Don't Mess With Texas
10/24/2005 8:57:39 AM
EDITORIAL
By Steve Fielder
Don’t Mess With Texas. Travelers to the Lone Star State recognize the motto of the state’s anti-litter campaign posted intermittently along the inexhaustible expanses of concrete from Paris to Houston, from Laredo to Amarillo, from Nacogdoches to El Paso. The motto could also be said to precisely express the feelings of most Texas coon hunters when confronted with the future of coon hunting in their state. Texans are either stamping their Justins in anger or shaking their Stetson-clad heads in disbelief at the attitudes of the mainstream coonhound registries toward their sport today. Most Texans will tell you that the registries either don’t understand the challenges and opportunities of coon hunting in Texas or they simply don’t care. Either way, they see the sport being driven into a box canyon of neglect where it will languish and die if some Texas-sized changes aren’t made and made very soon.
Coon hunting has a long and storied history in Texas. In terms of shear impact and influence, the Texas State Championship of old had no peer. One of the most successful of all coonhound events in our sport’s history, the “State Hunt” licensed by the UKC was held originally at Fort Parker in Mexia before moving to a long and impressive run at the Freestone County Fairgrounds in Fairfield. At the pinnacle of that dazzling run, the Texas State Hunt was the largest two-night competitive coonhound event in the nation. Sadly, that is no longer true. Likewise, the Lone Star 5000 was a innovative project that was immediately successful. The first guaranteed $100 cast win and a $5000 purse were just some of the ideas that made the event a success. Today, there is uncertainty as to what the future holds for this landmark event.
I’ve always said that Texas is an attitude and right now that attitude is sour. Coon hunters in Texas have seen virtually every major event, regardless of registry affiliation, decline in participation and Texans believe the reason is lack of registry support. Texas, despite its enormous land mass, has some serious issues in terms of land leasing and subsequent loss of hunting grounds. Those woes aside, there’s probably more available land per hunter in Texas than in any other state. Lack of hunting spots can’t be blamed for the decline in attendance at Texas hunts. Lack of leadership is the more likely culprit.
Lest you read this as an effort to bash the practices of other registries, I’ll readily admit that AKC largely checked out on coon huunters and the sport several years ago. The leaders at AKC today admit right up front that the registry of yesterday did a miserable job both in understanding and in serving the sport. The difference lies in the commitment to the future and the way I’ve got it figured, there’s no better place to illustrate that commitment than with Texas.
Call me nostalgic, old-fashioned or whatever but I believe we will see a revival of the glory days of coon hunting in Texas. Our team will be contacting all the known clubs in Texas to see what we can do to meet the needs of the Texas coon hunter. We’ll be contacting key individuals in the state to share our ideas and to listen to their deepest concerns. We’ll be looking for just the right location to host the first ever Old Fashioned Texas Coon Hunter’s Reunion. If you never attended a Texas State Hunt from the 70's to the early 90’s you can’t imagine just how great an event this can be. You see, the Texas State Hunts of old really were annual reunions of the state’s coon hunters, many of which would not see each other again until the state hunt the following year.
When I look back, I see a lot to be proud of in Texas’ coon hunting history. With the help of a lot of great folks in the Lone Star State we were able to bring one of the most successful of all the World Hunts to Texas. We were able to create the American Heritage Hunt, a great tribute to the nation’s hunters and to those that serve our nation in order to preserve our hunting heritage. We also were able to see some of the most successful money hunts in history take place in Texas. I believe there are many more of those kinds of events down the road for Texas coon hunters to enjoy. And I firmly believe that although coon hunting may be ill in Texas today, the problem is not terminal.
I call upon the hunters of Texas to rally around your sport like the noble defenders rallied to the cause in San Antonio nearly 170 years ago. I urge you to “remember” the way coon hunting in Texas used to be and to look positively to the future. We don’t want to “mess” with Texas coon hunting but we sure would like to bring it back to a point that will bring honor to all the great pioneers of the sport that corralled a hound or a mule at Fairfield or Mexia or Iola in their glory days and called Texas their home. We believe that there’s still a mess of good coon hunters in Texas that want and deserve to have coon hunting again the way it was meant to be. We hope you will help us make that dream a reality.
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