There’s new brass at the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Austin headquarters.
Veteran wildlife biologist Alan Cain was recently selected as the new wildlife division director for the state agency. Cain, 53, replaces John Silovsky, who retired from the department last fall following a 10-year tenure.
Cain should be a good fit for a job that positions him to direct about 360 employees and oversee management efforts aimed at a wide variety of small and big game species ranging from cat squirrels to bighorn sheep.
The Texas native has been with the department since 2000. He worked his way up through the ranks during a 24-year career that started when he hired on as a private lands biologist in Fort Bend County. That position eventually led to a district leader slot in South Texas before Cain took over as white-tailed deer program leader in 2010. He transitioned to big game program director in 2023.
Cain called his most recent promotion an “an absolute honor” that is sure to come with a host of inherent challenges like dealing with chronic wasting disease policies, ongoing land fragmentation, population growth and water availability in addition to important issues linked to the sound management of fragile bighorn sheep and mountain lion populations.
“I’m excited and I’m up for it,” Cain said. “It’s an awesome job, but it also comes with a wealth of responsibility in providing direction and guidance aimed at dealing with all of the issues facing wildlife in the state of Texas now and down the road,” Cain added. “Those are huge responsibilities. It scares me a little bit, because I don’ t want to let people down.”
An avid hunter himself, Cain’s love for the outdoors has deep roots in North Texas, where he grew up hunting and fishing in the Weatherford area.
“I’m just a small town guy who grew up hunting on a small lease in Stephens County,” he said. “I spent a lot my time as a kid running the Clear Fork of the Trinity River below Lake Weatherford, catching crawdads and perch and trapping raccoons, fox and everything else. To go from that to where I’m at now is pretty overwhelming. This is the last thing I ever thought I’d ever be doing.”
Cain says private landowners are the common denominator in his focus for the future. One of his main priorities is staying connected with the private sector and establishing good working relationships that are everlasting.
“As an agency, we have to come to the table and work with landowners, he said. “We have to try to find reasonable solutions to make things work and help them. We’ve got to keep those gates open so we can provide education, outreach or technical guidance to help them manage their land. It doesn’t matter if someone has five acres or 500,000 acres. We’ve got to build a meaningful relationships with landowners and maintain them. We’ve got to be a resource that excites people. Private lands is where the rubber meets the road in Texas.”
Cain welcomes any correspondence with the public. He can be reached by email alan. [email protected] or 512-389-8012.
Javelina: Texas leaders stoked about B&C new records category
Javelinas have never gotten a wealth of respect hunters and wildlife managers, but things are changing. The Boone and Crockett Club has plans to elevate the gritty critters to new heights.
Based is Missoula, Mont., B&C recently announced that it will create a new big game records category for javelina, also known as collared peccary.
B&C is recognized as the official records keeper for native North American big game animals taken on open range by legal hunting methods. The B&C records program includes trophies taken by rifle, bow, hand gun and other methods.
B&C says idea for a new category recognizing trophy javelina was recently proposed to its records committee by wildlife managers from Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Mexico. In December, the organization’s records committee voted in favor of the proposal. The decision is ex-pected to lead to the creation of the organization’s first new big game category since 2001 and the first new species added to the record book since 1998.
“The decision to add javelina as a trophy species was years in the making and reflects not only the growing appreciation for the species among hunters and wildlife managers, but can bring conservation benefits to javelina and the places it lives,” says Mike Opitz, chairman of B&C’s records committee.
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department wildlife division director Alan Cain was part of a Texas group that was instrumental in leading the charge for the creation of the new records category for javelina. Cain suspects it will be late 2025 or 2026 before the new category becomes official.
“It’s great news,” Cain said. “It’s going to bring some respect to an animal that doesn’t always get it and probably place some value on it as far as hunting goes. It’ll give hunters a new opportunity to get something in the record book if they are interested in that sort of thing. Plus, it will highlight javelina hunting and javelina conservation. It’s a win-win for everybody.”
It is unclear at this point what type of measuring protocol and minimum score will be required for record book status, but Cain suspects the animals will be judged by skull measurements similar to those followed when scoring javelina for the Texas Big Game Program.
Kyle Lehr, B&C’s director of big game records, says the organization’s main focus is coming up with “a minimum that strikes the balance between a mature specimen worthy of recognition and a good representation of a mature javelina across its range. Lehr said he and his staff work with several states and Mexico to establish that number. “We need to determine if a mature javelina in, say Texas, is quantifiably different than one in Arizona,” he said.
According the TPWD publication “The Javelina in Texas,” the javelina’s current range has been restricted to portions of the lower coastal plains, the South Texas Plains, the western half of the Edwards Plateau, the Trans-Pecos, and the southern edge of the Rolling Plains.
Javelinas are not pigs, although they do have pig-like characteristics like a long snout and stout bodies averaging 35-45 pounds. They live in highly social herds averaging about 20 animals.
The animals are legal game in 99 of Texas’ 254 counties. There is no closed season in the South Zone. The 202425 season in the North Zone runs Oct. 1 to Feb. 23. Hunters are limited to two javelinas per license year.
TPWD’s most recent Big Game Harvest survey indicates that nearly 43,000 hunters shot about 28,000 javelinas in 2023.
Outdoors Briefs
Franknens drops 29 01 to win ‘Rayburn BFL Texas bass pro Wyatt Frankens of Corrigan grabbed the top prize in the MLF Phoenix Bass Fishing season opener held Jan. 4 on Sam Rayburn.
Frankens’ five-bass limit weighed 29-01 pounds. He earned $4,796 for the win.
Frankens said he caught the winning sack targeting submerged timber along creek channels, ditches and drains in water ranging 10-15 feet deep. His go-to baits included a 6th Sense Ozzie, Crush 300DD crankbait and a Divine Hybrid Jig guided by forward-facing sonar.
Rounding out the Top 5 finishers: Wesley Baxley of Cypress, 23-15; Cole Moore, Anacoco, LA., 19-0; Hayden Heck, Lufkin, 17-15; and Ian Leybas, McAlester, Okla.. 1712.
Matt Williams is a freelance writer based in Nacogdoches. He can be reached by email, mattwillwrite4u@yahoo. com.
