The slogan at Dead Man’s Pass Ranch is “We make dreams come true.” The first dream to come true was the ranch itself. 2300 acres cleared of indigenous wildlife then stocked with the best quality deer and exotics. The lodge is sanitized weekly and meals are prepared on site by a talented chef including steaks branded “DMP” on Saturday night. Clients are guided one on one. Animals taken are on schedule as per what is best for the environment. If it sounds clinical the truth is onsite you quickly become one of the family. I can’t imagine a better hunting experience.
The meat hunt package at Dead Man’s Pass Ranch has got to be one of the best bargains available to the hunter. Lunch on arrival Friday, a sight-in session at the 100-yard range thereafter followed by an evening hunt guided one on one from a clean, well-designed stand seated some ten or more feet above the rugged landscape. Inside the stand was a carpeted floor with compact wheeled desk chairs. Three additional hunt sessions were scheduled for Saturday morning, Saturday night and Sunday morning. No luck Friday night but the show was magnificent. A pecking order of different sized bucks and does followed by exotics cautiously stepped into the clearing. Saturday morning the hunt began with a drive to the stand under a starlit night. The Big Dipper was clearly displayed. Its size was staggering as if it were staged lighting from the walls of a skyscraper. Planets Jupiter and Saturn beamed like incoming aircraft.
No words are adequate to prepare one for the sky view available in deep West Texas. Before the sun could rise, I spied what appeared to be several large white boulders that suddenly began to move like ghosts. These were the Scimitar Oryx, huge desert antelope from North Africa. They ruled the clearing driving off the deer that had been taking turns at the feeder. Nevertheless, a Black Buck exotic from India about one-quarter their size showed no fear and the Oryx gave them a wide berth. As mysteriously as the Oryx had arrived they decided to leave, exiting stage left. Finally, a set of does came in. Choosing the largest doe my guide, a young man with a degree in wildlife management, walked me through the process of letting the doe settle into a position that was safe from my shot possibly impacting any of the other animals that were taking turns at the feeder. We took our time. Finally an ethical shot with the doe nearly quartering the angle of the shot path became available. One round from my 243 Winchester Weatherby Mark V put down the doe. The fully expanded 100-grain bullet was recovered from beneath the hide at an angle across from the entry wound. The doe was transported back to the cutting room where it weighed in a 94.9 pounds.
My guide then gave me a lesson in how to skin and quarter a deer in preparation for processing the meat. Aged by inspecting its teeth excessive wear to the crown of the third rearward molar indicated the doe was about 5 years of age. What a magnificent lesson. My first deer.
For the Saturday evening hunt our stand was positioned before a broad expanse of flat ground. The first deer to arrive were young bucks that locked horns treating us to a series of wrestling matches. Several does arrived and also engaged in posturing and aggressive behavior standing on their hind legs and throwing “punches” with their hooves. With so many deer in attendance the only question was the taking of which animal would be most beneficial to the ranch and leave the best opportunities in store for the future. My guide contacted ranch management and a decision was made leaving three possible candidates for harvest including an Axis doe. The next problem was getting a clear shot. Hunting is a game of not just stealth and marksmanship but of patience. My guide instructed me we were going to go slow and take as much as 20 minutes to settle on a shot after the right doe has come into view. In this case we needed a fawn to clear out completely as it kept moving into the shot path. Several times it walked forward and back turning its head momentarily exposing the side of the doe. Our desired point of impact was directly behind the shoulder just below midline. The doe repeatedly pulled back, turned, and pulled alongside the doe again. Finally, the fawn moved fully rearward of the doe and stopped. The fired shot came just as the doe was rotating towards us. The doe jumped upon impact and ran even though the guide assured me it was as solid hit. As with the morning kill, we waited about 10 minutes before exiting the stand in pursuit. It was up to the guide track the doe.
Having seen the herd move away to the right my guide reasoned he should track in the same direction. It was beginning get dark, but we were able to track the deer through the heavy brush. His tracking skills paid off just as they had 12 hours earlier finding the deer expired at the base of a patch of mesquite. Transported to the shed by ATV the doe weighed in at 85 pounds. Age was estimated at more than 4.5 years old. Both deer were big healthy specimens yielding enough meat to fill two large coolers after processing. In addition, we had enough hide to produce two large pillows and a warm throw for the couch.
– Roger Eckstein
