Magnum raindrops pelted the north wall of the lodge. Early pre-dawn temperatures continued to drop. I loved it! For the past several days, the afternoon highs had been in the mid-80s, not what most would consider “ideal deer hunting weather.” The falling temperature was something I’d hoped and prayed for as was the rain that fueled recently fertilized food plots.
I had gotten to the lodge late at night, after a four-hour drive just before the northwesterly cold front arrived at Becker Bottoms Ranch.
David Cotton, whose father Edgar owns the ranch, arrived shortly after 5 a.m. “Daddy will be here after the rain quits,” said David.
Edgar, 85 years young, loves hunting, fishing and the outdoors. Earlier during the 2025 autumn, he had taken a 347-pound black bear with a crossbow on at Choctaw Hunting Lodge in Oklahoma as well as an impressive bull elk in southern Colorado with his 6.5 PRC custom rifle. Now, he was looking for management bucks and in particular, a “little bit bigger buck” on his northeast Texas property.
Over cowboy coffee, David asked, “Where do you want to hunt this morning?” I smiled, because he knew my answer, “I know . . . wherever you want to put me!” I nodded in agreement.
Over coffee, we discussed where management bucks had been seen on the trail cameras. As we were loading guns and gear into his CanAm, I received a text from Rick Lambert that read: “I should be at the ranch right at lunch.”
David and Edgar had invited Rick, my longtime friend and now theirs, to come hunt. Rick, among many other things, has been a Dallas Police Department under-cover narcotics officer and detective, a private detective who along with his wife Beverly also a private detective, had spent considerable time investigating a previous U.S. President and his “lady friends.” Rick is also a very accomplished songwriter/entertainer and happens to be the father of Miranda Lambert.
Rick is a pretty fair hand in a camp kitchen and an outdoorsman who is a crack shot with anything that goes “Bang!” – rifles, handguns and shotguns. He and his team recently won the annual National Quail Hunt in Oklahoma, both the shooting and hunting competitions.
Suggested David: “How about you hunt where you saw that ten-point last year. He’s still around. I’ll go to the sandhill where you shot that old six-point three years ago.”
I liked his plan. I had hunted both areas several times in the past and had always seen deer coming into or cruising across the “L-shaped” food plots of fertilized triticale and volunteer turnips.
By the time we got to the enclosed deer blinds, the rain had slowed a bit but not much. I personally prefer hunting from natural ground blinds. But, it had rained hard all night and based on the latest weather forecast, it would continue doing so throughout at least mid-afternoon. Hunting from a dry, enclosed blind sounded really good!
The morning passed uneventful. In the past while hunting Becker Bottoms, I had seen a lot of deer movement when it was raining, but also, no movement. The latter was the case that morning. When David picked me up just before noon, he said he had seen a nice young buck, but nothing else.
We had barely started a fresh pot of coffee when I greeted Edgar and questioned him about his most recent Model 99 Savage acquisitions and if he planned to use one that afternoon. As he was showing me his latest .300 Savage, Rick Lambert arrived.
After admiring Edgar’s latest vintage Model 99, Rick, who is also a fan of the Model 99, said: “I brought the Taurus Raging Hunter .460 S&W Mag. revolver I got from you, Lar, and a .45-70 lever-action. Going to hunt with the revolver. I have yet to take a deer with it. It’s time I did so.”
He hesitated and then added, “I shoulda brought my .300 Savage.”
That afternoon, after the sky quit dripping, we saw three does and two yearling bucks. Not what we expected or hoped for.
The campfire session that night ran a bit late, and the next morning came early. I was reminded that it does not take long to spend a night in a hunting camp!
Our second day weather was very “deery,” but the local herd did not seem to agree. We saw two young bucks, three does and three fawns between us. That night, two-inch thick ribeye steaks grilled over pecan coals negated any disappointments of the day’s hunt.
The third morning, same results: fabulous hunting weather but deer seemed to have crawled into a hole and pulled a cover over themselves. Fox squirrels however, seemed to love the cooler weather, which coincided with their late fall breeding season. They were active to say the least.
We were having lunch when David mentioned he had just seen seven squirrels right around the lodge when he returned from his morning hunt. The fact that squirrels had chewed on several electrical wires on their tractors, requiring expensive repairs, had him more than a bit perturbed with the bushy-tailed treetop dwellers.
“How do you feel about hunting squirrels?” asked David.
“I love hunting squirrels . . . grew up hunting them,” Rick replied. “When times were tough around our home back when Miranda was young, we just about lived on squirrels.”
Moments later, Rick and David headed out the door with a fine-looking Winchester Model 101, 20-gauge shotgun. I was about to question them about their choice of firearms, knowing both had told stories the night before about hunting squirrels with .22s, when David said, “Don’t have a .22 on the ranch, just a shotgun and I found two boxes of shells. We’ll be back in a little while.”
I decided to trail behind to get photos and if necessary, circle a tree to get a squirrel to move around to the opposite side where Rick and David waited. Doing so reminded me of back when I was a very young “squirrel influencer.” My grandfather would send me to the backside of a tree he was watching. Having someone walk around to the other side, the squirrel tries to keep the tree trunk between it and perceived danger, thereby exposing itself to the shooter.
It did not take long for Rick to shoot the first squirrel. I got some quick photos of Rick and David, then headed back to camp to join Luke Clayton, with whom I do a weekly radio show (now in our 19th year of me doing the first segment in every show). The show is turned into a weekly podcast after the episode airs on radio stations. “Catfish Radio with Luke Clayton and Friends” and the podcast are available at Luke’s www.catfishradio.org website or on Spotify, Applepodcasts, outdooraction.com, carbontv.com and many other places. Luke and I also do “A Sportsman’s Life,” a weekly television show with Jeff Rice that airs on www.carbontv.com and our YouTube channel of the same name.
“Hey Lar, did you hear all those shots?” asked Rick when he and David returned to the lodge. I assured him I had as would all who would be listening to the first segment of Luke’s next radio show and podcast.
“Shot enough for squirrel and dumplings,” Rick noted. “I’ll be back in a little while, gonna go skin these. David said there were some plastic bags in the kitchen. Can you get a couple for me?” I did and regretted I had not stayed with Rick and Dave as they hunted squirrels. Like both my friends, I had grown up hunting squirrels, mostly fox squirrels.
The first game animal I ever shot was a fox squirrel taken with my maternal grandfather’s Remington Model 33 single-shot .22 on his property along the banks of Cummins Creek in southeastern Texas. Later that same single-shot .22 rimfire became my first deer rifle.
“Talk about fun and bringing back memories. I’m sure glad squirrel season is open,” Rick said. “With the way the deer have been making themselves scarce if not totally invisible, I may just go squirrel hunting the rest of the trip.” I glanced at David, who was all smiles.
Taurus Raging Hunter .454 Casull, topped with a vintage T/C LER scope, loaded with Hornady Handgun Hunter ammo accounted for this doe, one of the few Larry saw during a recent hunt.
I have to admit that Rick’s statement was tempting. I had two 7mm PRC rifles with me, both topped with Stealth Vision scopes (www.stealthvision.com) and shooting Hornady’s 175-grain ELD-X Precision Hunter ammo. That combination certainly was accurate enough to be considered “squirrel guns.” I also had my .454 Casull Taurus Raging Hunter revolver, which I was using to hunt deer. My double-action revolver is topped with a vintage Thompson/Center 2.5-7×28 Long-Eye-Relief scope. It stays loaded with Hornady’s 200-grain FTX Handgun Hunter or 240-grain XTP Hornady Custom. Both rounds are precisely accurate out to 100 yards or more.
Rick, David, Edgar and I hunted that afternoon. Nothing seemed to be moving once again, not even birds or squirrels. Later that afternoon, I happened to turn to look behind me. There stood two does 75 yards away. They were feeding on triticale and had no idea I was there.
I slowly turned, positioned my .454 Casull in their direction, cranked the variable scope to 4X, cocked the hammer on my double-action revolver and settled the crosshairs just behind her broadside shoulder. I started squeezing the trigger. At the shot the doe simply fell, kicked once and laid still. I cocked the hammer again, found the downed deer in my scope and kept the crosshairs on her in case there was any movement. There was none.
Instead of going to her, I decided to stay where I was in case a coyote, hog or one of the management bucks I was after appeared. In doing so, I noted my doe fell about a foot off the road that led to where I was hunting. I sent David a text: “Doe down, long 12-inch drag will be required.”
Nothing else showed. When David arrived, we loaded the deer and headed to the skinning shed. There, as part of the on-going management program we weighed and aged her. She weighed 87.6-pounds intact and was 3.5 years old. When I gutted her, I noted she was no longer lactating. A quick check of her reproduction tract revealed she had been bred within the last week. Her overall body condition was excellent based on body fat. I also noted she did not have any ticks or other ectoparasites.
I hung the skin-on doe high out of reach of marauding coyotes. The near freezing temperature was ideal for letting the carcass hang a day or so. She would provide many delicious meals. I opened her rumen to determine what she had been feeding on. It was filled with freshly fallen acorns. Several species of oaks are scattered throughout the property, which is traversed by several creeks. Food, water and cover are all in very close proximity. There really was no reason for deer to move, which explained why we were seeing so few of them.
In time, the acorns will disappear between being eaten by the deer, squirrels and especially wild hogs that live on the property. Once they are gone and after hopefully more cold weather, deer will start feeding in the fertilized food plots and have to move to find food. Thankfully, the Becker Bottom Ranch is on a Texas’ Managed Land Deer Permit that allows hunting through the last day of February.
The ranch’s wildlife management plan allows each hunter to take several management bucks, as well as three “good” bucks, plus at least an equal number or more of does. I will definitely be back to hunt there again in the future.
Hopefully, the next time I get to hunt Becker Bottoms the deer will be moving. But if they are not, I’ll also bring a .22 rimfire or my .410 over/under shotgun to hunt squirrels. It’s always advisable to have a back-up plan!