Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/641958
Lloyd Newberry D e s t i n a t i o n s blackbuck antelope is one of the fastest animals in the world. Wyatt said that the buck would be extra alert for the remainder of the afternoon so we should look elsewhere. The hunt suddenly took on a new meaning and my fascination with the blackbuck grew even stronger. Over the next two days we located and stalked three more mature bucks, and each time we were foiled by the animals' incredibly keen eyesight and their habit of keeping a good distance between themselves and anything on four wheels or two legs. I did manage to call up and take a nice Rio Grande gobbler on my hunt, but no blackbuck. N ot to be outdone, I was back in Texas the following year, this time at the YO Ranch near Kerrville. I had driven by its entrance gates many times and heard interesting bits of its history from several Texas friends. Founded in 1880 by Captain Charles Schreiner, the ranch has been in the same family for 135 years. Originally developed for raising cattle, sheep, and goats, the YO evolved into a whitetail hunting operation in the 1930s and some years later began introducing exotic game from around the world. The Schreiner family is also credited with helping save the famous Texas longhorn. The 40,000-acre spread is in the Texas Hill Country, where the rolling, rock- strewn hills are covered in juniper and live oak forests interspersed with open plains, many several hundred acres in size. The first exotics to come were aoudad, mouflon (barbado), blackbuck antelope, and axis deer. All four species adapted quite well and after a century of expansion, much of it in remote, unfenced areas, they are considered by many Texans to be on a par with native game animals. The YO provides hunts for a wide variety of Asian, European, and African animals. Over the years I've hunted big game in more than 30 European countries and enjoyed a number of African safaris. I find S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 6 7