The window for deer lease cleanup in East Texas is August through early October, after licenses go on sale and before archery season opens on October 3, 2026. That is when leases around here hold their workdays, and a workday goes a whole lot faster when a dump trailer shows up for everything the camp has been stepping around since January: the box blind that lost a leg, the feeder the raccoons finally beat, the trailer that quit being a camp trailer during the Obama administration.
County Line Junk Disposal is based in Trinity, and lease country is our backyard. We run a 2024 Ram 2500, a Big Tex hydraulic dump trailer, and a Mahindra tractor on land jobs from Groveton and Apple Springs out toward Crockett, and we have seen what three or four seasons of deferred camp maintenance looks like. Here is how to time the cleanup, what to haul first, who actually owns that ladder stand the guy who quit the lease left on the fence line, and what the haul-off costs.
When does deer season open in Texas for 2026-27?
Per TPWD's Outdoor Annual, the 2026-27 archery-only season runs October 3 through November 6, 2026, and the North Zone general season runs November 7, 2026 through January 3, 2027. Every county in our service area is North Zone. Hunting licenses go on sale August 15.
Those dates come from TPWD's Outdoor Annual, and that is also where you check your specific county's listing for doe days and antler restrictions, because both vary county by county and both catch somebody on every lease every year. Read your county's page before you plan the season, and make the new guy read it too.
Now work backward from October 3. Bow hunters want the camp quiet well before that. Feeders need filling, cameras need hanging, stands need a safety check, and the corn budget needs arguing about. All of that eats the same September weekends a cleanup would, which is why the leases that run smooth deal with the junk in August or early September and keep the last weekends for hunting prep. Waiting until the week before opener means the junk stays another year. We have watched that cycle repeat on the same properties, and the pile only grows.
What actually piles up on a deer lease?
The usual haul: collapsed box blinds, rusted-out feeders, a dead camp trailer, ladder stands nobody claims, and a season's worth of feed bags and target trash. Most camps clear out in one dump trailer trip during the workday weekend.
- Box blinds and shooting houses past saving, legs rotted or wind-flipped
- Feeders with rusted barrels, dead motors, or hog damage beyond repair
- The camp trailer or camper that has not rolled in years and never will again
- Ladder stands and climbing sticks left by hunters who moved on
- Feed bags, mineral tubs, shot-up targets, and the bunkhouse mattress everybody refuses to sleep on
- Brush and blowdown around the camp, blinds, and shooting lanes
Plenty of lease camps also have an old barn or shed working as a catch-all, and clearing one of those is its own project; our barn and shed cleanout guide covers what that job looks like. And when the camp itself has gone to yaupon, the tractor work runs the same as our overgrown lot clearing jobs: knock it down, pile it, load it, gone.
Who owns the stands and feeders when a lease changes hands?
The lease contract and the landowner set the rules on stands and feeders. TPWD has no regulation covering gear left on private leases, so everything comes down to what the paperwork says and what the landowner will put up with. In practice, gear stays only as long as the hunter who owns it keeps renewing.
Every lease handles it a little differently, but the common pattern is simple: pay your spot, keep your gear. When a hunter drops out, most leases give him a deadline to come get his stands and feeders, and after that the stuff either becomes camp property or becomes the landowner's problem. Smart leases put that deadline in writing and make everybody label their equipment, because "whose ladder stand is this" arguments are a workday tradition nobody enjoys.
The calls we get usually come after a turnover. New group takes the lease, walks the property in August, and finds three generations of homemade blinds, a feeder graveyard behind the pens, and a camper with a pine limb through the roof. The landowner wants it gone before the new contracts get signed. That is a morning's work with a tractor and a dump trailer, and the new group starts their first season with a clean camp instead of somebody else's leftovers.
Can you burn the brush pile at the lease?
Only if no burn ban is active in that county on the day you burn. Bans are declared county by county and change week to week, so check the Texas A&M Forest Service burn ban map the morning of the workday. A months-old blog post is the wrong place to learn today's status, so we will never print it here.
The Texas A&M Forest Service burn ban map shows the live status of every county in the state and takes about thirty seconds to check. The full rules on what a landowner can legally burn are in our brush burning guide, and the short version matters at a lease: vegetation that grew on the property, outside city limits, daylight hours, no ban. The rest of the workday pile, the feed bags, the treated lumber off the old blind, the bunkhouse mattress, is illegal to burn anywhere in Texas and belongs in a trailer.
One more lease-specific point: the burn decision usually belongs to the landowner anyway. Plenty of landowners around here flat refuse open fire on their timber, ban or no ban, and their word settles it. When the fire option is off the table, the pile rides out in our trailer with everything else.
What does a deer lease cleanup cost?
We price by the space your stuff fills in the trailer: a single item is $95, a quarter load $175, a half load $325, three-quarters $475, and a full load $650. Travel is free within 25 miles of Trinity; past that, out to our 50-mile edge, a small trip fee of about $2 per mile, always quoted upfront.
You get a firm number on site before we lift anything, and you are free to walk if you do not like it. The number we say is the number you pay, cash, check, or Cash App when the job is done. A couple of add-ons worth knowing for lease work: each mattress runs +$30, and if the dead camp fridge still has freon in it, that is +$35 for proper handling. New customers get 15% off the first job, which covers most leases the first time we come out.
Lease roads do not scare us. The Ram 2500 and the dump trailer handle gate-to-camp two-track fine, and when a blind sits back in the timber where no truck belongs, the Mahindra drags it out to where the trailer can reach. Text a few photos of the pile to (936) 259-3200 and we will text you a ballpark today, then set a time that lines up with your workday weekend so the whole camp only has to gather once.
Book the haul-off before opening day
August and September are for workdays, October is for hunting, and the junk pile does not have to see another season. Get a free quote by call or text at (936) 259-3200, 7 days a week, 8 AM to 6 PM. We answer our own phone, we show up when we say we will, and if your lease sits anywhere around Trinity, odds are good you are inside our free 25-mile travel zone.
Questions we hear a lot
Per TPWD's Outdoor Annual, the archery-only season opens October 3, 2026 and runs through November 6. The North Zone general season, which covers every county we serve, runs November 7, 2026 through January 3, 2027. Licenses go on sale August 15, and your county's listing in the Outdoor Annual has the doe days and antler restrictions that apply to your lease.
Only if no burn ban is active in that county on the day you burn, and only for vegetation that grew on the property, outside city limits, during daylight hours. Bans change week to week, so check the Texas A&M Forest Service burn ban map that morning. Feed bags, old lumber, and camp junk are illegal to burn anywhere in Texas; we haul that instead.
We do. A single item like one blind or feeder is $95, and a bigger camp cleanup prices by the space it fills in the trailer, up to $650 for a full load. The Mahindra tractor drags blinds out of the timber to where the trailer can reach, and we can time the haul-off to your lease workday weekend. Text photos to (936) 259-3200 for a ballpark today.
The lease contract and the landowner decide; TPWD has no rule covering gear left on private leases. Most leases let gear stay as long as the owner keeps renewing, set a pickup deadline when somebody drops out, and treat whatever remains as camp property after that. We regularly clear out the leftover blinds and feeders when a new group takes over.
Yes. The 2024 Ram 2500 and the Big Tex dump trailer handle typical gate-to-camp lease roads fine, and the tractor covers anything set back in the timber. Travel is free within 25 miles of Trinity; farther out, to our 50-mile edge, it is about $2 per mile, quoted upfront before we commit to anything.