The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Galveston District (SWG) hosted the 10th Annual Lone Star Warriors Outdoors Gator Hunt at its Wallisville Lake Project location, Sept. 14 to 17, 2025.
USACE co-hosted the event in partnership with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, Chambers County Emergency Medical Services, and Lone Star Warriors Outdoors (LSWO)—a Texas-based nonprofit 501c3 organization.
Texas game wardens escorted six veterans for three days of hunting, to ensure everyone was hunting legally and safely. Chambers County Emergency Medical Technicians provided support as well. Each veteran was eligible to harvest three alligators.
The hunt consists of tying heavy lines to trees on a bayou bank with a big hook attached and baited with chicken hanging above the high-water line. Then it’s just a waiting game. The hunters check lines in the morning and the afternoon.
When they weren’t checking alligator lines, veterans fished for fresh and saltwater species, with Wallisville Lake Project park rangers on hand to answer questions about the 23,000-acre expanse and the Wallisville Lock and Dam and Structure A. The lock and dam and Structure A provide salinity control on the Trinity River, by opening and closing depending on tides, river flows, winds, and drought conditions.
SWG hosted the hunt to manage alligator populations --- in support of its environmental stewardship mission --- and to help wounded warriors connect with one another.
“I am very proud that the Galveston District continues to support special events like this because it helps accomplish the project's mission while also building professional relationships between agencies and most importantly, it provides an opportunity to take care of our veterans,” said David Mackintosh, SWG’s Houston Project Office chief.
The annual hunt gives veterans a unique opportunity to experience the outdoors with a tight-knit group of natural resource management professionals and expand their network of fellow veterans they can lean on when times get tough, Mackintosh said.
“We also want to expose the veterans to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and its missions as an organization where they can continue to serve and that also values the talents, skills, and abilities they earned from their military service.”
Veterans from different service branches from all over the U.S. came together for another mission, Mackintosh said.
“There was an instant camaraderie with this year’s veterans that really stood out,” Mackintosh said.
The event was a resounding success, Mackintosh said.
“This year was the first time hunters filled all their tags and harvested 18 alligators,” he concluded.
When they weren’t hunting gators, the veterans had plenty of time to get to know one another, which is the primary goal for LSWO, the non-profit which co-sponsored the event.
“The whole point of this is to take combat-injured veterans hunting and fishing, to work on suicide prevention and PTSD recovery,” said Chris Gill, LSWO’s president and founder. “We want to get these guys to a point where they have a whole new group of people they can text at any point in time, they can call at any point in time to help them out in these hard times.”
LSWO made the arrangements for this year’s six veterans to stay at the Cajun Outback Hunting Lodge in Baytown, Texas, just outside the Wallisville Lake Project boundary.
“We provide the food and basically spend a lot of time cooking out here. We coordinate the schedule and logistics,” Gill said.
Gill expressed his thanks for the part USACE played in this hunt, and another.
“Thank you to the Corps of Engineers for working with us whether it be the alligator hunt, or the deer hunt we do at Addicks and Barker,” Gill said. “It’s an amazing thing, an amazing opportunity, and I just can’t thank you enough.”
To learn more about LSWO, visit https://lonestarwarriorsoutdoors.org/.
To learn more about the Wallisville Lake Project, visit https://www.swg.usace.army.mil/Locations/Wallisville-Lake-Project-Office/.