Double Draw Ranch: Transformed For Wildlife Pt. 1

I heard once if you want to shoot big deer, don’t shoot little deer. Well, that’s a good start.

But if you want a lot of big deer and other animals, you have to provide habitat.

So how did the Double Draw Ranch do it?

Double Draw Ranch was started in 2007 by Gene and Patti Hennigan with 425 acres covered in cedar. We added several other tracks over the years to peak near 1,000 acres.

The question was, “Where do we start?”

I had managed 4000 acres in Sonora and 2000 acres in George West, Texas, for 25 years. I knew what it took to grow big deer on other property that was mostly open. But what did I need to do to grow big deer here in Junction, TX?

The first step was to get the land under wildlife evaluation. This helps tremendously on taxes and helps pay for the required practices to keep the certification. There are seven qualifying practices.

Wildlife Evaluation Practices
1. Habitat Control: Ours started with clearing cedar to create a better habitat.
2. Erosion Control: The Double Draw is called that for a reason. The ranch has many Double draws running through it. We left the cedars on the sides for erosion control and provide cover and bedding areas for the deer.
3. Predator Control: The property has coyotes, bobcats, foxes, hogs, raccoons, opossums, porcupines, and others. We hunt and trap them with various methods. We take pictures to verify the practice. We also signed up with the Kimble County Predator Control Board. They pay bounties for certified harvest.
4. Supplemental Water: We provide various sources of water as detailed later to qualify.
5. Supplemental Food: Corn is NOT supplemental food. You must feed some protein to qualify.
6. Providing Supplemental Shelter: We leave cleared piles of cedar for small game to nest in. We also leave some half-fallen trees for shelter.

7. Census: Game censuses help you understand how many animals you are caring for on your property. A minimum of three surveys a year is required.

Many of these practices also help qualify for Manage Land Deer certification.

We prioritized the practices to suit our needs better to get where we were going.

Water was a no-brainer. You have to have it. Deer found food long before we were here. There was an existing windmill on the ranch for water. We added two more electric wells and three water troughs to provide water for the animals at multiple locations. A little later, we added a solar well and pond near the windmill.

We high-fenced the ranch to manage the wildlife better and have exotics. High fencing means you must supplement the food sources. When you start adding more animals than the natural habitat is supporting, you have to increase those resources. We added four 2,000 pound protein feeders. We have them filled by the Junction Warehouse every two weeks. We couldn’t keep up with all the other work.

On top of that, it was more economical. We then added ten 1,000 pound corn feeders and a half dozen turkey feeders. We fill them every nine weeks. We also pour the protein to the animals providing peanuts on demand from April thru September.

A special note. We feed year-round and change from Purina Antler Max high protein to Purina Rut Conditioner in November till March.

It was now time for some professional advice. The local Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) Biologist and Extension Agent were happy to come out and look at the property.

Both said you need to clear cedar “where all the good stuff can grow.”

We started by clearing enough cedar through the center of the ranch to see what we had. We hired a contractor that used a shredder to mulch the cedar. It looked great but had disadvantages. Cedar mulch doesn’t rot. Not much could grow through it.

After that, we tried hiring a contractor with tree shears. It also looked great but had even more disadvantages. Shearing required going back and picking everything up and piling it to be burned. The stumps left started sprouting and growing back in a year.

In all, it had been a good start on our own.

For part 2 of this article series click here.

By Gene Hennigan

To contact Gene Hennigan and book hunts on the Double Draw Ranch click here.