Austin novelist and longtime Hill Country deer hunter David Marion Wilkinson poses with five bucks he's taken off the same 1,580-acre Hill Country ranch. Photo courtesy of David Wilkinson.

We blended well with our surroundings. After all, we had on the proper clothing (jeans and a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and a T-shirt), we ordered the proper food (tomato bisque and sandwiches), and drank only water and a soft drink. In short, we looked like two city guys in a trendy coffee shop-bakery-sandwich shop -- not two deer hunters.

While someone at another table clicked away on her laptop and other customers chatted between periodic cell phone calls over raspberry-flavored iced tea or café latte, Austin novelist David Marion Wilkinson and I talked about deer hunting. Fortunately, none of the many non-hunters around us bothered to drop a dime on us and call PETA to report two men who enjoy eating venison summer sausage on the loose in a yuppie joint.

Despite our decidedly urban surroundings and the 100-plus-degree heat outside, our minds were on autumns past and future. I grew up in a hunting-oriented family, and so had my friend, David. Both of us took our first deer when we were still in grade school, but if I had been wearing my camo gimme cap on this particular afternoon, I would have tipped it to him in recognition of his whitetail savvy. He's a few years younger than me, but he's logged a lot more hunting time than I have. In fact, if bucks put up posters, he'd be on the 10-most-wanted circular. Well, maybe least-wanted is a better way to put it.

David's father was a lifetime hunter and professional hog trapper, and his grandfather was a game warden. So not only has he learned a lot about deer over the years, but he also has inherited two generations of hunting wisdom he doesn't mind sharing.

Specifically, we were discussing the kind of Texas deer hunting that separates the proverbial men from the boys -- the late season.

Deer season for most of Texas, including the highly huntable Hill Country, runs from Nov. 1 to Jan. 4 -- 65 days. But while those two-plus months constitute one deer season, for all practical purposes the state has two seasons: early and late.

No matter what the calendar says, getting a buck or doe is never guaranteed, but anyone who has done much hunting knows that the odds are definitely better on the front end of the season. That's why the highways leading to places like Fredericksburg, Kerrville, Llano and Mason look like outbound hurricane evacuation routes the day before deer season opens. Tens of thousands of Texas hunters turn out for opening weekend, and a large percentage of them come home with meat.

Most Hill Country leases are small tracts with limited hunting acreage. They are family ranches for the most part, or tracts leased out to small operators for grazing. They see little activity most of the year. On opening weekend, the young and naïve bucks make easy targets.