Just let it ride Booner, put your pitchforks down people. Pull some cams from the prop line and move em into the prop more. Hopefully that buck makes it through, lay low and kill that buck next year.
100% all of these. I sympathize with Boon, but at the end of the day this started with FB. So Mr. Rogers walks the property line and sees platforms right on the other side. Right or wrong, his assumption is that something is shady or at the very least Boon is usurping "his" deer and he isn't even the owner of the adjacent land. I disagree, but that's likely his thought process. He's an a-hole, sure, but where he crosses the line literally and figuratively is touching your stuff. What I really don't understand is if he's so concerned why doesn't HE put up stands along the line and hunt them? there is nothing illegal or civilly liable about this. It is "plain view" and so long as Booner has permission/legal right to have cameras on "his" side of the fence it doesn't matter if they happen to be pointed onto the other side. Unless the guy undresses and obviously had no idea that he was being photographed (neither of which applies) Boon is safe posting his ugly mug.
Google has been successfully sued because of its street view. Photos taken from the street of things in "plain view". At the very least, the guy can sue and you would have a costly defense. He might even win, especially considering the intent of putting cameras right on the fence pointed at his private property. Either way, that is a really crappy thing to do to anyone. Again, in my opinion, which is based on actual experiences, fence sitters are leeches. I can even tolerate it better when the fence sitter is actually the neighboring land owner. At least they are paying taxes on the land and have an investment in the property. But, when Johnny Come Lately shows up with absolutely nothing invested for time and effort in paying for land and throws up platforms right on fence crossings to trophy hunt, I get angry. He wouldn't be there if he was limited to does only. The guy that owns the good cover and has managed his ground for trophy bucks has every right to be a bit upset about this. The same reason guys are buying up little parcels all around managed land. They want to take advantage of someone else's large investment and hard work for minimal outlay. I have seen guys use a dozer and push up brush along fences like those and I really don't blame them.
The vast majority of fence sitters are doing so because most property lines delineate some sort of terrain/vegetation change or at least a travel corridor between the 2 parcels; and as we all know deer are creatures of the edge. It is very common to see multiple stand sites within view of each other (either active or historical) on both sides of a line. What's an appropriate distance to sit from a line in your view? 20 yards? 50? 100? Does that extend further during gun season? Do we all need to have a DMZ 200 yards wide on all property lines? Replete with land mines and trip wires? Good lord, people. Your property goes from line to line. You and/or your designees are entitled to the use of every inch thereof. It's your land but not your deer. If you want to "own" deer put up a 15' fence and be done with it. The second a deer steps over the line it becomes off limits to you. If you can't work out a solution to where you can track a deer from one property to the other after shooting it then you may want to re-assess how close to the line you hunt; but you are still entitled to use every inch of that property. Would anyone here really begrudge that? Anyone who would intentionally illegally shoot over a property line would also night hunt or road hunt if presented the chance with sufficient temptation.
I would argue the oppsite is also true in may cases. Many Large landowners, especially ones who claim to be “managing” their land constantly look down on and trash the people who can’t afford a big farm and rely on permission. Somehow making it seem like Those hunters don’t deserve a big deer as much as someone who “manages”. That all those hunters are fence sitters who just try to capitalize on someone else’s hard work by shooting the deer “they” raised. That’s bullcrap. Any hunter who cares about the management and quality of his own hunting isn’t going to walk up and down a property line through the best bedding on the property just to screw up a neighbor, knowing it will hurt his own hunting in the process. Instead, a true manager would try to figure out what they can improve on their own property to make the deer not want to leave. That’s what I did. I figured out what the deer wanted (food) and am using it to pull deer onto my side. I don’t have the option of adding cover because its an active cattle pasture. I can count on one hand (with fingers to spare) the hunters I know that work as hard as I do. I suppose it wouldn’t matter that he has ladder stands and a box blind all along the fence on his side as well, because he also knows where the deer go to feed (my side of fence). You can call me a Johnny Come Lately, a fence sitter , a leech, or whatever else you can think of. I do what I have to in order to be successful on the land I have access to. If that makes someone mad, ohh well. Just because I don’t own the land doesn’t mean I have nothing invested. I spend thousands every year on that property putting in plots, buying mineral, cameras, helping the owner with cattle, etc. I’d rather have a fence sitter neighbor that only shoots 5+ year olds than an neighbor who hunts 1/4 mile away from the line and shoots every 2 and 3 year old he sees. Being upset about what someone else is doing has become a disease. It’s not enough to control your 250 acres, or 1000 acres, people want to control the 3000 acres surrounding it too, expecting all your neighbors to do things exactly the way you want them to. The deer I hunt aren’t mine, and they aren’t my neighbors either. I’ve never bothered the neighbor. He chose to bother me. I have had bucks dissapear on camera that i was fairly certain the neighbor killed, but I didn’t attack him about it. Why would I? What can be gained? Nothing. Its his property. He can do what he wants. The problem is when he wants to tell me what I can do on my side. Nothing I have done is illegal. I only related a small portion of what has transpired and the lengths he has gone to give me a hard time. I will be going to court next month to hopefully have a resolution. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I guess every guy that hunts a 10 or 15 acres parcel is a fence sitter, because your not getting that far off a property line no matter where your sitting.
Exactly! I once had a guy (one of the large landholding “managers” I referred to in last post) tell me that any stand within 50 yards of property line is unethical. Take a 40 acre square and mark off everything within 50 yds of the line and see what you are left with. Jealousy is a real thing Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Exactly the mentality I expected and disagree with. But, the beauty of that is that we can agree to disagree and move on. How big is your property on the Drury boarder? I know they and many like them get plenty of fence sniffers. Lots of little tracts getting bought and leased all around ground that is managed. It's easy to let someone else spend millions of dollars and put in tons of work to take full advantage of. I could not disagree more about shooting across the fence. There are plenty of guys that would never go spotlight deer, that can not resist taking a shot at a giant buck just across the fence.
And yet, if it wasn't for the large tracts being managed for big bucks, none of you would have interest in sitting near those properties. It certainly goes both ways kids. The big buck frenzy and putting everything on film is what started this long before a lot of you could buy a hunting license. I am so glad that I sold some of mine while the market is insane and took up fishing. I still had a great deer hunting year and none of the crap to go along with it. And I did it without sitting on anyone's fence.
from a lawbreaking perspective; I would be much more worried about getting caught trespass killing than night hunting. Generally speaking it's easier to get away with things in the dark. Not that I worry about either because I do neither. As Booner alluded to; I have better things to do than to worry about what other people are doing so long as they are lawful. If you want to supervise/manage the land next to you then buy it.
Everyone has their own measure of ethics. We will not agree on this one. That's okay. Many guys will not sit on or near a fence out of respect for the landowner. I would guess that is a rather old-school thought process, similar to not mowing your yard while the neighbors are out having a cookout. It's about having consideration for others and not being concerned only for ones self. We have certainly moved away from that way of thinking. A poll would likely show the older guys to be less likely to sit on a fence and the younger generation seeing it as their absolute right to do as they wish within the law.
I'm glad there are still people who can agree to disagree. It's not really a question of ethics to me. To what end should a hunter on less than ideal property not hunt close to the line? Should I hunt way out in the middle of the property where no deer ever go just to be "ethical", even though doing so will drop any chances of my success to near zero? What possible benefit would that have, other than to benefit the neighbor? The whole point of hunting is to try to be successful. I hunt where I need to in order to do that. Deer hunting isn't charity work. i do it so i can be successful, not so someone else can. Someone else's success is up to them. If the deer concentrated on the center of the property, that's where I'd be. It's not a "grass is greener" scenario to me. I just don't see any reason why I should intentionally lower my chances of success to appease a neighbor that perceives my tactics as "unethical" simply due to the distance from the fence. He isn't doing anything to lower his chances of success. That logic makes no sense to me. Let me ask you this. Since no one can choose to have the perfect neighbors , which scenario would you rather have, assuming your property is highly "managed"...Neighbor #1 who may hunt pretty close to your fence, but doesn't shotgun hunt the property, shoots very few deer overall, and when he does it's a doe or a 5,6, or 7 year old buck, and unfortunately he may sometimes kill "the" deer you are after....or Neighbor #2, who has every stand at least 100 yards across the property line, but shoots the first 2 year old he sees with his bow every year, then brings in a few buddies to party hunt during shotgun season and pushes the deer around, shoot a pile of deer, including a few bucks, maybe one big one in the lot but mostly young deer, and then he shoots another 2 year old buck during late muzzleloader season. And does this year after year. Which neighbor is more ethical? distance a person hunts from a fence has ZERO to do with ethics. Ethics has to do with a hunters practices/attitude regarding the animals we hunt, not their relationship with another hunter or neighbor.
Sorry, I could not disagree more. Charlie Alzheimer once wrote a good article about the ethics of sitting on fences. It is absolutely an ethics thing. Again, to each their own. My ethics, my hunt. Ethical is not always legal, legal is not always ethical. I will in fact shoot and kill a wounded animal on the spot, tag or not. Illegal, yes. Ethical, to me it is. You will not find me sitting on a fence. After doing some quick searches on the WWW, I find many that share my view. Its all good.
So you would rather have the deer blasting party hunting young deer shooting neighbor whose stands are far away from the line? To each their own I guess. I’d rather have a neighbor kill a booner every year than slaughter the age structure in the area. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
What about hunting near property lines if the surrounding neighbors do not hunt? What about sitting near the property line if you have a non hunting neighbor and that neighbor is feeding in an effort to keep the deer off your property?
I have no dog in this fight because fence lines are not an issue where I hunt, but I can only see problems coming from it. The main one being the retrieval, or lack of permission for a retrieval. That by itself would keep me away from a property line.
That isn't a problem in Iowa. Hunters are legally allowed to pursue a wounded animal onto another property, provided the hunter does not bring a weapon with him.
