‘The coolest experience we could come up with’
Winner of drawing to fish and hunt for 2½ days in state’s newest WMA
The trip of a lifetime awaits at the Powderhorn Wildlife Management Area, a paradise on the Texas coast and the state’s newest WMA.
A winner and a guest will participate in the first Cast and Blast from Big Time Texas Hunts.
“All of the Big Time Texas Hunts are very good, all very special in their own way. But we kind of dreamed this one up to be the coolest experience we could possibly come up with, and I think we’ve done it,” said Justin Dreibelbis, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s private lands and public hunting program director.
The greatest difficulty for the lucky Powderhorn visitors will be picking which aspect has them most excited, the Cast or the Blast.
The trip is all-inclusive. Meals will be provided, and guests will stay at the recently renovated ranch house that overlooks Matagorda Bay.
“The Cast and Blast is going to provide a singularly unique opportunity, an unparalleled outdoor experience for the lucky sportsman or sportswoman who gets drawn,” TPWD executive director Carter Smith said.
No shortage of game
A full exposure to the wonders and wildlife of Powderhorn WMA is planned over 2½ days this fall. WMA staff will guide hunts for the white-tailed, sambar and axis deer that roam the 17,351-acre property. The guests will get to hunt for waterfowl, too.
The fishing portion of the package will be provided by the 11 miles of Matagorda Bay shoreline and Powderhorn Lake. Anglers can wadefish and take a guided boat trip. Bait, tackle and fish cleaning are included.
Essentially, most everything an outdoor enthusiast would want can be found on the diverse landscape of the Powderhorn.
“Whoever gets this hunt is going to stay very busy for a few days,” Dreibelbis said.
Finding success should not be an overwhelming endeavor. The WMA, in Calhoun County near Port O’Connor, is known for its abundance of wildlife.
“It’s definitely one of the gamiest wildlife management areas that we have,” Smith said.
The WMA has lots of white-tailed and exotic deer, Rio Grande wild turkeys, bobwhite quail and a variety of waterfowl, and it has potential for dove.
Drawings have been held for public deer hunting on the WMA the past two seasons. The public hunts have met with positive reviews so far, Dreibelbis said.
A jewel of the coast
As a WMA, access is limited to the Powderhorn. The drawing provides a rare opportunity to explore a mythical piece of Texas, one that only recently came under the state’s control.
In 2014, a bid to preserve the historic Powderhorn Ranch culminated with the property’s purchase and donation to TPWD through a joint effort by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation, the Nature Conservancy and the Conservation Fund.
The success was decades in the making and the silver lining to a tragedy. Most of the money used to acquire the Powderhorn came from the Gulf Environmental Benefit Fund, created in the wake of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster.
“It’s just one of the great jewels of the coast. We are very blessed to have been in a position to be able to protect that special place for generations to come,” Smith said.
Today, the Powderhorn is managed as one of the last remaining tracts of intact coastal prairie.
The Powderhorn is a habitat hodgepodge. Freshwater and brackish wetlands are interspersed with expanses of native coastal prairie, littered with mature oak motts and mima mounds.
However, if you had visited the Powderhorn when it was acquired, you might not recognize it now.
Five years in the making
Running live oak had taken over much of the property by the time habitat work began in earnest in 2015.
Powderhorn WMA area manager Daniel Walker referred to the short shrub oak as an “invasive native.” It grows densely, choking out other native species when left unchecked by overgrazing or lack of fire.
TPWD has improved about 4,000 acres of habitat by removing the running live oak. Habitat managers used an herbicide called Spike 20P to remove the brush and have followed up by rotating prescribed burns.
TPWD did not have to reseed with native grasses[ the seeds were already in the soil bank. Grasses and forbs re-emerged once the thick canopy was removed.
“With all the forbs coming up, bigger critters like deer are foraging, getting better nutrition, heavier bodyweight, better antlers. Across the board, our wildlife have benefited from this habitat work,” Walker said.
Populations of grassland birds such as meadowlarks, sparrows and northern bobwhite quail are increasing in the treatment area.
Bobwhites are not the only beleaguered birds to take refuge and benefit from the work happening on the Powderhorn.
The endangered whooping crane takes sanctuary on the property. As many as six whooping cranes wintered in the WMA last year.
The Powderhorn is also home to mottled ducks, a species in decline.
“They like to have freshwater wetlands surrounded by open grasslands. So they’ll be benefiting from our habitat work as well,” Walker said.
Walker said the longterm goal is to treat and burn as much of 15,000 acres as possible. The remaining 2,300 acres eventually will become a state park.
Work funded by hunters
In the meantime, the winners of the Big Time Texas Hunt package will get to witness and reap the results of the incredible habitat work so far.
That work will continue in part because of the drawing. Big Time Texas Hunts revenue goes back to WMAs.
“Since 1996, this program has produced more than $16 million in gross revenue that we’ve been able to (put toward improving) the habitat of our WMAs, public hunting access, deer blinds, research projects,” Dreibelbis said.
“This is just a really good example of hunters paying for conservation.”
Entries are $9 online or $10 at license retailers.
Other popular Big Time Texas Hunts include the Texas Grand Slam, which packages four separate hunting trips for desert bighorn sheep, pronghorn, white-tailed deer and desert mule deer. Five winners of the Whitetail Bonanza will enjoy guided hunts, including one on the Gus Engeling WMA for the first time.
The deadline to enter is Oct. 15, and winners will be announced by the end of the month.