For Hill Country ranchers like Buster Terrell of London, as well as operators from East Texas to the Panhandle, fees from recreational hunters have become ever more profitable, delivering a dependable income stream when bad weather or a poor market eat into profits from the core beef-cattle business. Last year, statewide revenues from hunting leases more than doubled to $588 million from $221 million in 1996, said Carl Anderson, an agricultural economist with the Texas Cooperative Extension service.
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