Historic South TX Bobcat & Lion Hunters

[Dads dogboy]

Do any of you Hunters have any information on a pair of brothers(Possibly the Snow Brothers, oldest maybe named Luther) from S. TX who hunted Bobcats & Lions across S. TX, Mexico, and the Western US. This would have been in the 1st half of the 20th century, mainly the 30's and 40's. Possibly based around or hunted the King Ranch, Kingsville, TX.

Thanks for any info.

C. John Clay

[Big N' Blue]

Luther hunted the King ranch and Bob hunted the YO. Was told by a very good friend that hunted with both that Luther was the best. Do not know, just what i was told by a man I trust.
That is all I know.

[Mike Leonard]

B&B,

This parallel universe thing is getting a little scary!

About 20 years ago I ran into a guy in one of the local gun shops. He was dressed in western cut dress slacks a white westen shirt, tie and a silver belly Stetson hat. He had a tweed type sport coat on and a Lone Star belt buckle on a tooled western belt. He had salt and pepper hair, moustache and light blue eyes. I said Mister you look for all the world like a Texas Ranger. His booming deep voice with that familiar Texas drawl said well you have a pretty good eye. He stuck out his hand and said my name is Mack I told him mine and he said I am not a Ranger but US Marshall. I dress this way because I grew up surrounded by rangers and Bob Snow was my mentor, and he literally grew up around the YO. I said is that the same Bob Snow that ran hounds and his eyes really lit up. Shore Nuff! Well we exchanged pleasantries and after a bit we went and had a cup of coffee together. I told him I had read about the Snows and I was a hound man and ran cat and lions. He said well I ran a lot of cat with Bob as a kid and we even went into old Mexico and ran lions and spotted cats.
He told me he had family in this area and that he would be in from time to time when working on somthing that brought him to New Mexico. I told him to give me a call if he could get a couple of days and we would go run a lion. He said boy that would be great it has been many years since I heard the hound run. Well to make a long story short he came in and we made a two day hunt staying in an old bunkhouse on a ranch and we treed three lions on that hunt and one was an exceptionaly large male. He really enjoyed himself, and I got a kick out of seeing him knock off running jack rabbits with his customized 1911 Colt 45 ACP.

He told me looking at my long eared southwest hounds that Bob's dogs had some running hound in them as did most dogs that could catch cat in that country.

[Dads dogboy]

Gentlemen Thanks for your help!

Dad was asked about them by a friend who is writing a book about Old TX Bobcat Hunters. He had heard stories about both but they were before his time.

Mr. Leonard the Marshall you mentioned if he was Stationed in Austin I probably knew him, a great guy who looked like he was right out of Central Casting as a Ranger! Also
Dad and I really enjoy your stories.

Mr. Blue eat some Blue Bell for me, hope you are getting some of the rain Mama says they are getting in Brenham. Yall sure need it!

Thanks again!

C. John Clay

[Big N' Blue]

Mike, maybe we are in the twilight zone. LOL
Mr. Clay you can have some of this rain if you want it! Makes feeding hard on a old man. HA LUV THAT BLUEBELL!!
We stayed on the YO when Rita hit and read alot about Bob Snoe in their bunkhouse.
My father-in-law and my wifes grandfather both cowboyed on the YO when he was hunting there. Wish I could have met him.
Another friend, Buster Moore who was a great hunter told me about Luther and he told me he was a great houndman, honest and very humble. Buster said he asked Luther one time who had caught more lions, him or Bob and he said most likely Bob although Buster knew that Luther had caught alot more.
I am telling this as it was told to me and have no personal knowledge of either. Just wanted to share what was told to me.

[Mike Leonard]

I use to talk to Obe Cory about the Snows. Obe grew up down there and he knew them pretty good. In fact I beleive he talks a bit about them in one of his books. Treedogs I think.

[Gary Roberson]

I met Bob Snow though never hunted with him. He and my Grandfather J. A. Roberson were very good friends. I hunted with August Timmerman, a one armed Game Warden from Hondo who was also a good friend of Bob Snow. All of these men were good houndsmen at one time.
I think that most of these fellows met at the South Texas Wolf Hunters meet and friendships grew from there. By the way, some of the old time cat hunters are still around. At the gathering in Dilley, there was Norman Davidson, 82 from down in the Valley, Henry Beatrix from Poth and J. Martin Bassinger, Stanton. All of these gentlemen were in attendance at the hunt the night before the gathering. We treed 4 cats that evening. Ironically, we were hunting near Dilley which was home to one of the really good cat hunters, Ira Woods. As a youngster, I can remember going to Ira's and seeing a barn that was covered in bobcat scalps. When he caught a bobcat, he would scalp it and nail the scalp to the barn wall. The barn was well insulated inside and out with cat scalps. In his later years, he hunted bobcats with beagles.

[Budd Denny]

Does anyone know if Walt Shriner is still alive (owned the YO) a friend of mine guided him in Alaska on brown bear and moose (out of the famed Jack Lee's camp). His tip was a whitetail hunt on the YO, which he did. Anyhow we were talking yesterday and he was wandering if Walt was still alive.

[Mike Leonard]

Don't know about Shriver.
Gary the desert southwest lion hunting and cat hunting in South Texas is about as much alike as soup and peanuts, and I know you savvy that.

I can't help but love hearing stories of these old cat hunters and the exploits they had back in the day and some even now. It's a great game folks.

But it is a whole different game when you talk about cold trailing a 24-36 hour old panther track in the desert. It's no screaming running track thru the brush it's no bawl here chop and bawl and locate in an hour it's hour after hour of dog and man work. Is it better? NO it is different, as different as what Buddy talked about on the site. Maybe we should celebrate a couple spots.

Just somthing to think about?




Saddle up boys let's go riding
Thru the foot hills of old New Mexico
Saddle up boys we'll go riding
Thru the canyons of those long ago.............................+

[JJB]

Budd, Walter is still alive. I hunt the YO. 4-5 nights a week, and see him quite often. As for Capt. Bob Snow my dad hunted with him in the early 70s

JJ

[Gary Roberson]

Mike
You're sure right about those running dogs not trailing. They don't trail much and the hunters don't want them cold trailing for there are so many bobcats that they can go down the road and start another better track. Having 15 dogs on the ground and running as a pack is something much different as well.
I will have to give them credit, those boys do have a good system to catch a lot of the bobs. If you love a fast race that does not cover a lot of real estate and don't really care what a dog sounds like, this is the hunt for you.
It gets back to what we have discussed before, different type dogs function well in different zip codes.
Gary

[LSPC]

I am a niece of Bob and Luther Snow. In doing some family research, I discovered this web site with questions and discussion posted several years ago about my two uncles (my mother's brothers), Bob Snow and Luther Snow, both of whom I knew. In the early 50's there was a movie made about the Snow brothers hunting cats (mountain lions) called "??? of the Cameron", I think. In their earliest days Bob and Luther started "treeing cats" as they called it to help neighboring ranchers whose stock was being destroyed. If anyone is still interested in further information about Bob and Luther Snow, I'll be glad to share what I know or can find in our family files. LSPC

[kloudermilk]

Lspc - I am Luther 's granddaughter and would love to see your information. Thanks -k

[Mike Leonard]

I have a great old video that was made from 16mm film of a number of Bob Snow's hunts. One he caught a jaguar in old Mexico. I beleive the man that produced this film was a man named Singer and he was a soldier of fortune type but sounded like he had hunted with Bob a lot. It also showed them working cattle roping and branding as well as dipping in Old Mexico. My copy is pretty good, and they catch ocelots, and bobcats and other stuff until the end where they actually catch the jaguar and then it hangs up. My buddy in Alberta has a good copy and he ran the copy for me and his plays all the way thru. If you wish to contact me I might be able to arrange for you to get a copy of that when he gets back. He is in africa hunting at this time.

[kloudermilk]

Mike - i would love to to have a copy of that film. My mother used to talk about it but I 've never seen it. I have 3 "city " boys and they are fascinated with the old stories. My email is keloudermilk@Yahoo.com