Hey guys, I would keep the plat map/cell phone trick kinda on the down-low...If that were to ever catch fire & farmers start getting frequent calls from hunter-strangers like a bunch of telemarketers, that will be the end of that in short order for all of us! That particular strategy would probably work much better for those like engpointerman who are fortunate enough to live local & already somewhat know some folks and the general area as common reference points...
I do like the plat map idea very much & need to get one myself (I always do things the hard way & just ask around trying to chase the landowner down)...Personally for me, I like the old school approach of a short, gentlemanly visit in person, shaking hands and giving them a fair opportunity to see my face, size me up and decide whether they like me & want to let me on their land (so far this has worked out great for me in gaining long-term access for hunting many types of game over many years across multiple states & I have even been able to build some really neat relationships with landowners over time)...For first-time introductions, I only make a phone call as a last resort if I can't manage to chase the landowner down in person (although I have had fairly decent luck on the phone as well)...I would say I have had about 50/50 luck overall with this approach over the years! :thumbsup:
BAD HUNTER ETIQUETTE--any rude & totally SELFISH behavior such as say impatiently looking over their shoulder and tapping your foot while you drool at all the birds, or taking up a lot of a hard-working farmer's time while he is obviously very busy--are really bad juju for the rest of us trying the same thing after you!!! And for God's sake, don't argue with or get mad at the landowner if he says no! Worst of all, the gluttonous CARDINAL SIN of hunters as far as I am concerned is showing up on the same property nearly every d@#! day of the season once you have gained permission! Bon Jovi should add a new line to his song about these kinds of things - "You give hunters a bad name"...
As far as timing, it is usually an absolute waste of time & effort to ask permission a year ahead of time. If you wanna kill birds, you gotta earn your scouting and permission-asking stripes like the rest of us & keep movin with the birds. This much I have learned over a lifetime of hunting all kinds of game - if I only had two days to hunt, you can bet I would spend at least half of the first day scouting & locking down permission (especially if I had not had any time at all to scout well beforehand)!!! There is good reason why so many of the 30-35% (or whatever) of successful hunters are the same exact 30% year-after-year & the same old 70% just keep on twiddling their thumbs hoping on a pot-luck wing & a prayer!!!...I most often ask permission while out fresh-scouting my butt off a week or two or several days before the season opens...I do not like to nearly as much, but I have also often even stopped and asked on the day of the hunt when I see something promising, with at least some moderate success.
Hey, if you never ask the answer will always be 100% NO!!! If you are only asking, how much worse can the answer possibly be???
Guys, just always remember--please REPRESENT our fraternity well out there & show a genuine interest in someone besides yourself!!! If ALL of us hunters worked harder at that, we could build a much better name for hunting/hunters & it would benefit us all in the long run!!! We don't need any more of our members constantly shooting our own group in the foot! This is not rocket science here, just the good old golden rule - "Treat people (in this case landowners) like you would want to be treated yourself"! If you were the one who owned the land, would you want to be treated like some hunters act???
