Lot 16

The land lifts 77 ft from the low corner to the high side, 2,027 up to 2,104, and it does it in long easy steps instead of one hard pitch. Tract 16 is 63.36 acres of ranch land for sale on Alamo Ranch in Edwards County, shaped long and narrow at better than four times its width, so the rise reads the full length of the property rather than sideways. Take the high end and you're looking at most of your own drainage. The shape sets the rest.

The spine of it is a draw that enters at the northeast corner and cuts corner to corner, some 2,560 ft of it, before slipping out at the southwest. Two shorter channels feed in toward the middle, one tracing close to 450 ft and the other 380, and where three drainages gather you get a shaded, lower route of travel that anything with legs will take before it fights open rock in the heat. They fill after a storm and empty again, the way draws behave here. Don't count on standing water. Catch one wet after a rain instead of taking our word for it, and odds are elk, deer and hogs will have been in the bottom ahead of you.

The crossing is already cut. At the northeast corner a two-track drops into the creek bed at a ford and climbs the far bank, so you can get from one end of this tract to the other without picking your way for a spot to cross. On something this long and this narrow, that single detail changes how much of the acreage you actually use. From the crest you can watch a fair stretch of the drainage without ever leaving the high side.

Cover is live oak and cedar in mottes, scattered rather than solid, with pale caliche and broken limestone showing between them and grass filling the openings. Prickly pear here and there. In July the rock goes white at midday and the oaks throw hard pools of shade, which is where anything with sense spends the afternoon. There's room between the mottes to take a side-by-side wherever you want to go, and enough thick timber on the slopes to keep you out of sight of anybody else.

Fence sits on the north, west and southern sides, better than half the perimeter, though the recorded survey and title govern any boundary question and we'll hand you the plat to read for yourself. A graded caliche ranch road, wide and crowned, passes the north end, and it holds up after weather better than most surfaces out this way. How you legally get in and out is spelled out in the deed and plat, and we'd rather explain that to you in detail than let a track in the dirt speak for it. Power reaches the county road and other spots on the ranch; we'll show you where the closest service sits, and the co-op can tell you what a connection involves.

This tract also holds a half interest in a well, and a windmill with a concrete storage tank sits at the north end. The tank held water when we were last out there. What any well produces, who shares it, and on what terms are all matters for the paperwork, so ask us for it, read it, and confirm the particulars before you sign.

Rocksprings sits a short haul north, off Hwy 55 and County Road 310, out on the western rim of the Texas Hill Country where the pastures are still bigger than the towns. The rules on this ranch are short and few, with no paid outfitting allowed, and we finance our own tracts with as little as 5% up front. Wear a stiff-soled boot; limestone is unkind to soft ones. Fall shows this one best, once the heat quits and the shade holds later in the afternoon. We'll take you in at the ford, follow the draw its full length, and put the plat in your hands back at the truck.