What to do about persistent poachers?

[Lumberjack Glenn]

Here in PA we have the purple paint law.
PA game commission reminds hunters to obey "purple paint laws" during hunting season. ... The law states that landowners must paint the purple lines 3 to 5 feet above the base of the tree and should be at least 8 inches long and 1 inch wide. Additionally, marked trees and posts should be within 100 feet of each other. Please don't start a Hatfield's and McCoy's fight. Game warden, lawyer's, police involvement is the correct thing to do. Good luck... we'll be praying for you.

 

[Joisey]

Pretty country in WV. Can't be any more different than Jersey I would imagine.

I like the line about the guys wife. That's classic. Are you sure your not Vic DeBenidetto? Just kidding..........

The area where I live (it was my grandmothers grandfathers house) used to be very nice. Once the casinos came the traffic went crazy, crime went up, and taxes doubled the following year. On 10 acres I pay just shy of 9K per year. No city water or sewer.

WV property is the same size, home and outbuildings the same value, except I have city water and sewer. I pay $900 per year. Car insurance from the same company (Geico) is 66% less. Health insurance is 30% less. Can't afford to live here anymore.

Glad you liked the line about the guys wife. Hey, I'm 5'7" in a 6'6" world. Used to people trying to intimidate me with size. It doesn't work. His wife was probably a two bagger anyway.

I wish you and yours a Merry Christmas and a happy healthy new year. Great talking to you.

 

[Joisey]

Here in PA we have the purple paint law.
PA game commission reminds hunters to obey "purple paint laws" during hunting season. ... The law states that landowners must paint the purple lines 3 to 5 feet above the base of the tree and should be at least 8 inches long and 1 inch wide. Additionally, marked trees and posts should be within 100 feet of each other. Please don't start a Hatfield's and McCoy's fight. Game warden, lawyer's, police involvement is the correct thing to do. Good luck... we'll be praying for you.

My neighbor in WV told me that same rule applies there. Certainly easier.

 

[arathol]

You're going to need more resolution than that or a significant zoom function if you want to identify faces from distance with a drone.
Speaking of drones, if they are on your property and you get close enough with the drone for them to clearly see it, you might get them to take a shot or two at the drone. Get a cheap drone and make it a target of opportunity for them. In case you didn't know, the FAA classifies all drones as aircraft, and shooting one down is a federal offense that could carry as much a 20 years in jail....Get video of them shooting at the drone and go from there....

 

[Joisey]

Couldn't agree more on the legit "got lost" and "was looking for my dog"... Im out there helping in a minute for that cause as well. Spent an entire day looking for a [friendly] neighbor's dog when it was found under her porch that evening keeping cool. Reward beers were the best I've ever had. Very different from entering, shooting and killing whatever on a property that does not belong to you as we would all agree....

I got tired of finding deer in the woods that were shot in the ass three or four times (known as a NJ heart shot) and were not tracked. They died from loss of blood or infection, or both. Ditto for finding deer with just the hams cut off, and a few times just the rack. Antler soup I assume. The average NJ hunter in my area is about 40 or 50, 40 pounds overweight and drunk on brandy. I'm surprised more hunters don't kill people or one another in the woods.

 

[lone wolf]

I got tired of finding deer in the woods that were shot in the ass three or four times (known as a NJ heart shot) and were not tracked. They died from loss of blood or infection, or both. Ditto for finding deer with just the hams cut off, and a few times just the rack. Antler soup I assume. The average NJ hunter in my area is about 40 or 50, 40 pounds overweight and drunk on brandy. I'm surprised more hunters don't kill people or one another in the woods.

I had a buddy get shot at with Buckshot one pellet went through his down jacket and missed him by a tiny bit. When we confronted the idiot shooter he said he thought he was shooting at a Deer! WTF!

 

[Joisey]

I had a buddy get shot at with Buckshot one pellet went through his down jacket and missed him by a tiny bit. When we confronted the idiot shooter he said he thought he was shooting at a Deer! WTF!

Two brothers that I went to school with went hunting before school one morning. The younger 17 year old brother stayed outside the thicket while his 3 year older brother went in the thicket to flush the deer out. After a few minutes the younger brother saw movement in the brush (always be sure of your target and what lies beyond) and unloads both barrels. He hits his brother sideways thru the butt cheeks with 13 or 14 pellets. I'm surprised it didn't give him brain damage.

 

[Mad Professor]

I agree with you in theory, but....

Not sure about other states, but I tried the trespassing route. There is a list of excuses a mile long as far as why they were on your property. Getting "lost" is the most popular excuse among them.

In NJ:
"A person commits defiant trespassing when he or she enters a place despite having been given notice to stay off the premises. This notice can be given in the form of an actual communication by an angry property owner or it can be communicated through a “PRIVATE PROPERTY” sign. Defiant trespassing is a petty disorderly persons offense, and a conviction could expose the offender to 30 days in jail and a fine of $1,000.00."

Notice the wording in the line that explains the penalty. "could" means you stand a snowball's chance in hell. The easiest out for the trespasser is that they didn't see the signs. There are specs as far as size of signs, height posted, distance apart and age of signs. Signs can be a year or less old. Be off on any one of the specs and the person walks. There goes your cost of a lawyer and your time.

Cost them money. That hits home fast and is remembered a LONG time. Having to shell out 2-3 hundred dollars stings, no matter how much money you make.

Here you just check the signs yearly and date that time with a sharpie

 

[mudrat2]

Surprised no one has mentioned using this stuff on the back of your signs:
https://safetymedia.com/aa67/tamper-dye
Would really show up if they pulled the sign down with their bare hands....

 

[9050lx]

Sorry for your dog.You don't want to know what I'm thinking right now.

 

[lone wolf]

Sorry for your dog.You don't want to know what I'm thinking right now.

I have a good idea I'm a dog lover too.

 

[JoeDoakes]

The "non violent" part makes any of this tough for you...I own land bordering state land in MN but not enough to be a "farm" so I have to post and come across as a Ahole to the Citiots who come up and hunt in the State woods to keep them away...it sucks but if your a "Giver" its hard to deal with "Takers"(look up the "Giver and Taker" thing it will help explain their attitude....If this was big enough to be a farm(and I farmed it) I'd be protected by the no tespassing laws without doing anything.....so get a hunting licence booklet and look up the laws and go from there...Good luck, Michael

Just a comment on the "Citiots" comment. That's a two-way street. I hunt public land and it seems like every landowner touching it claims the bordering public land as his. They put up stands early, take them down late or leave them there forever. Some mow the woods thirty feet past their property lines and some mow trails and picnic areas where I could be hunting. In Michigan if you don't hunt then you aren't paying for the state land as it's funded by license sales. Bottom line there are jerks on both sides of the fence, but most people want to do the right thing.

 

[Pythagorus]

As others have said, best bet is to find a couple of responsible hunters to spend time on the property. That in combination with plenty of cameras watching cameras should help. Send a copy of the evidence to the sheriff's office, and have your lawyer send contact the offender so that they can be prosecuted on the 2nd offense.

As you find there deer stands, cut the tree down. Make sure it lands on the stand. Especially effective if the stand is in use at the time. A local farmer uses this technique very effectively.

One local farmer will let you hunt if you ask, but you have to park at the house or the barn. All other vehicles get towed, via tractor, back to the barn where the spark plugs are removed. You'll have to call the sheriff to get it back, which has happened. If you caught hunting without permission, you will end up stairing down the business end of more than one rifle. Oddly enough, people don't tend to enjoy that, and they tend not to come back.

As far as being an outsider, most of that is garbage. These individuals are consuming valuable oxygen that would be better served feeding a fire somewhere. Having said that, building relationships in the community will get you more help in the long run, and that is extremely valuable. It also makes life more enjoyable.

As far as the dog goes, make sure you always have a couple extra head of livestock. You never know when you might need an excuse to dig a big hole.

It's true that locals sometimes try ....and succeed...in exercising 'authority' over a 'new chum...' The second time it's called bullying which civilised places actively condemn....Sometimes they never give up....they are simply sociopaths possibly brought up in violent families or gun toters excusing themselves with the pathetic 'I'm a hunter-gatherer' fantasy excuse...to excuse theI don't know about USA of course however ...if you have an animal protection agency it might help to report the dog incident as cruelty. Trespass is trespass but unless you are insured and again I don't know USA...you are liable for injury to trespasser....notwithstanding warnings. Trespassers may be entitled under law just as are 'invited people'. Someone mentioned not wanting confrontation...I'd say looking at what you have written that they would love to have confrontation...to excuse in their tiny brains, injuring you.You saw demonstration of that self-excusing madness recently in the invasion of the whitehouse. You buy a drone and use it...they'll likely shoot it down. That they removed cameras means they were very obvious or that they are very experienced in their sociopathy. So what to do?...keep a diary written asap 'on the day', take damage or footprint or shooting remnants (cartridge cases for example, picked up with tongs and put in a sealable bag...like in the detective shows. ) Talk with your local sherriff but don't go in raging and ranting....say "I want to explain my fear coming from invasion of my property and I want your advice on what to do or what can be done....The killing of the dog is an implied threat to you by the way...presuming also it was killed in the forest and taken to the railway....murderers have done the same with people...killed them then placed them on the lines. Evidence is primary after staying alive...gather evidence...and the more you get angry, the more often they will 'get off'. Of course they may have been doing this long before you moved to the place and consider it 'our right!!!' ...In a nutshell....even if one's tiny mind tells its owner 'I'm a hunter gatherer'...that does n ot give a right to save on buying meat by killing deer or livestock on someone else's land.

 

[Stonesforbrains]

I have a small property on the lake and my neighbor has a very large property to the east of me. She has poachers that come from the trailer park east of her property she has been trying to get rid of for years. She called the game warden and he came and visited her once. He told her to lease it and they would keep the poachers out. She asked him if he was going to do anything about it and according to her he told her “ma’am this is no man’s land, your not going to get any law enforcement out here unless there’s a dead body or a accident on the lake”. She told me the warden hasn’t been out here since and that was 9 years ago. She still has poachers even though she’s had the property leased for 5 years. I hate the fact that the poachers want to ignore the rules while the rest of us hunt legal and pay the license fees and tags and have all our stuff in order. I have talked to land owners south of me in the past about hunting their property and have been denied because of poachers. They always tell me the bad apples screw it up for the bunch that are good.

 

[Pythagorus]

Just a comment on the "Citiots" comment. That's a two-way street. I hunt public land and it seems like every landowner touching it claims the bordering public land as his. They put up stands early, take them down late or leave them there forever. Some mow the woods thirty feet past their property lines and some mow trails and picnic areas where I could be hunting. In Michigan if you don't hunt then you aren't paying for the state land as it's funded by license sales. Bottom line there are jerks on both sides of the fence, but most people want to do the right thing.

Only an idiot would be shooting in an area where there are private lands within several kilometer ...and the 'licence sales' would go nowhere near to paying for the State land. I own over 700 acres of 'bushland' and whilst I hold all 'gun licences' have no desire to shoot on my land....or allow anyone else to do it. I undrstand what you are saying about landowners stands but again....I've no sympathy with the 'hunter-gather' excuses and fantasies.The Davey Crockett/ Deerslayer mentality (Fenimore Cooper was it who wrote that?) is way out of order these days...but those who yearn and lust to kill or pump themselves up through killing will always find an excuse.

My rifles were at the outset setup by a famed big game hunter. I was a very fine 'shot' with iron sites...could headshot a rabbit at 150 metres and more, downhill with 22 lr... By the time I was 16 I was 'over' killing...it was their environment not mine and I was invading it and killing animals as though they were not social...but they are, whether tribe/species or just family. Humans have a very evil notion that THEY decide what has a right to live and what doesn't.

I recall a few years ago being in an Australian gun shop in Qld...someone anounced 'hey there's a deer on the main road in Nerang'...Half a dozen of the dipsticks went racing home for their rifles...'what the&^^%$*&??...'..You are going to shoot in a built up area??...you must be insane...in fact hould not have a licence.. .come on!!...These are screwballs and the NRA has plenty of those it seems also. If you must hunt deer on privately owned land....where your bullet might easily invade anyway...then ask the owner's permission in writing, organise safety, pay any insurance possibly needed and shoot only what is essential for your food...and leave no injured animal.

Shoot only where there is safe projectile stoppage within say 50 metres and get to within say 20 metres of your victim. Then of course maybe the shooter would prefer not to know the surveyed boundaries or understand trajectory or care about bullets going into private land or even care about risk to others....or the despoilation of nature.

 

[Mad Professor]

Naw. Skip the fingerprints. Go for the DNA!

Every hunter I know that is out drinking beer is also pissing in the bush. A cheap fluorescent flashlight will find those locations in the dark, too.

Of course, the only way that works to prove the violations and get convictions is if Law Enforcement is doing the collection. Chain of custody, etc. I think you need to contact the game wardens and county sheriff to see who is willing to help. Has that been done yet? I haven't read the whole thread.

If the law enforcement doesn't seem to willing to help, maybe you need to mention the problem to a friendly politician in the local government. Perhaps your lawyer knows exactly who to talk to. Sometimes that can have a huge beneficial effect, especially when it is being done for a significant property-tax paying citizen.

I've done forensic science, fingerprints, drug testing, DNA analyses............fingerprints can be done quickly with 1800s technology

It's true that locals sometimes try ....and succeed...in exercising 'authority' over a 'new chum...' The second time it's called bullying which civilised places actively condemn....Sometimes they never give up....they are simply sociopaths possibly brought up in violent families or gun toters excusing themselves with the pathetic 'I'm a hunter-gatherer' fantasy excuse...to excuse theI don't know about USA of course however ...if you have an animal protection agency it might help to report the dog incident as cruelty. Trespass is trespass but unless you are insured and again I don't know USA...you are liable for injury to trespasser....notwithstanding warnings. Trespassers may be entitled under law just as are 'invited people'. Someone mentioned not wanting confrontation...I'd say looking at what you have written that they would love to have confrontation...to excuse in their tiny brains, injuring you.You saw demonstration of that self-excusing madness recently in the invasion of the whitehouse. You buy a drone and use it...they'll likely shoot it down. That they removed cameras means they were very obvious or that they are very experienced in their sociopathy. So what to do?...keep a diary written asap 'on the day', take damage or footprint or shooting remnants (cartridge cases for example, picked up with tongs and put in a sealable bag...like in the detective shows. ) Talk with your local sherriff but don't go in raging and ranting....say "I want to explain my fear coming from invasion of my property and I want your advice on what to do or what can be done....The killing of the dog is an implied threat to you by the way...presuming also it was killed in the forest and taken to the railway....murderers have done the same with people...killed them then placed them on the lines. Evidence is primary after staying alive...gather evidence...and the more you get angry, the more often they will 'get off'. Of course they may have been doing this long before you moved to the place and consider it 'our right!!!' ...In a nutshell....even if one's tiny mind tells its owner 'I'm a hunter gatherer'...that does n ot give a right to save on buying meat by killing deer or livestock on someone else's land.

Yes, the Whitehouse has been invaded by Pee Pads and Knee Pads.

 

[arathol]

Only an idiot would be shooting in an area where there are private lands within several kilometer ...and the 'licence sales' would go nowhere near to paying for the State land. I own over 700 acres of 'bushland' and whilst I hold all 'gun licences' have no desire to shoot on my land....or allow anyone else to do it. I undrstand what you are saying about landowners stands but again....I've no sympathy with the 'hunter-gather' excuses and fantasies.The Davey Crockett/ Deerslayer mentality (Fenimore Cooper was it who wrote that?) is way out of order these days...but those who yearn and lust to kill or pump themselves up through killing will always find an excuse.

My rifles were at the outset setup by a famed big game hunter. I was a very fine 'shot' with iron sites...could headshot a rabbit at 150 metres and more, downhill with 22 lr... By the time I was 16 I was 'over' killing...it was their environment not mine and I was invading it and killing animals as though they were not social...but they are, whether tribe/species or just family. Humans have a very evil notion that THEY decide what has a right to live and what doesn't.

I recall a few years ago being in an Australian gun shop in Qld...someone anounced 'hey there's a deer on the main road in Nerang'...Half a dozen of the dipsticks went racing home for their rifles...'what the&^^%$*&??...'..You are going to shoot in a built up area??...you must be insane...in fact hould not have a licence.. .come on!!...These are screwballs and the NRA has plenty of those it seems also. If you must hunt deer on privately owned land....where your bullet might easily invade anyway...then ask the owner's permission in writing, organise safety, pay any insurance possibly needed and shoot only what is essential for your food...and leave no injured animal.

Shoot only where there is safe projectile stoppage within say 50 metres and get to within say 20 metres of your victim. Then of course maybe the shooter would prefer not to know the surveyed boundaries or understand trajectory or care about bullets going into private land or even care about risk to others....or the despoilation of nature.

Never been to America I take it? I don't think you realize that many things are different from what you may be used to. There is no reason you can't hunt near the boundaries between public and private land as long as you follow the rules and distances prescribed in the hunting laws and follow basic gun safety protocols. If you know how to shoot and how to set up your equipment, 100 yards + is not a problem.

 

[pdqdl]

Surprised no one has mentioned using this stuff on the back of your signs:
https://safetymedia.com/aa67/tamper-dye
Would really show up if they pulled the sign down with their bare hands....

I kinda doubt that will work outside. Rain.

 

[Kdawg]

Here in PA we have the purple paint law.
PA game commission reminds hunters to obey "purple paint laws" during hunting season. ... The law states that landowners must paint the purple lines 3 to 5 feet above the base of the tree and should be at least 8 inches long and 1 inch wide. Additionally, marked trees and posts should be within 100 feet of each other. Please don't start a Hatfield's and McCoy's fight. Game warden, lawyer's, police involvement is the correct thing to do. Good luck... we'll be praying for you.

Thanks so much for your well wishes. Intent is to use the legal process to make hunting my land expensive and encouraging hunting elsewhere henceforth.

I read the purple paint law some time ago. Thanks for the refresher. Unfortunately NY has not passed purple paint law. If it would it would save me some trouble with signage. As things are now the boundary trees ALL get a purple belt next spring with the survey. That will help my case that a visual boundary exists.

 

[Kdawg]

You're going to need more resolution than that or a significant zoom function if you want to identify faces from distance with a drone.
Speaking of drones, if they are on your property and you get close enough with the drone for them to clearly see it, you might get them to take a shot or two at the drone. Get a cheap drone and make it a target of opportunity for them. In case you didn't know, the FAA classifies all drones as aircraft, and shooting one down is a federal offense that could carry as much a 20 years in jail....Get video of them shooting at the drone and go from there....

I’m aware of that FAA rule and that though had occurred to me. For the faces, cameras at the place they drop off and typically enter the property will do and the identified individuals can then be tracked in the woods as I call it in. Further confirmation of identity if they can be picked up by guiding the DEC in to them.