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Looking for Advice!

MackDaddy

New Member
My family and I own or rent around 900 continuous acres of crop land, timber, and pasture ground. We have religously managed our deer herd for close to ten years now. The strict management has been paying off really well.....too well. On one side of our property we have a neighbor who is letting a guy hunt on his land. This consists of about 20 trees that sit directly on our fence line. On the opposite side of our property their is a guy who is leasing the neighbors ground to hunt on. He too puts his stands right on our fence lines. These are two different guys who have two things in common....they hunt our fence lines, and they both have salt blocks directly under their stands! Baiting deer is illegal here in Iowa, and when we had the local game warden come out last year, he tried to catch the guys a few times, and then gave up. :confused:

I am looking for some advice on what to do here! I'm not one to just go take their stands, as they do have permission to be where they are. But it does frustrate me to see them basically hunt our ground and do it while sitting over bait. What would you do????
 
Some advice would be to go to your closest salon and get as much human hair as possible. place around thier stands and they wont see a deer.
 
I don't understand why the conservation officer would have to catch them. If the salt blocks are right out in front of their stands and its hunting seasons that seems like enough evidence to me. I guess if that officer gave up see if you could contact his boss or a supierior to his position. If all else fails, you do have 900 acresm, so I would say do something along the fencelines where they hunt to make the deer avoid going to that particular spot.

What would probably work best though if you haven't already would be to talk to those guys hunting there and tell them if they do not remove the salt blocks that you will call the C.O. on them, that is if they don't know you have already called the C.O. That would probably scare them enough to remove them.
 
The warden came and took samples of the salt rocks, took several pictures of their setups, but ultimately told me that unless he catches them in the stand with their bow, there was nothing he could do. He tried for several weeks to catch these guys, and we would even call him when we saw their trucks parked there, but he was always just a day late and a dollar short! He brought us a thank you gift for calling him, and never returned again.

Thanks to our state budget cuts, our officers are just too spread out.
 
Go through the process of contacting TIP.....they will assign someone to the case and stay on it till the poachers are caught.
 
Liquid fence or bleach on the steps of their stands will solve the problem :way::D:way::D
 
I would just hang a stand right across theirs on your fence line. Hunt it every time you see them parked there. Who cares if you ruin a night, they will get the point soon enough.
 
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I would just hang a stand right across theirs on your fence line. Hunt it every time you see them parked there. Who cares if you ruin a night, they will get the point soon enough.

I am with Liv on this one. They will get the point real quick, I would hang within 10 -15 feet of them, talk to them a bit even.

I have also parked my truck right in front of a guy who hugs our fence. Nothing better than watching a guy get frustrated, climb down and go home for the day. I would never do this to someone who has either asked if we cared and or if his stand didn't face directly into our fields. On top of that I have taken one of his stands down on our side of the fence. Scattered it throughout the timber and told him to have fun rounding it up.

kratz
 
If it was me I would be persistent in calling the conservation officer and TIP. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. Just keep after them until they get it done. It's their job and they are busy but they will eventually get it done if you keep hounding them.
 
How is it much different than sitting on a fence of a park or refuge? Granted he should not have a salt block under his stand. I also think it is illegal to alter deer movement to keep game from going by another hunter. So parking a truck by his stand would be illegal even though it is on your own ground. So you have 900 acres to hunt and you are complaining of someone sitting on your fenceline? Here is an idea build a high fence.
 
How is it much different than sitting on a fence of a park or refuge? Granted he should not have a salt block under his stand. I also think it is illegal to alter deer movement to keep game from going by another hunter. So parking a truck by his stand would be illegal even though it is on your own ground. So you have 900 acres to hunt and you are complaining of someone sitting on your fenceline? Here is an idea build a high fence.


Never heard that it is illegal to park a truck in your own field. DNR has seen my truck parked there for years during gun season and have never had one single thing said to me.

As far as sitting on the fence, I generally wouldn't have a problem, except there is only one direction that the guy can comfortably shoot, and that is on my side, that I have a problem with.

I have hugged fencelines, as they can be great travel routes, but hunting them with the sole purpose to shoot on the neighbors property is a different story.

Kratz
 
Couldn't agree more.... I could get permission to hunt a couple trees or an empty corn field just about anywhere next to a prime timber....but it's unethical. You don't do this if you have any sort of respect for the people that hunt or own that timber across the fence.

There's another post today about someone losing their hunting spot and wishing they owned their own land. You are only trading one problem for another. Owning land that holds game only brings a lot of 'fence sitters' that are disrespectful and mess up the normal travel patterns.
 
So hunting a farm that doesnt have much timber if any but lots of food next to a neighboring property is unethical??? Hmmm. Guess Im unethical as I have a farm with a simple creek bottom that connects two timbers owned by other people but all the food is on the property i hunt so me using that to my advantage is unethical. Well I guess it is what it is as I will be unleashing the rocket in a perfectly legal fashion. So is it unethical that I plant food plots on ground I can hunt with small amounts of timber that borders the neighbors big timber and shoot deer that may or may not come to the plots from neighboring ground?? If im wrong on this let me know, as Im curious. Because as of now Im unethical.
 
I'm assuming that you have already talked to them.

I'll also assume that they aren't waiting for the deer to jump the fence therefore they're shooting or facing your fence with the intentions of shooting over your fence. I'd just drop a few trees or "move" some brush piles that would keep them from any shooting lanes onto your land...as well as becoming the local CO's daily phone call guy.
 
Hunting a fence line is one thing but hunting over bait is completely unacceptable. I would definitely keep after the CO and/or place a call into the TIP line.

It seems like this topic comes up at least once a year. I look at it this way. When it come to hunting fence lines there's not a lot you can do about it. Legally they have the right to hunt there. It can be very annoying and might seem unethical, especially if all their shooting lanes are onto your property. But deer do travel along fence lines and cross them all the time. Just because a deer may spend most of its time on your property doesn't mean you own them. If they step across that fence then they're fair game for the neighbor.

Now in your situation it's a bit different. The guy is hunting over bait and I would definitely have a big problem with someone hunting the fence line over a mineral site.

I have had an issue with a guy that hunts my fence line for a few years now. I don't care that he hunts the line but that almost all the shooting lanes he trimmed were looking onto my property. To ensure he's not shooting across the line I implemented a solution to the problem. I strategically hinge cut a number of trees and planted three rows of dogwoods amongst the tops along the problem area. Now will be very hard to get a clear shot If he thinks about shooting across the line.

I also see scottonbuck's point because I too have a farm where I hunt the line. The only timber is impossible to get close too, because the entire 30 acres of it is bedding area. So I hunt a small slough where the only tree suitable for a stand is on the line. So here I can catch them moving from the bedding area, 100yds away, to the neighbors crop field. It just so happens the neighbor started hunting the same line as well. His ground blind is set 20yds from my stand where he can intercept a deer as it crosses into his field. I just wish he would have chose an area a little farther away from my stand. But oh well, what do ya do?
 
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