Coach James was my football coach. Great man

Sturdy Oaks must be between Childers and Abe Cook??

Sturdy Oaks is Childers, just south of the Cade Place on the corner. I've hunted the Cade Place and the land that borders Childers on the south that was owned by Roy Bonner at Dixon Creek. Both excellent places.

I have hog hunted Childers place. I got a drive in tour many years ago when Mr Roy was still alive, we saw some huge bucks. Mr Roy didn't allow rifles for a long time and the place was loaded with huge bucks.

Couldn't agreee more.

If you hunted with Roy on his uncles place on Dixon Creek you had to drive through my place to get to Mr. James' land, unless you used a helicopter or boat.

I have actually used a boat to get there, but mostly drove thru. PM me

A established club with a good reputation in those areas are nearly impossible to get in. Trust me when I tell you that as I've tried and pretty much have a blank check ready to fill out for the right opportunity. They don't have turn over and rarely any openings. My old club in this area never filled the few spots we had come open by advertising the 5 years I was in it. We had a list of friends and family that wanted to join.

After being out of this club for two years I'm starting to regret my decision to tell them to pound sand. The place did not have any giants like some of the clubs in that area does but it was the best deer hunting I've ever experienced in this state. It probably was my one and only opportunity to hunt an above average property in this state.

Back in the 70s, I shot a deer on the Cade place and he jumped the fence and died about 40 yds onto the Childers place. I had always been very careful to never set foot across that line, and spent a minute trying to decide whether to drive up to the house and ask permission to get my deer, or just to quickly drag him across. I could see him lying there dead, so I finally decided to just hurry over and get him. Then I still had to drag him over a half mile by myself.

The Cade place also joined Flatwood back then. I was hunting the Cade place by myself another day when a group of hunters walked across the line from Flatwood and had a man drive on the Cade place. They had me surrounded, whooping and hollering, so I just sat tight. Sure enough, they ran a buck by me and I shot at him and missed. They all went to calling to each other, trying to figure out which one had shot. When they figured out it wasn't one of them, they got real quiet and got out of there. I hurried to the road to see who it was; figured I probably knew at least some of them. But they were all running up the road and nearly back to Flatwood by the time I saw them.

That was the best deer hunting I've ever experienced. Lots of deer, lots of big deer, and even a bunch of fallow deer. It was a sad day when it got leased and I lost my permit.

I drove down the county road back in February and it looked so different I had a hard time figuring out where I had hunted.

LOL Steve. The guys I hunted with back then were scared of Roy Childers, I'd guess with reason.

Childers back then had more, and bigger , bucks than anyplace I ever set foot on. And I have set foot on some jim dandy places in Alabama.

I only met him a couple of times and didn't really know him, but I knew I didn't wanna be on his place without permission. My dad told me later I should have just driven around to his house and gotten permission and I could have driven close to the deer. But I didn't know; no cell phone to use from the woods in 1975.

I remember Mac Lawless about that time had permission from Mr. Roy to kill a fallow buck. Mac told me some unreal number of racked bucks he had passed in one morning trying to see a shooter fallow. I'm sure that place is still good, but I don't see how the Cade place could be as good as it used to be. All those big fields are grown up now. I kinda regret that I drove by and looked at it; I'd rather remember the way it was and how fortunate I was to get to hunt it for several years.

The Cade place was a fine place in the early 80s when I hunted there. I killed a nice fallow buck right on the line with the COE along the river bank. And a dang fine 10 point WT buck that weighed 230 pounds right behind the big house.

Hunted with Riley Smith on the land across the road from the fields also.

Last time I was by there most of the fields were planted pines.

We leased the Cade place from Watson Jones from mid 80s until about '95, beautiful land and great hunting.

did ya'll have the part where the house sits or across the road??? Both great places.

Had the house. From COE property to the property with catfish lakes (Bud Chambers maybe, it's been a while). Coming from bridge, we went from the first rd on the left, and then if you viered left on the next paved road past the little minnow bucket store, we had both sides of that road for a little ways.

gotcha , good land, all of it.

Watson Jones owned a huge big ole antebellum home in southern Greene Co, right at the old muslim place near Tishabee.

I can't figure that out. Roy and his brother Miller were two of the nicest old guys I've ever met. Then again any time I was around them it was a pleasant social setting.

I'd have to agree that Sturdy Oak is one of the top clubs in Alabama. I've been lucky enough to hunt there as a guest several times and I killed my biggest buck there in 2010. And the $10k that it costs for a membership there is peanuts for the members. Most of them also have leases in mid-west along with their Sturdy Oak membership.

Well everybody needs a place to hunt until mid February when the Midwest is snowed in.

Those guy's and I would get along great as I do the same as them. I'm just looking for a place to hunt the rut in Bama. With my work schedule and using all my vacation in March and November it does not leave a lot time for my home state. I do like to have a quality place to spend that limited time though.