfect bird point I've ever seen its tip actually spiraled one complete circle before coming to a sharp point. It was perfect. He also owned a ranch that completely surrounded the town of Pandale on the Pecos River adjacent to ranches that have already been mentioned in this thread I sat on a ridge one evening and watched A ridge on the other side of the river as five Mountain lions one adult, 2 yearlings (?) and 2 cubs lazed around on the clif. The man who ran his sheep on Tinkers ranch lost 140 ewes that year and hired a professional lion Hunter to come and take care of the problem. He arrived with three dogs, a backpack full of dog food, water jug, a flashlight, and a single shot 22. We took him to one of the kills and he took off. He returned four days later with a pair of ears and was payed his $2000. Another fascinating thing on that ranch was a single mountain or large hill that was populated by hundreds of foxes Only that one hill. A night you could spotlight that mountain and it would glow like fireflies with the eyes of those foxes amazing place. Tinker went off the grid some years back. I miss him.


----------



## Trouthappy

I have acquaintances in Iowa who actively look for hunting points. Each year they frame that year's findings, strictly found in-state. Going back 21 years, they tell me. Here's a group photo. They won't take me out hunting for points. They intend to donate their collection to a historical society, and maybe make a poster of them. I think one guy's findings have the red background, the other guy, his mentor, has the black backgrounds. Not many broken ones. Must be worth something.


----------



## hog_down

^ impressive!


----------



## Mikeyhunts

/\ Cool Stuff.


----------



## Jack's Pocket

GYB said:


> At my lease in east texas north of Jasper. I found an old glass Dr. Tishners mouth wash bottle. You could tell from the opening on the top that it was ment to be corked. Also once found 2 unopened cans of Fallstaff beer.


East Texas is full of old bottles and tools.
Family been here before it was a Republic, due to letters from an ancestor that died defending the Alamo. 
I have found a ton of old tools in the woods the most 
unusual was a hatchet in an cedar that had grown around it. Around that cedar was a bunch of lightered cedar stumps. Figured the old timers were cutting them for shingles.

Several have mentioned the old cemeteries out in the woods. I still maintain a couple of family plots that are
in the middle of the woods.


----------



## fmlyfisher

Trouthunter said:


> Pale Guy on our old lease south of Sheridan we found a marker out in the middle of a thicket...no road leading to it, it was all grown up and it was in memory of the crew of an Army Air Corps plane that crashed on a training mission during WW-II. Somewhere I have all of the info from it.
> 
> I think that there has been at least one marked grave on every lease I've been on, lol.
> 
> Oh yea, found a full but faded can of Billy Beer in the fork of a tree near Sublime once, lol.
> 
> TH


Just read through this thread really cool stuff! The headstone you are talking about above my cousins and I used to play around when we were little. My grandparents owned the place next to it and told us the story of when it went down. Small world

I managed a ranch on the San Antonio river in Goliad County for several years and found the old ruins of the slave houses of back when the place was a cotton farm. We also found an old truck with words Sals Meats painted on the door with bullet holes all through it half buried in a wash and always wondered if the bullets came before or after it washed down the river. Lots of experiences down in that river bottom that made me a believer in some of that "stition"

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## Trouthunter

Cool..it is a small world.

TH


----------



## activescrape

Trouthappy said:


> I have acquaintances in Iowa who actively look for hunting points. Each year they frame that year's findings, strictly found in-state. Going back 21 years, they tell me. Here's a group photo. They won't take me out hunting for points. They intend to donate their collection to a historical society, and maybe make a poster of them. I think one guy's findings have the red background, the other guy, his mentor, has the black backgrounds. Not many broken ones. Must be worth something.


That is an enormous collection.


----------



## activescrape

A million hits, unreal.


----------



## txbred

activescrape said:


> That is an enormous collection.


whats amazing is the amount of full clovis points. i think i have a base of a broken one. it feels smooth on the edges and has heavy patina.


----------



## Bocephus

Just wondering....now many forums in the world have a thread with over 1 million hits ?

Wow !


----------



## larrymac1

Went on a deer hunt somewhere between Clairmont and Jayton with my brother once. Found an old homestead shack type place. No roads in or out of the area of the house that was just barely standing. Walking along and my toe hit something hard and I thought it was a rock. Kicked a little with my toe and uncovered a 1929 Lincoln Zepher headlight cover. Tear drop shaped. Didn't have internet back then so took me a while to find a picture in a book about old cars to discover what it was. I have no idea where it is now. It was in a display cabinet at my Dad's service station but disappeared at some point.


----------



## Law Dog

While hunting at our ranch in Lasalle county several years ago I found a hole in the ground with some black tar in it. I now call it my Honey (Money) Hole!


----------



## Trouthappy

activescrape said:


> That is an enormous collection.


My friend just printed a limited edition poster of the best ones from this collection. Pretty classy looking. Here's a smaller low-res version. These guys just won't let on, where they find these points. They're hard-core.


----------



## craftkr

Took me a couple days, but definitely worth the time. Some great stories, thanks to all that shared.


----------



## Prof. Salt

A meteorite about the size of a golfball that still bore the white rock from impact with the stone shelf I found it on, and a very nasty looking old bear trap. Arrowheads, scrapers, arrow making stone tools, axe heads, knives and other flint-derived tools. Maybe I look down too much while hunting...


----------



## Bob Keyes

That is a forge poker, it is used for breaking up coke in a blacksmiths forge


----------



## Sharpest

Not my find but a few years ago I was cleaning out my grandma's garage and found this, a rusted and weathered Henry Repeater. My grandfather and dad hunted on the King and Kenedy ranches quite a bit many years ago and have had properties all over the rest of south Texas as well. Unfortunately grandad passed in '89 and my dad in '03 and grandma doesn't know anything about the origin of the rifle. What I find most interesting is that the hammer is cocked. Makes me wonder about the circumstances it was lost under...


----------



## ems1100

*Blue wig deer*

Sunday morning sitting in the stand watching a big herd of whitetail, a small buck walks out into the field and has a big wad of blue hay baling nylon string stuck in his horns. All the deer (30+) spook, tails up, and run around to avoid this deer. The blue wigged deer keeps trying to join in the herd and they are avoiding him like the plague. He can't figure out why they are avoiding him till finally he walks away. My buddy is hunting in the back of the lease 3 miles away and finds a deer skull that has a wad of blue nylon baling string all tangled up in its horns. Probably got tangled up in fence and died. What are the chances of seeing and finding these in the same morning? Hopefully the deer I saw will either rub it off or shed his antlers before the string gets him tangled up and kills him. Next time I see hay baling string lying on the ground I'm picking it up!


----------



## activescrape

We were tracking on our land last weekend, it's been in the family since 1932. We discovered an old dump site and came up with this old glass clorox bottle. A little research puts it late 1950's/early1960's. so about55 years old. It had the original lid on it but it was half rusted off.


----------



## Trouthunter

If you found a dump start digging. You'll find some really neat old bottles and some are pretty valuable.

Those old Clorox bottles are cool. I found one that's a pint size that used a cork stopper instead of a screw on cap.

TH


----------



## Law Dog

Absolutely a great thread, Thanks for sharing.


----------



## Texas Bill

Wonderful thread! I have found a weather balloon, old glass bottles and glasses, and old tools. There are two old homesteads on my place that I have not really looked into too much. Kids bough me a metal detector for Christmas and a few days later I found this thread so I have got to make time to go play around.

Thanks to everyone for sharing.


----------



## activescrape

Texas Bill said:


> Wonderful thread! I have found a weather balloon, old glass bottles and glasses, and old tools. There are two old homesteads on my place that I have not really looked into too much. Kids bough me a metal detector for Christmas and a few days later I found this thread so I have got to make time to go play around.
> 
> Thanks to everyone for sharing.


Yes, go detecting and show us what you find!


----------



## RB II

Trouthunter said:


> If you found a dump start digging. You'll find some really neat old bottles and some are pretty valuable.
> 
> Those old Clorox bottles are cool. I found one that's a pint size that used a cork stopper instead of a screw on cap.
> 
> TH


 Not necessarily related to hunting, but years ago, they buried all of their trash. Lots of great finds in old underground cisterns and burn pits.


----------



## Trouthunter

> Not necessarily related to hunting, but years ago, they buried all of their trash. Lots of great finds in old underground cisterns and burn pits.


Oh yea and in old outhouses too.

TH


----------



## John Galt

R Little said:


> My dad was on a directional drilling job two years ago in south east Ms when he found a cross cut saw against a tree. He told the land owner what he found and the landowner then told him the rest of the story; landowner was a teenager clearing the family property on December 7th 1941 when his mother came and got him from his chores. Never went back and retrieved the saw leaning against that small tree.


That story reminds me of a bar I've been to in New York, "McSorley's." They used to serve turkey dinners there. It became the custom for WWI soldiers to put a wishbone on the gaslight, to be removed when they made it home after the war. For every bone you see up there, there's a set of bones resting in France.


----------



## Porkchop12

This has been very fun reading!


----------



## RED DOG OUTFITTERS

John Galt said:


> That story reminds me of a bar I've been to in New York, "McSorley's." They used to serve turkey dinners there. It became the custom for WWI soldiers to put a wishbone on the gaslight, to be removed when they made it home after the war. For every bone you see up there, there's a set of bones resting in France.


I'm going to McSorley's in August. We will be in New York for a baseball tournament for my son and we will go by there. I was there back in 2000 and saw that same light.


----------



## tstorm5

A friend of mine tells this storyâ€¦
I hunted Mexico for many years and had a trailer on a ranch there, then one day a Road Runner (full grown) shows up and I throw him a few scraps of meat. He hangs around after that. Next time I go down there's the road runner, following me around camp like a pet. I throw him some more scraps whenever I eat. If I am out walking around he follows me, right on my heels. One day I have a corn feeder tore apart on the hood of my truck and "Vato" (named him Vato after a few trips) jumps up on the hood of the truck and stands there while I'm working. Bobbing his head back and forth as if to say, "whatcha doin"? 
Old  Vato was pretty neat to have around.


----------



## tstorm5

*Mambajimba*

One day years ago (1980-ish). A buddy and I are driving down the gulf Beach of Matagorda Island in a truck looking for a spot to stop and catch some trout. We had hit a few spots successfully and then stopped at another and as I was climbing out of the truck I looked down and saw this face looking up at me. The only thing exposed in the sand was the face of the little wood carving below.We dug her up and were very excited at our find. Who knows where she was made. Anyway, I was living at home at the time and there is no way my Mom would have allowed something like that in her house. I gave it to my buddy on the condition that if he died first I would get her back. He named her â€œMambajimbaâ€. We talk about her from time to time but it was a pretty neat find.
She is right at 2 feet tall, carved out of wood and weighs about 4 or 5 lbs. We never cared about trying to figure out the wood type or to determine origin. 
All hail Mambajimba!!! Pics below


----------



## jsb223

A few years back in Tom Green county on a 14 degree morning with 20+ mph winds all I could think about was keeping warm as most of my extreme cold gear was 250 miles away in my garage.

Then out it came. About 100 yards away due north a large cat. It just stopped in the edge of the right or way a sat on it's haunches.

It was short haired, completely black with a small head with no discernible ears and a very long tail.

After much ribbiing from fellow hunters and an extensive google search I have come to the conclustion that I saw a jaguarundi.

http://bigcatrescue.org/jaguarundi-facts/


----------



## Codye

Awesome thread!!! took me a couple of days to read everyones stories, but i enjoyed it very much. they should make this a topic on the message board so everyone on 2cool can acess it easily (its obviously worth it).


----------



## smokinguntoo

Codye said:


> Awesome thread!!! took me a couple of days to read everyones stories, but i enjoyed it very much. they should make this a topic on the message board so everyone on 2cool can acess it easily (its obviously worth it).


Welcome aboard.

SG2


----------



## BlueDawg

Awesome thread appreciate the stories. Felt like I should have poured a scotch and built a campfire. We have started documenting stories told and the fish camp (Sea Isle) and our ranch in East Texas. It is my hope that "some" of them will pass through many generations once I am gone. 

Our Ranch is one mile south of the Red River in NE Texas. We have 6 trees that grow up 3 or 4 feet then point level for about 3 or 4 feet then grow straight up like a normal tree. I looked it up and the Indians used to train these trees to grow like that to use as land marks or to provide directions. I will take and post pictures when go there in a few weeks. One is by a stand I hunt and every time I hunt there I get lost in thought.... Who did this? Where did it lead to? etc.....


----------



## locolobo

*youtube*

Ran across this about 3 years ago and made it to about page 35.Now it's more than twice that. Great read and brings back memories. Never found anything at a hunting lease but old bottles and some ******** once in Camp wood. I grew up on my grandparents farm outside Longview Tx. And that's where I learned about the outdoors, nature and hunting and fishing So hoping this counts. I was able to start roaming the farm and neighbors places at about 8 yrs old and obviously there was a lot of Indians in that area at one time. Mostly Caddo I think. By the time I left home @ 18 I had found a cigar box full of arrow heads, Knives and such. Never put much stock into them except they were cool. Left them @ home when I left and I lost track of the relics. Wish I had taken better care of them now.


----------



## Creekfisher

*Some odd stuff*

Got a few stories to add to this awesome thread! About 8-9 years ago on my family's lease we had near Flynn, Tx right off FM 977 my cousin and i were walking through the woods and found a center console boat! My grandpa had been on the lease for around 30 years and never knew about it! It was in the middle of the woods next to a creek, sitting on the trailer. We would find the occasional dryer, xmas lights, and tools, but nothing ever like this! If i remember correctly it was around 25 feet. looked to be from the mid 70s. Asked the owner about it and he had no idea who's it was or how it got there. That wasn't surprising since every time i saw him he had a bottle of jim beam in his hand :rotfl:

Next one was on a different lease in Rocksprings. My uncle, cousin, and i were walkin around in between hunts and found an old hunting cabin and a willys jeep in a carport. we went inside and there was a box of keys (probably to the old stands), a fridge, poker table, and some other stuff out back. don't really remember what else. when we asked the owner if he knew about it he said he found it not too far after he bought the place and was planning to restore it. we got off the lease and fell out of contact with the owner so i don't know if he ever went through with it.

This one isnt mine but my friend's. He found an illegal confused by the game camera on his ranch in south Texas. Its a pretty priceless picture!

less than a year ago on some property my family bought north of Columbus. we were clearing a field and found an old 1918 dodge brother's chassis and an 50's ford truck frame both converted in to horse drawn trailers. we pulled em out of the brush and found an old grease gun, a few intact glass jars, a pump sprayer, and some more random odds and ends. got all of it in the cabin up there. ill try to remember to take some pictures next time im up there. got a picture of us pulling out the old dodge chassis. we might try to restore it for some lawn art!

last one was on our columbus property and it was one of the weirdest things ive ever seen. my uncle, dad, sister and i were riding around the property on the ranger and we were passing the feeder next to the fence line. on the other side we saw a pretty good size hog, about 150lbs. he was just on the other side of the fence on my neighbors property. he just stopped and started looking at us so we stopped too. we had a good 20 second stare down and he passed under the fence and came about 15 feet from us. we got down off the ranger and just stood there looking at him. i pulled out my pistol and sent 3 bullets his way. he was so close it was like a dream. we loaded him up and took him and cleaned him. we kept joking he was someone's pet! we smoked him a few weeks later and he made some dang fine pulled pork sandwiches! in the picture it looks a lot bigger than it was!


----------



## lapesca67

We were hunting on one of the Kenedy ranch pastures last year. Anyone familiar with that country knows that it is what the Texas coastal prairie looked like 200 years ago. We were in the middle of no where and my son looks down and finds an iphone 1/2 buried in the sand. Given that it had rained two weeks before, I gave it zero chance of working. We plugged it in back at the camp to see if it would boot up. Sure enough it did and while trying to figure out who owned it, we found a video of a Nilgai that had been roped and tied like a calf roper would in a rodeo. Then a guy gets on its back, someone else unties the binding on the legs and he rides it like a bronc for about 10 seconds before getting dumped! Turns out some cowboys who had been moving cattle had the crazy idea of riding a Nilgai. We found the owner and he laughed and said they do that from time to time to have some fun.....


----------



## 24Buds

lapesca67 said:


> We were hunting on one of the Kenedy ranch pastures last year. Anyone familiar with that country knows that it is what the Texas coastal prairie looked like 200 years ago. We were in the middle of no where and my son looks down and finds an iphone 1/2 buried in the sand. Given that it had rained two weeks before, I gave it zero chance of working. We plugged it in back at the camp to see if it would boot up. Sure enough it did and while trying to figure out who owned it, we found a video of a Nilgai that had been roped and tied like a calf roper would in a rodeo. Then a guy gets on its back, someone else unties the binding on the legs and he rides it like a bronc for about 10 seconds before getting dumped! Turns out some cowboys who had been moving cattle had the crazy idea of riding a Nilgai. We found the owner and he laughed and said they do that from time to time to have some fun.....


Would love to see that video!


----------



## 2bayous

I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


----------



## Bill C

2bayous said:


> I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


Very cool! I can't wait for the pictures.


----------



## Sea Aggie

2bayous said:


> I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


Can't wait to see the photo's of the cave / guns / book. Thanks for sharing the story.


----------



## patwilson

Would love to see the pics!



2bayous said:


> I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


----------



## oOslikOo

2bayous said:


> I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


 That's awesome!! There were some rough characters running that territory back then!!


----------



## Gorda Fisher

Found this belt buckle? In the river bed today. Dunno if it's very old or not


----------



## vette74

I found a fuel tank while walking our lease in Del Rio it is most likely from a T-33 end fuel tank. I couldn't imagine the plane flying without it they were not drop tanks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_T-33


----------



## sweenyite

vette74 said:


> I found a fuel tank while walking our lease in Del Rio it is most likely from a T-33 end fuel tank. I couldn't imagine the plane flying without it they were not drop tanks.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_T-33


Keep looking. You might find the rest of it. :ac550:


----------



## Charlie B

*finds*

Gold ! lived in Colorado and would prospect for gold. Did a lot of panning, high banking in rivers and streams. Found small flakes and little bitty specks. Went to Arizona on a prospecting trip. Started North of Kingman Az around the king tut mine. Worked our way south to Yuma. Met with a prospector in Yuma. I will not give his name. Seen hundreds of nuggets that he had found all over the world. Set with a gold broker who was selling 6 nuggets all over 1.6 ounces in a McDonald's restaurant in Quartzsite Az.. Held in my hand a 9 oz nugget, also in Quartzsite. 10 years of prospecting and metal detecting Found many bullets, Shell casings. nails boot tacks, and old soda cans and interesting stuff. Maybe in all that time I found maybe 2 oz of gold, and spent twice that in the hunt. but the memories are priceless.


----------



## tstorm5

A couple of friends out deer hunting (evening hunt) were walking to their blinds and came across two of those big Blue Indigo snakes in a battle to the death. Watched em for a while and saw them get all wrapped up together and go rolling across the ground, kind of like an alligator in one of those death rolls. After hunting they came back a few hours later, snakes were still at it and blood all over the ground. Pretty wild. I think one of the guys had pics. Maybe he still has em. Will try to find out.


----------



## Paper Boy

*Rifle*

A 30.06 rifle leaning up against a pine tree between Livingston and Woodville


----------



## Favre4

Snow monkey on a lease in Agua dulce... Shoulda plugged him and ain't seen him since.. Get looked at stupidly every time I tell story but it's ok.


----------



## surf_ox

2bayous said:


> I have family property in New Mexico right outside Lincoln which was my great great grandpas. Since I'm the only one in my family that enjoys hunting I spend a bunch of time out there. Anyways I was elk hunting and found an old cave entrance call it dumb luck because I have been by there a 100x and never noticed because it was grown over. I entered and what I saw when I went in I was immediately in shock. I found a camp fire with old pots, 2 knives, books that dated back to 1865, 1 rifle which I have and it's a winchester45-70 saddle gun and 2 trusty Sam colts which my dad has. Tried to find history on them but no go. Called Cody firearm museum to see but they couldn't help. It was a cool find because of the dates and history in that area. Billy the kid days. I will try and post pics.


Ever find those pics??

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

Don't ever hesitate to try something new. Remember amateurs built the ARK and professionals built the TITANIC.


----------



## Trouthunter

surf_ox said:


> Ever find those pics??
> 
> He hasn't been back on here since he made that post.
> 
> Last Activity: 11-09-2015 11:06 PM
> 
> TH


----------



## Moonpie

Found an old glass insulator once.
Middle of nowhere. Literally miles from any telegraph/telephone lines.
Looked it up and it dates to about 1880.


----------



## Bill C

Paper Boy said:


> A 30.06 rifle leaning up against a pine tree between Livingston and Woodville


About 30 years ago I took a Hunter Education course from a guy in East Texas who, to illustrate the dangers of drinking and hunting, mentioned he went into the woods one morning drunk and found himself back at his car without his rifle. He never found it. I wonder if you did.


----------



## fishhawkxxx

Bret said:


> We hunted near Alto for several years.. and the cabin we stayed in was bulit in 1847 out of virgin timber.. 18in mainbeams. and a couple of huge fireplaces... behind the house was the grave and headstone of helena berryman, the first Anglo child known to have been born in Tx after it became a state.. There were old slaves quarters back down the hill.too with lots of old machinery etc.. Lots of old stuff there..
> I did find a nice hand scraper and tons of broken flint on my place near Blanco.. Still looking for arrowheads.....
> This is a great thread You guys find lots of cool stuff.


intresting, my mother was (supposedly through dna) was 1st white woman born in texas as a republic, She was a henson, also from that area.


----------



## Ficking

This thread is so freaking amazing to read. I've never found anything THAT interesting... I've only found some strange but rather not interesting things... especially compared to the stories I read here.


----------



## Kat

*Dead Body?*

After a flood on the Trinity River north of the I-10 bridge, I was cat fishing by myself in a shallow back water area in the trees when I noticed something odd sticking up from the muddy water. As I trolled closer to it I realized that it was an old wood coffin that had been buried at the base of a large oak tree and almost half of it was exposed above the waterline. It kind of creeped me out, so I left that area ASAP!


----------



## jpond100

*Grave Site*

One of the most interesting things I came across was a grave site in south Texas that had been undiscovered for years. We were clearing some thick brush and stumbled upon a tombstone dating back to 1883. Turns out it was an entire family of 5 that had all died within a month of each other. We asked the landowner about it... he said it was the families family before he purchased the property. He had known about it but hadn't seen it in the 20 years he owned the property.

Makes you wonder how many more undiscovered sites are out there.


----------



## Bucksnort

*License plate house*

A friend of mine purchased a ranch a few years ago and discovered it had an old cabin on it covered both inside and out with Texas 1932 and 1933 license plates. He has no clue what the history is behind it. Like me, he is very curious to who built it. He has found a few other plates on the ground about the ranch.


----------



## willydavenport

Bucksnort said:


> A friend of mine purchased a ranch a few years ago and discovered it had an old cabin on it covered both inside and out with Texas 1932 and 1933 license plates. He has no clue what the history is behind it. Like me, he is very curious to who built it. He has found a few other plates on the ground about the ranch.


That's awesome.


----------



## raghead

*Cool cave*

These are some pictures of a pretty cool cave on our lease in old Mexico - Right on the Rio Grande, just west of the Pecos. The entrance is just a hole in the ground - access is by a LONG extension ladder. Some bones and stuff from critters that fell in and couldn't get out..


----------



## Trouthunter

That's a cool cave! Have ya'll found any Indian artifacts down there?

TH


----------



## raghead

No artifacts in the cave except animal bones, but on the property some cool obsidian spearheads (maybe scrapers?), arrowheads and the like -


----------



## Fin Reaper

i hunted on a 3000 acre ranch in junction with my dad and grandpa for 15 years when i was a kid. Used to walk all over the ranch while hunting (back then couldnt afford four wheelers and such). Would find random license plates from the 30's and 40's, found old glass medicine bottles, a really old iron hatchet head stuck in a tree like some put there and forgot (handle rotted off long time ago). Also came across a small cave with an inscription on the entrance (couldnt make it out what it said) asked the old rancher said back in the 1800's some famous bank robbers holed up there and carved their gang name in the rock face with an axe. Never validated the story but was very cool. 
On buddies ranch i currently hunt others have found arrow heads and metal detected an old henry rimfire .44 cartridge. Thought that was neat.


----------



## billboytx

Three arrowheads, one hide scraper, numerous "trail trees", a large rock that was reportedly the boundary between the Creek and Cherokee Indians, and one very large swarm of angry bees.


----------



## tiberiuswade1

While turkey hunting Junction Tx found this rock formation that looks like a kitchen knife.. artifact or rock
















Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk


----------



## Trouthunter

That's pretty cool.

TH


----------



## polekaat

*Bear Hunting*

A buddy found both of these, within an hours time, laying on the ground, while bear hunting, in Alaska. 38.8 grams and 40.15 grams


----------



## Bill C

Thatâ€™s a definite Wow! What a find.


----------



## scwine

polekaat said:


> A buddy found both of these, within an hours time, laying on the ground, while bear hunting, in Alaska. 38.8 grams and 40.15 grams


Seriously?!! ****.


----------



## Trouthunter

Funny. 



People use metal detectors for days and don't find nuggets like that. That's a really cool find.



TH


----------



## activescrape

Wow. I would have quit bear hunting I think.


----------



## Catawba

I found this built into a draw on the property I recently purchased. Definitely man made. These are some big rocks. Put the keys there for context. Any ideas what it is?


----------



## Trouthunter

Possibly a grave marker. The rocks aren't black so no fires were made inside of it so I'm going with grave marker.


TH


----------



## Trouthunter

Sharpest said:


> Not my find but a few years ago I was cleaning out my grandma's garage and found this, a rusted and weathered Henry Repeater. My grandfather and dad hunted on the King and Kenedy ranches quite a bit many years ago and have had properties all over the rest of south Texas as well. Unfortunately grandad passed in '89 and my dad in '03 and grandma doesn't know anything about the origin of the rifle. What I find most interesting is that the hammer is cocked. Makes me wonder about the circumstances it was lost under...


Looks more like an 1873 Winchester than a Henry. It doesn't have the same magazine as a Henry Repeating Rifle.


----------



## Tarpon1

While pronghorn hunting south of Vaughn NM ran across an area where dirt had been moved into a pattern, but I couldn't tell what it was from ground level. Asked the ranch owner about it and he told me it was a giant swastika used by the Air Force for training during WW II. Pilots would fly up from Roswell AFB and bomb it with dummies (once with live bombs, though)! He said to look at it on Google Earth...


----------



## canyonfvr

Now thats different


----------



## Tarpon1

This is such a great thread, I have never looked at it before this week and now that I've read everything thanks for sharing all these great stories and pictures!

Here are a couple of "true crime" hunting stories for ya'll:

Hunting aoudad back in 2012 west of Valentine close to Ft Holland mentioned earlier and spotted 5 guys with heavy backpacks escorted by two heavily armed (AR15) muchachos hiking up from the river. Watched through the binos and the rifle scope and realized they were coming right toward my guide and I and between us and our vehicle a mile or so away. They stopped to rest in a little patch of shade and I had a cell signal so I called the personal cell of a DEA guy I knew in Houston, he called their office in El Paso and a helicopter showed up 30 minutes later. The pistoleros gave up without a scrap and they recovered a bunch of weed and a few guns.

After early limits hunting ducks north of Las Vegas at Paranagat NWR my two friends and I drove out in the desert to look around. We were 3-400 yards from a travel trailer hooked to a pickup truck about a mile off highway 93 when it suddenly blew up...BLEW THE F UP! We hauled *** over there and found two injured people, two injured dogs and a dead guy. Apparently grandson and his bud had a meth cook going and blew up the trailer killing his partner and injuring his grandmother who was asleep in the trailer. We did CPR on grandma until an ambulance got there in about 35 minutes but she died on the way to the hospital. Had to shoot one of the dogs which was literally broken in half and suffering terribly. The mastermind of this little operation was unscathed...but I went back to Nye County NV and testified at his double manslaughter trial. Glad he died in prison.

But my best discovery: shortly after moving to Houston I was invited to go duck hunting. We didn't have a bling, just jump shooting over a pond. We got there in the dark, tossed out some decoys and hunkered down in the marshgrass to wait until shooting time. I found a nice hump to sit on so I could see those quackers coming in. Unfortunately no one told me about fire ants or their mounds...they can get in your waders fast! Got bit about 20 times. I'm sure my buddies could post on here "we saw a guy strip completely naked while duck hunting once..."

Thanks for reading!


----------



## canyonfvr

Love these posts keep em coming


----------



## paulmondolfi

On my way back from Dove hunting I came across the ugliest puppy in the world abandoned and starving. He devoured three doves and jumped into the back of my car.
That was 13 years ago and he is still with us


----------



## S-3 ranch

pilar said:


> while hunting on the hopper ranch in brooks co , we had been driveing cross country bird hunting . we found a car " about 5 miles from any road " and next to the car hanging from fishing line was a dead guy " he looked like a mummy / leather " we called the cops they could not tell us what or why the guy was doing that far from a road


Thought I would digg this one up from the way back


----------



## DA REEL DADDY

paulmondolfi said:


> On my way back from Dove hunting I came across the ugliest puppy in the world abandoned and starving. He devoured three doves and jumped into the back of my car.
> That was 13 years ago and he is still with us


Cool of you and great story

Got any pics of the pup


----------



## colnz

*My most memorable*

I was 10 or 11 yrs old hunting in a large working ranch outside of Mason. I was a city boy from a town of 40k and har not experienced any ranch operations before but this one day the ranch hands had corralled some calves outside the old stone German homestead at the ranch and I was encouraged to observe their activities. I might not be using the correct vernacular in this description but they were separating the boys and the girls. All the boys were getting castrated, then they would get something that looked like lard lather on their exposed remaining reproduction parts and then they were set free to join the other new steers. This was circa 1964 and I thought that this was the best deer hunting trip yet even though I had only been on about 2 up to then. Chalk it up to an educational one too.

The river that ran along the ranch would show dinosaur foot prints on the rocks when the water was low enough too.


----------



## Cavjock22

Thanksgiving weekend on the ranch, my brother brought his metal detector and decided to go into the brush where an old road bed was. He discovered a pistol round with the bullet about 2 inches away. They were both 2-3 inches in the ground. Neither of us could distinguish the markings on it. Sunday night he posted on some gun/ammo forums and discovered it was a .455 webley cartridge with a C stamped on it apparently Identifies cordite propellant.. 1891-1897.. We know nobody on the ranch , guest or grandfather has ever had that caliber., We have owned since 1932...


----------



## BIGDADDY22

Good stuff guys!


----------



## MayaWilson

antique bottles, a cannonball, that's pretty cool. keep em' coming.


----------



## Pearland Greg

paulmondolfi said:


> On my way back from Dove hunting I came across the ugliest puppy in the world abandoned and starving. He devoured three doves and jumped into the back of my car.
> That was 13 years ago and he is still with us


I have a similar story, but it was only 3 years ago. My wife wanted to kill me from bringing that dog home, in fact she looked at our eldest and pointed at me saying something like "Get that ugly flea-bitten dirt bag out of my house, and throw his dog out with him!" Now three years later, I can't separate her from that dog.


----------



## Joe blo

Awesome stories and finds! Really enjoyed reading these.


----------



## gary.curlin

I found a dragon. Well a piece of wood that looks like one.









Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk


----------



## TxAg80

*This has been an amazing thread! Read the whole darn thing.*

A few stories from the years. 

I grew up in Hays county West of Kyle, when it was still a small town. Before I was old enough to start working we spent many summer days out on the Blanco river just fishing, swimming, and paddling around. One day we saw something odd floating in the water. Turned out to be a dead Flounder, about 16" long. No idea how it got there. Maybe somebody tried to keep it alive back from the coast and dumped it or something?

Around 1996 I was deer hunting along a creek outside Driftwood. Washed up at the edge of the water was a rather nice sized dead Rainbow trout. Best guess is he had navigated up from the Guadalupe river or something.

Growing up a neighbor kid and I were digging a hole one day just for fun. About a foot down we found a few coins, one turned out to be a penny dated 1912. I always wondered how they came to be there, just ranch country back in the day. 

Elk hunting in New Mexico, found the old log cabin of the original Home Steaders. Brought back a couple cool old Whiskey bottles that dated back to the 30's, still have them. Found some old painted pottery pieces up next to a hill at that same place.

On an old deer lease outside Castell found the cab to a 35 Chevy out in the pasture, all grown up around it. Turns out it was somewhat common for them to take old cars out and use them as deer blinds back in the day. This one had a **** who was quite happy in it.

Have a few more, will post as I remember.


----------



## schmellba99

Nothing super interesting, but did come across what was left of a truck out in the desert west of Phoenix several years back. Burned to the ground, complete with a crispy critter in the driver's seat. LEO's said it was likely cartel issues. Also came across what I could only assume was a freshly dug grave in the same general area once. Just a hole dug with a backhoe out in the desert in the middle of BFE. I know for a fact it was filled back in sometime after, never bothered to find out what was buried there (if anything).


----------



## Old sailor

I found this piece of driftwood on a Canadian fishing trip.
Looks like 3 dragon heads on the right side.


----------



## Ridgerunnerdoc

About twenty years ago we came across a the cab of an old chevy pickup at the edge of a field that was used as a deer stand. The cab that was elevated about 12 feet off the ground and access was via a ladder.


----------



## DC31

This thread reminds me of the late Patrick McManus's books. Rubber legs and whitetail hairs and the the night the bear ate Gumba are some of my favorites


----------



## canyonfvr

LOve this thread


----------



## Camper_bob

Been lurking here for a while, but reading this thread compelled me to join and post. LOVE this thread!

My dad has been on a lease in Junction for a few years. After the first couple years, I decided to actually join and become a member. The previous guy who held my spot left his blind, and left it in general disrepair. I didn't have the money to build a new one, so I went to work "renovating" that one. I was up there with my dad one afternoon working on it, and discovered "droppings", and heard something moving around. So my dad and I stood on either side of the ladder (blind was only about 6 ft off the ground), grabbed hold of the carpet and started pulling. We yanked it out, threw the carpet down and watched for something to scurry away thinking it had to be mice. Nothing moved. So we looked at eachother somewhat perplexed. I climbed up the ladder to peer into the blind, and about the time my face came up over the bottom threshold of the door, I came about a foot face-to-face with a critter much bigger than the mouse I was expecting! We locked eyes for a beat, and it darted to the other side of the blind, jumped through the window, hit the ground on the other side of the blind with a thud (I'd say it was about 10 ft to the ground there, maybe more, and it's Junction, so it was all jagged rocks) and jetted off into the brush. There were some choice words thrown from my mouth, but thankfully I don't panic easily, otherwise, I might have thrown myself off the ladder backwards and had a real big problem! My dad says "What the heck was that?!" I looked at him wide-eyed for a moment as I tried to process what I had just seen; "That... was a ring-tailed cat!!"

Never seen one before or since out there...


----------



## Prof. Salt

A huge lion trap with chain and hook that had been laying out there in West Texas for who knows how long, a petrified wood ceremonial tomahawk head along a creek edge, a few stone heads and a meteorite that still had impact marks from landing on the chalk bluff we were stalking along near Del Rio. And some canon grape shot along a river edge near Fort Worth.


----------



## canyonfvr

You guys find some cool stuff out there


----------



## quackattack

I was about 16-17 and my cousin had a few acres in between Seadrift and POC. It was good for a hog every night. One day I decided to walk around and I found an old stand that our dads used to hunt out of. it was in rough shape; as in missing the door and rotten, but since it wasn't very tall I decided to check it out. When I got to the top of the ladder there were 2 baby owls on the floor. Both of them shaking their heads like they were telling me "NO! DO NOT COME IN!". For some weird reason I decided to climb back down. When I got back down, the bottom step of the ladder broke and a huge swarm of bees erupted from inside the stand. I was like OMG! 

I've told this story many times and everyone thinks I'm nuts, but them owls were warning me.


----------



## The Lynn Marie

I was squirrel Hunting in Northwestern PA when I was 12 years old. I found an extremely heavy rock, that I am almost certain was a piece of a meteor, or falling star, out in the middle of the woods. It looked like nothing i have ever seen before or since. All molten, and with different colors. I was carrying it home when I saw a large Gray Squirrel. I put the meteor down, to try to get the squirrel, and could never find it again. I also came across a huge Iron Kettle out in the middle of the woods. The place was always called the "iron Kettle" by my great uncle. It was about 6 feet across and 4 feet deep. Have no idea what it would have been used for, or how it got there. (Maple Syrup? Lastly, when I lived out in the Allegeny National Forest in Hallton, PA , on the National Wild and Scenic River (Clarion River) our water system was a wooden box, high on the top of the mountain, fed by a spring. The box collected the water, and a pipe brought it down the mountain to my trailer, and about 8 hunting camps. Our water developed a bad smell, so I went to investigate. Found chipmunks had drowned inthe box. Gross, I know! So, I looked up and could see something white up the mountain. I went up there, and it was an old bath tub! The kind with the legs. So, I rolled it down to the spring, and that became our new water collector, with screen over it to keep out chipmunks. Have no idea how, or why that tub which weighed a few hundred pounds, was up there. 

Garry


----------



## johnamil57

activescrape said:


> What wierd, rare, unusual or interesting things have you come across while hunting? I'll go first.
> 
> Once while hunting along Home Creek south of Sanna Anna in Coleman county I shot a turkey. He ran off in to some very thick underbrush and I went in after him. Deep in there I discovered a washed out stone age indian grave. There were two double bevel knives, never resharpened(meaning new) a couple of Perdiz points a Scallorn and a Wa****a. Most interesting were some shell beads and pottery shards. I showed them to an archaeologist at SMU and he said that was very unusual for that far west and inland.
> Another time I was pheasant hunting in the panhandle around an old playa lake. I noticed some flint and started looking around. I didn't find any arrowheads but I did find an almost perfectly round, something, that was white, about the size of a big marble, but too light to be clay or glass. I could not figure it out. I took it over to the museum in Plainview and the resident archaeologist there told me that it came from a buffalos stomach. He said they would lick themselves and ingest lots of hair. In their stomach this hair would form balls which were hard to digest. Sometimes it would get very hard. He said that apparently indians or wolves had killed a buffalo there and after everything else had decomposed this was left and that although they are kind of rare he had seen them before. I still have it. Wierd huh?
> What about you guys, and girls.


Weird


----------



## schmellba99

Favre4 said:


> Snow monkey on a lease in Agua dulce... Shoulda plugged him and ain't seen him since.. Get looked at stupidly every time I tell story but it's ok.


Doesn't surprise me at all. There is a pharmaceutical research facility outside of Agua Dulce that has a crapload of monkeys. I did a project for them several years back, I think there are about 1000-1500 monkeys there. One escapes every now and again.


----------



## catalina22usa

I was hunting at a friends place in Rocksprings Texas. I didn’t find this but he showed me something that he found. It was a stainless steel box with valves and Spicket’s on it. It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Turns out it was a coffee maker from a Learjet. A few years back, this jet crashed in rock springs and actually blew up in the sky. This coffee maker is fell from the jet and landed on his land and he found it several months later.


----------

