Ty Chumley was due for a bit of luck after losing his home and most of his belongings to Hurricane Ike.

Chumley, a tugboat operator from Nederland, bought one chance in this year’s Big Time Texas Hunts Grand Slam category; it was the first time he’d ever entered. He won.

The winner of this year’s Big Time Texas Hunts crown jewel, the Texas Grand Slam hunt package, receives four separate guided hunts for Texas’ most prized big game animals -- desert bighorn sheep, white-tailed deer, pronghorn antelope and mule deer.

“I haven’t hunted deer since I was a kid and I lost most of my guns in the hurricane,” said Chumley, who will embark on the first of four big game hunts-of-a-lifetime in early December as winner of this year’s Texas Grand Slam special drawn hunt package. “I’m a fisherman, but this will definitely get me started back into hunting.”

Chumley joins 16 other lucky sportsmen who are making special plans for hunting season as winners of this year’s Big Time Texas Hunts. The hunters were selected by random computer drawing from applicants in the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department program.

All told, hunters bought 72,688 Big Time Texas Hunt entries during this year’s sales period through the Oct. 15 deadline. This generated about $704,507 in gross revenue to support wildlife research, habitat management and public hunting.

Following are the winners of this year’s Big Time Texas Hunts.

Grand Slam — Ty Chumley, Nederland.
Premium Buck Hunt — Kelly Nunn, Austin.
Exotic Safari — Michael Masera, Houston and Jeffrey Pumphrey, Midway, Kentucky.
Whitetail Bonanza — Lawrence Ringley, McKinney; Gene Finn, Granger; Daniel Boschert, Dallas; Randy Ansley, Forney; Sammy Kelley, San Antonio; Robert Peterson, Temple; John Ehrhart, Highland Village; Charles Salazar, Houston; James Denny, Lockhart; John Massey, Kerrville.
Big Time Bird Hunt — Phillip Barry, Highland Village.
Waterfowl Adventure — Donald Tousley, Wichita Falls.
Gator Hunt — Gregg Slade, Lockhart.