This week we start off by talking poaching with our Texas Parks & Wildlife Lt. Game Warden Lewis Rather. Lt. Rather has been a Texas Game Warden for 32 years, he has seen and done it all. We discuss how Texas law with stricter poaching penalties has helped reduce the number of poaching related crimes over the past 15 years. Spotlighting and road hunting cases have bottomed out, but there is a new and very brazen breed of poacher out there. We discuss how to protect your property against them. Also, Lt. Rather adds some humor to the broadcast when tells us about the dumbest poacher he’s ever come into contact with. Pure radio gold! Operation Game Thief is an effort where Texas hunters work with TPWD Game Wardens to prevent the theft of you and I’s wildlife:

Next, we gear up for our October Oklahoma whitetail muzzle loader hunt at Roberts Ranch Outfitters. Since we are completely new to the sport of muzzle loading we bring in CVA Muzzleloaders Director of Media Relations and Cabela’s Pro Staffer Chad Schearer. Chad answers all our questions on ballistics and at what distance you can ethically take an animal with a modern muzzle loader. We can’t wait to get that first animal on the ground with our new CVA Optima V2! Chad with a huge caribou taken with his CVA Muzzleloader.

Then our old friend and 5 time Crappie Anglers of Texas Angler of the Year Paul O’Bier drops by to discuss late fall and early winter crappie patterns. As water temperatures cool off on Texas reservoirs, crappie start moving into those cold weather haunts. Paul tells us what depths to target right now and what structural features to consider when searching for moving schools of slabs. Of course we also discuss his favorite fall bait and get him to give away a couple of those secrets that have made him the most respected crappie tournament angler in Texas.

We wrap things up by talking whitetails with American Whitetail Authority President David Fort. The AWA is a great resource for whitetail hunters and their new Pro Series hunting competition pits professional hunters against one another to see who really is the most skilled whitetail hunter. With a six deer per day bag limit, it’s easy to see why no deer are actually killed in this format. Instead, each hunter’s scope captures an image the moment they pull the trigger and the animal is scored based on shot placement and trophy quality. The AWA Pro Series tv show will air on Pursuit Channel in the summer of 2014. Just to clarify, these guys are all about killing whitetails. This format just allows them to hunt more animals and further educate the viewer on whitetail hunting tactics. An image from a scope from one of the Pro Series competitions.