Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

The Texas Panhandle suffered devastating fires in March 2006. This month, a story by Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series producer Don Cash, highlights the habitat and wildlife before and after the blaze.

One of the places that burned during the panhandle fires was an area where I had shot a story three years earlier on lesser prairie chickens. So, I decided I would go and be able to compare before the fires, and went up a couple of weeks after the fires…

Trees, shrubs, uh, all the grass is gone. All cover. All habitat for all wildlife is at this point gone. For the most part the wildlife are on their own.

And then went back a year after the fires. And so its sort of a look at how the habitat makes a very strong comeback after fires like this.

These animals have living up here on the prairie for thousands and thousands of years. And this isn’t their first fire. They’ll come back, and they will all recover.

When I went up there three weeks after the fire, there were some areas that were just sand, which – a month before – had been hip deep in grasses. They had had a little bit of rain a week after the fires, and there was already plants starting to poke through four or five inches of sand that quickly. So, the land is very resilient. Nature does a good job of bringing itself back.

Thanks, Don. Visit passporttotexas.org for a complete listing of stations airing the series.

That’s our show for today…for Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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Texas Parks and Wildlife on PBS and Cable
Stations and Air Times
Times and dates are subject to change, especially during PBS membership drives.

• Amarillo, KACV-TV, Channel 2: October–March, Saturday 6 p.m.
• Austin, KLRU-TV, Channel 18: Monday, 12:30 p.m.; Friday 5:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9 a.m. KLRU2, Cable 20: Tuesday, 11 p.m.
• Bryan-College Station, KAMU-TV, Channel 15: Sunday, 5 p.m.; Thursday, 7 p.m.
• Corpus Christi, KEDT-TV, Channel 16: Sunday, 12 p.m.; Friday, 2 p.m.
• Dallas-Fort Worth, KERA-TV, Channel 13: October–March, Saturday, 6 p.m. Also serving Abilene, Denton, Longview, Marshall, San Angelo, Texarkana, Tyler, Wichita Falls and Sherman.
• El Paso, KCOS-TV, Channel 13: Saturday, 3 p.m.
• Harlingen, KMBH-TV, Channel 60: Sunday, 5 p.m. Also serving McAllen, Mission and Brownsville.
• Houston, KUHT-TV, Channel 8: Saturday, 3:30 p.m.; Friday 1:30 p.m. Also serving Beaumont, Port Arthur, Galveston, Texas City and Victoria.
• Killeen, KNCT-TV, Channel 46: Sunday, 5 p.m. Also serving Temple.
• Lubbock, KTXT-TV, Channel 5: Saturday, 10 a.m.
• Odessa-Midland, KPBT-TV, Channel 36: Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
• San Antonio and Laredo, KLRN-TV, Channel 9: Sunday, 1 p.m.
• Waco, KWBU-TV, Channel 34: Saturday, 3 p.m.
• Portales, New Mexico, KENW-TV, Channel 3: Sunday, 2:30 p.m.
• The New York Network, NYN, Thursday 8:30 p.m.; Saturday 2:30 p.m. Serving the Albany area.

Cable

Texas Parks & Wildlife can also be seen on a variety of government, educational and access cable channels in the following communities: Abilene, Allen, Atlanta, Boerne, Collin County Community College, Coppell, Del Mar College, Denton, Flower Mound, Frisco, Garland, Irving, McKinney, North Richland Hills, Plano, Rogers State University, Texarkana College, The Colony, Tyler, Waco and Wichita Falls. Check your local listings for days and times.

TPW TV - Panhandle Fires Then and Now Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program

It’s good to have choices, and the Hunter’s Choice program offered duck hunters just that last season, and again this season. While Hunter’s Choice reduces the overall daily bag limit to five birds — down from six – it increases the species hunters may harvest by eliminating season within a season.

So now [for example] rather than having a pintail season that only runs for 39 days, you can shoot a pintail every day [of the 74 day season]. So, if you’re out there hunting, you shoot a pintail…you can’t shoot a mallard hen; you can’t shoot a canvasback; and you can’t shoot a mottle duck. It’s an aggregate bag. It’s something we’re looking at as trying to look at a different way of approaching bag limits.

Dave Morrison, waterfowl program leader for Texas Parks and Wildlife. Before you go hunting, it’s a given you should know how to identify ducks. With Hunter’s Choice, a case of mistaken identity is less likely to land you in hot water.

You don’t know what it is – you shoot a pintail. Well, with season within a season, if you did it in the first part of the season – you’re in trouble. This, at least, allows you the opportunity that if you do make a mistake – I can take that bird home. But you need to learn your ducks. Try to learn how to identify them.

That’s our show for today…our series receives support from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration program… working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas…

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Hunter's Choice Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program

Duck hunters are bracing for what could be one of the best waterfowl hunting seasons in many years thanks to ideal habitat conditions brought on by our rainy spring and summer. High Plains Mallard Management Unit season opened October 20… the north and south zones followed suit November 3 – all zones have split seasons.

Splits in seasons are a management tool, if you will. It provides an opportunity to let the birds rest. Because, if you give them an opportunity to rest, you get more birds coming in; it’s kind of like you get two opening days.

Dave Morrison is waterfowl program leader for Texas Parks and Wildlife. The north and south zones close Nov. 25, resume December 8, and all three zones end their seasons January 27. The 2007-2008 waterfowl season will also see the second year of the Hunter’s Choice program.

A lot of people like it, some of them don’t like it. Because when you went to Hunter’s Choice, you went from six total birds per day down to five. BUT, what it did, it did away with season within a season.

We have details on Hunter’s Choice tomorrow. Find all hunting regulations and seasons in the 2007-2008 Outdoor Annual.

That’s our show for today…our series receives support from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration program… working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas…

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Waterfowl Season / Hunter's Choice Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Wildlife Restoration Program

You have until the end of the month to nominate candidates for the Lone Star Land Steward Awards.

Lone Star Land Stewards award program is a program that recognizes private landowners for the good work they do on their private lands in Texas.

Linda Campbell is program director for private lands and public hunting. The awards program honors people for exemplary habitat management of private lands.

We feel like we have a great diversity of landowners that have participated and been nominated for recognition. And it just really highlights the diversity of the types of innovative management for wildlife that’s going on in Texas.

Next year marks the 13th year for the awards program.

Anybody can nominate for Lone Star Land Stewards. Landowners can nominate themselves. They come in from other agencies, as well as from our biologists.

Whether you nominate yourself or someone else, time is running out.

November thirtieth is the date that we’d like to have the nominations in for the various eco-regions. We take those, and we have a team of biologists that visit each of the nominated places, and they decide which ones are most worthy of recognition. And then we present the awards in May.

Nominate a landowner. Learn how at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show for today… with support from the Wildlife Restoration Program… providing funding for the Private Lands and Public Hunting Program.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Lone Star Land Steward Nominations Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish Restoration Program

The population of southern flounder in the gulf is…well… floundering.

The populations are down in the bay systems across the board for the southern flounder.

Robert Adami coordinates Coastal Bay Team fishing events, where two-person teams of experienced anglers, catch specific species for the hatchery program. In spring, teams reel in spotted sea trout, and in fall, southern flounder.

Sometimes the more experienced anglers can go out to the spots they know are good gathering spots for southern flounder. Usually those guys can get the fish and bring them to us rather quickly. They also know how to handle the fish in terms of care, transportation and trying to get them to us in the best possible health.

Participation is free. Adami says almost as soon as anglers catch them – the flounder start their new lives.

Immediately we’re going to be putting them right into spawning tanks in Sea Center Texas and in Corpus Christi to be used, hopefully, for next year’s spawning program.

Saturday morning Froggy’s Bait Doc in Port O’Conner is the staging area for the event, and next Saturday, Boyd’s One-Stop in Texas City closes this year’s Coastal Bay Team opportunities.

Find full details – including the prizes for participating anglers — at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… with support from the Sport Fish Restoration Program…which provides funding for Sea Center Texas… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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Coastal Fisheries Bay Team Fishing Tournament — Experienced anglers are invited to help us collect southern flounder for our hatcheries. Tournament is open to 30 two-person teams, on a first-come, first-serve basis.

All entrants must be 21 or older.

Participants may turn in up to three fish. Anglers turning in fish will be entered in three different drawings for fishing gear. Participants not turning in fish will be entered in a separate drawing for fishing prizes.

All participants will receive a shirt and cap.

The prizes, equipment and program are made possible through support from Anheuser-Busch, Inc. Held at Froggies Bait Doc in Port O’Conner on November 3rd, and at Boyd’s One- Stop in Texas City on November 10th; register at the tournament.

For more information, or if you want to become a member of the Coastal Fisheries Bay Team, send an e-mail to Robert Adami at robert.adami at tpwd.state.tx.us with your name, address and daytime phone number and which tournament you can fish or call him at (361) 939-8745.

Coastal Bay Team Fishing Event: Southern Flounder Play Now | Play in Popup | Download