AUSTIN – This season, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s (TPWD) Big Time Texas Hunts (BTTH) program is offering Texans some of the very best hunting opportunities in the state. Ten premium guided hunt packages are offered in this year’s Big Time Texas Hunts drawing.

In the last 25 years, Big Time Texas Hunt participants have helped raise more than $18 million to fund wildlife research, habitat conservation and public hunting access. The 2021-22 hunting season was the biggest revenue producing year for the program, raising over $1.32 million.

Conservation efforts funded by Big Time Texas Hunts include desert bighorn sheep restoration work in West Texas, thousands of acres of brush control work across the state for the benefit of species like mule deer, pronghorn and quail, along with multiple grassland restoration projects.  Public hunting efforts include the funding of numerous public hunting leases and the purchase of hunting equipment like ADA accessible blinds for a number of Wildlife Management Areas (WMA).

“Hunters pay for conservation and the BTTH program is the perfect example of that,” said Kevin Mote, TPWD’s Private Lands and Public Hunting Program Director.  “In our 26^th year, we are extremely excited to continue offering hunters an opportunity at once in a lifetime hunting opportunities and raising important wildlife conservation funding at the same time.”

Some of the popular hunts included in this year’s drawing include an Exotic Safari, where the winner and a guest will have a chance to hunt gemsbok and scimitar-horned oryx at Mason Mountain WMA— plus win a Browning X-Bolt Hunter .270 rifle with Leupold scope being donated by McBride’s Guns in Austin, the Texas Grand Slam which offers the winner four separate hunts for desert bighorn sheep, white-tailed deer, pronghorn, and desert mule deer, and the Ultimate Mule Deer Hunt, a three-to five-day hunt for mature mule deer in the Texas Panhandle.

Big Time Texas Hunts entries are available online for $9 each or for $10 each at license retailers, or by calling 800-895-4248. The deadline to purchase entries is October 15 and winners will be announced within two weeks.