EAST TEXAS HOG DOGGERS FORUM

Ive been on this forum for a while and have enjoyed seeing the diversity of hog hunting in other areas. Im from north florida and have been hog hunting with dogs for a most if my life. Well I got news I might be moving to Lufkin Texas for work. How does getting land to hunt on work? Are there hunting clubs or do I have to get permission from a land owner? Is there anyone in the area that might want to get together and hunt? Any more info that I didnt ask about will be real helpful. Thanks in advance. 

What work is making u think of moving to lufkin? I grew up there n go back every now and then to see my folks and only thing in that town is fast food or chain stores. Aint no industry there anymore. 1 of the 2 foundries are closed down and the other is up for sale again and is always a roller coaster on jobs available.

I pug in for a job on the Davey Crockett national forest.

You can run dogs in the Crockett national forest. That whole country is hunting leases... some allow dogs and some don't.

Ok sounds good. Is there a better area to be besides Lufkin thats close by? I was just referencing Lufkin because thats bigger town I saw close by.

And while I'm at it. Anyone know of any houses for rent in the area?

The town of crocket is on the west side of the forest bout the same distance as from lufkin. The hole in the wall town of ratcliff is where the usfs office is located.

Which is a better place to live?  Crockett or lufkin?

A good place to look for rent houses and such is Peddlernet.com, it's actually a paper that serves  lufkin and the surrounding area. You can find pretty much anything your looking for on there. You can find a hunting lease occasionally and if your lucky, find some private land owners that will let you hunt. It's not a bad place to live, but definitely as many hunters as hogs and most of the hogs like to run for miles. Do you have kids that will be in school?

Iv only lived in lufkin and with that said, i wont ever move back there unless my dad really needs help n my wife can find a good paying job there. Id try crocket and as indian valley said, try the peddler. I didnt know they had an online, but it doesnt surprise me. The peddler is like an honest version of craigslist. The office is or was located in lufkin. Give them a look and if u trust craigslist, look them up too n see whats for rent.

Indian Valley, I will definitely take a look at the peddler. I saw it on Google but it sound kinda scetchy to be honest. And yes I have 2 little girls. One is 6 one is 3.

Charles, we've been looking at all the surrounding towns around the forest. Lufkin, Crockett, Kennard, etc. I'd like to be in a good place for my wife and kids. Schools, and amenities. I know nothing about texas. Only been there once and that was a flight layover on the way to California for a wildfire. So any info or advice would be appreciated.

Depending the area of lufkin depends on the elementry school they will attend. If u end up in lufkin, STAY AWAY from the northwest side. The schools there SUCK n a lot of hood style housing and kids. Kennard is a small town, u blink n uv missed it, but its a 5 min drive to the usfs office, but i think there is another usfs yard on the south side of lufkin. Ill be going back to lufkin on my next rotation off in a couple weeks. I too will be going on either a usfs or oregon, washington or cali fire contract for the summer.

Feel free to give me a call, I'll do my best to help you with any ???'s and save a lot of typing. 936 240 1385 Britt Garcia

I wasn't trying to put smiley faces in my reply, I guess my phone has a mind of it own haha. Questions, I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Charles, thanks for the info. I definitely want to stay away from anything like that. I've looked at several houses on the south end of lufkin. Are you doing some AD work for the usfs? I currently work for the Florida Forest Service but the pay and benefits are much better with the federal government. Im trying to get my foot in the door, and it's especially nice to possibly be going to a place with hogs.

Indian Valley, I will definitely be in contact with you. Any kind of local knowledge will help.

And just to put it out there I've got some pretty good dogs for my area of Florida. So if either of y'all wanna do some hinting when I get out there I'm definitely game.

I live in Huntington about 15 mins from lufkin. There is far an few places to hunt but if you get in with the right crowd you will have dozens of places!

Cooter, if ad stands for what i think, yes. I work for columbia helicopters and we use a 2500gal bambi

cooter, my wife reminded me about hudson. they have a good school district, close enough to lufkin for major supplies and food, and its not to far from ratcliff, IF thats where your stationed at. but if memory serves me correct, i think the fire fighting side of the USFS is in lufkin. if it was me and i had to choose between lufkin and hudson, id go with hudson. its small, quiet but again, still close enough to the major supplies. to bad you can't take a trip there to check it out, if it was gonna be a week id be off, id sure meet you there and take you around the areas you'd wanna check out and let you make your own mind up. and also, huntington as mentioned by another member, isn't a bad place, has a good bit more to offer than hudson, but my son attends huntington school and his half sister, and if i had a choice, i would dang sure never let him attend there. but thats me and my views and how i was raised, but i know several people who went to huntington schools and they did well for themselves. but that was nearly 20yrs ago for them. things have changed and the stuff my son tells me of what they teach/promote, there, (possibly the same in all school districts)  he wouldn't attend that city school. maybe 7mhunter can fill in more info on the pros/cpns of huntington. both hudson and huntington are small quiet towns. redland, the community to the north of lufkin, where i grew up has changed some, but still quiet and still close to lufkin too. 

Central ISD is another one to look into. That's where my kids go and they like it for the most part. The town of Central and Pollok feed central isd, when searching stuff, put in central isd or it will pull up everything from out west in Austin area.

Charles, I assumed you were on a fire crew, not a helicopter. That side of things is a little different than what I do. My grandfather is acctually a retired helicopter pilot. He did many years fighting fire with a sky crane. From what I was told, my duty station will be in ratcliff, but things change. If they offer me the job I'm going to take a week trip up there and do some looking. I will definately look at those areas metnioned by all of you. I would prefer to be in a small town, thats what I've always live in and what Im used to.

I did my time as a ground pounder for 6yrs as 11b, 13b and 11c, then i wized up and went in as a 15u, chinook mechanic/crewmember. Being a wrench on an aerial firecrew has its perks. I was suppose to have my heli pilot cert 2wks ago untill a fatal accident haulted all flt training for a bit. I was gonna finish up out of pocket when i went back to tx, but decided to wait till the fall to finish up on the flt school's dime. I get back to work today and was told to grab my headset, rags and window cleaner, clean the windows and get the acft ready. After i was done, i was told to go to flt ops give them a copy of my cert. I go up there to ask wtf and they were under the assumption i followed through and finished up and they had a new stick b!t(h. I unfortunately had to tell them i didnt finish up and would do it this fall unless they wanted me to finish before hand. I was told it would be in my best intrest, the sooner, the better. I guess ill be finishing up on my nxt couple breaks at hm.

Sounds good man. Ive got limited experience with aircraft. Currenty a helicopter crewmember trainee. The job I applied for in texas is a firefighting equipment operator position. Thats what I do now for the Florida Forest Service, been at it for 7 years now. Just trying to go after bigger and better things. The federal government pays alot more and they actually allow overtime. Ive also done my time ground pounding on a firefighting hand crew. Ive dont several trips out west to assist with major fires. Still waiting on the word from them though. Ill let yall know what I hear.

Also, someone put on here to stay away from northwest lufkin. Is the hudson area considered northwest lufkin? The Peddler has several houses for rent in hudson and I know some folks said that was a nice area.

Man every wildlands firefighter in the country is gonna be out here in Wa. or Or. before this summer is over. Got fires startin up all over. If we get one of those dry lightning storms. Katy bar the door. Not tryin to steal your thread but this will be quite the year for fires in the NW.

Hudson is on the outskirts of Lufkin, you don't have to drive that far outside the loop to get into Hudson school district, the loop might be the boundary for that side of town. Give me a shout, If you find something you like or would consider, I would be willing to go look at the area and give you some feedback, most of Hudson is going to be country live but real close to amenities. I would not hesitate to buy there if I was in the market and wanted to stay in this area.

Hudson is southwest of lufkin down hwy 94 bout 15-20 miles

WayOutWest, yeah I heard its warming up out there. Two of our crews from florida just got back from California. Im hoping to get out to alaska or canada, that would be nice.

Indian Valley, Ive been doing some looking all around lufkin. Ive found several nice homes to buy but I would much rather spend some a little time there before commiting to buying a house. But it seems homes for sale are more frequent than homes for rent. If I do rent something im stuck in a 1 year lease.

Charles, I was mistaken. I was looking at Central and got it mistaken for Hudson I guess.

I know what you mean,  and it's also hard to find rent houses that allow more than 1 pet, if any. I've been looking myself lately, looks like I may be moving back to north tx though, waiting to hear about a job up there. But if things change and I stay here, we can try to get together and hunt. I'm on a decent club out in the Pollok / Wells area. As for Central, it is much like hudson, being a sought after school district. Not in all cases but most of the area Charles is talking about is going to be inside the loop in Lufkin.

IVR, thank you for clearing that up. Yes, insude the loop of lufkin.