Weird situation on public land in MN

B

Bob Peters

Well-known member
I don't know how else to describe it. I'm always really careful hunting with knowing where I am and map study. We were hunting over the weekend and after a while I heard some hollering and whistles and noticed a guy walking on the edge of the wma near my truck. We continued hunting and saw this guy walking on the wma with a couple dogs. This was pretty far away, but as we hunted along some low ground we were coming closer. Eventually the guy is just standing on a hill watching us with his dogs running loose. I wasn't too concerned, but I told my buddy I'd go talk to him, just because I was concerned about dog interaction. I thought maybe he had been duck hunting and was coming back for decoys or something as there is a nice duck pond on the property. I walked up to him (with my gun broke over my shoulder) and said politely, "what's the scoop?" The crusty old guy snapped, "nothing, I live here, we do this every day!" I calmly said "ok" and turned to walk back to my buddy and our two dogs. At this point his two large mutts started to follow me(they were not aggressive). I tried to tell them to go back, but they wouldn't, and this guy didn't have much control over them, not that he made any attempt to call them back. So they followed me and then of course they run right up to our retrievers and are sniffing them up and down and jumping wanting to play all the while Skye and Roxy are trying to hunt and are all business. I was just really nervous there might be a dog fight and here the other owner is 100 yards away up on a hill with zero control of his two. Finally after 10 or 15 minutes of him trailing us up above he starts hollering and whistling for his dogs. We stayed and finished hunting the spot and got to our truck an hour later. Then a vehicle pulls up with a family of hunters in it, and the driver asks, "Hey, how's the hunting, and by the way, were you harassed out here?" I told him the story. Turns out he owns land across the road, and when his son was duck hunting this year the same guy came over and yelled at him and told him he couldn't hunt there. That's gotta suck to buy hunting land and have that guy for a neighbor.
 
Bob Peters said:
I don't know how else to describe it. I'm always really careful hunting with knowing where I am and map study. We were hunting over the weekend and after a while I heard some hollering and whistles and noticed a guy walking on the edge of the wma near my truck. We continued hunting and saw this guy walking on the wma with a couple dogs. This was pretty far away, but as we hunted along some low ground we were coming closer. Eventually the guy is just standing on a hill watching us with his dogs running loose. I wasn't too concerned, but I told my buddy I'd go talk to him, just because I was concerned about dog interaction. I thought maybe he had been duck hunting and was coming back for decoys or something as there is a nice duck pond on the property. I walked up to him (with my gun broke over my shoulder) and said politely, "what's the scoop?" The crusty old guy snapped, "nothing, I live here, we do this every day!" I calmly said "ok" and turned to walk back to my buddy and our two dogs. At this point his two large mutts started to follow me(they were not aggressive). I tried to tell them to go back, but they wouldn't, and this guy didn't have much control over them, not that he made any attempt to call them back. So they followed me and then of course they run right up to our retrievers and are sniffing them up and down and jumping wanting to play all the while Skye and Roxy are trying to hunt and are all business. I was just really nervous there might be a dog fight and here the other owner is 100 yards away up on a hill with zero control of his two. Finally after 10 or 15 minutes of him trailing us up above he starts hollering and whistling for his dogs. We stayed and finished hunting the spot and got to our truck an hour later. Then a vehicle pulls up with a family of hunters in it, and the driver asks, "Hey, how's the hunting, and by the way, were you harassed out here?" I told him the story. Turns out he owns land across the road, and when his son was duck hunting this year the same guy came over and yelled at him and told him he couldn't hunt there. That's gotta suck to buy hunting land and have that guy for a neighbor.
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Wow, what a pr*#k. I got my but chewed once for parking half my truck over the line on some walk in in K.S. What do you say? I was on his property some but geeez. The only thing I could do was apologize.
 
I've heard of this sort of situation occurring on public land with individuals that live right next to it or own land next to it. Generally, it occurs because they've have a fair number of hunters that trespass on their land, crossing over from the public land.

The dog situation can get hairy pretty quick. Sounds like that part of the story wasn't too bad, luckily.
 
That's why I always carry a concealed pistol on me no matter where i go. There are some crazys out there and you just never know when things might pop off and you gots to defend whats yours and stand your ground.
 
I actually hunted a place years ago near Hilger Montana that I thought was state land.Turned out to be private. I was able to sneak out the other side, before this guy saw me.
 
We had a similar thing happen around 5 years ago. After talking to the local CO. It turned out the person recently purchased a house near the public land. Wasn’t much that could be done as walking his dogs on public land was allowed. I suspect the owner just didn’t want hunters around.
 
Smasher said:
That's why I always carry a concealed pistol on me no matter where i go. There are some crazys out there and you just never know when things might pop off and you gots to defend whats yours and stand your ground.
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You carry around a pistol when you're bird hunting? Obviously you are free to do that but aren't you already toting a much more powerful firearm anyways? lol
 
why worry about carrying a concealed weapon. I often hunt with a 40 caliber Glock parked right on my hip as an advertisement that I don’t want trouble but nor will I back down from it. Granted, I often hunt in wolf country so I’ve become used to carrying it, but I figure it will work just fine on human wolves too.
 
Oh, and as for carrying a more powerful weapon in the shotgun, I’d use my Glock with 14 rounds of a single hefty projectile over bird shot, when it comes to needing it for dangerous animals and human animals.
 
gimruis said:
I've heard of this sort of situation occurring on public land with individuals that live right next to it or own land next to it. Generally, it occurs because they've have a fair number of hunters that trespass on their land, crossing over from the public land.
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In this case the guy doesn't even have that to fall back on. His property is across the road from the public, and there's no cover on it anyways.
 
Thinblueline said:
Oh, and as for carrying a more powerful weapon in the shotgun, I’d use my Glock with 14 rounds of a single hefty projectile over bird shot, when it comes to needing it for dangerous animals and human animals.
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So you think a single projectile handgun is more powerful than a 12 gauge at close range? I've got news for you, it isn't. Not to mention the lack of accuracy. Why do you think law enforcement goes for a shotgun when they need more firepower than their standard issue handgun?

But go ahead and carry it. Add more weight to your belt if you feel the need to.
 
gimruis said:
So you think a single projectile handgun is more powerful than a 12 gauge at close range? I've got news for you, it isn't. Not to mention the lack of accuracy. Why do you think law enforcement goes for a shotgun when they need more firepower than their standard issue handgun?

But go ahead and carry it. Add more weight to your belt if you feel the need to.
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I have to agree I would take a shotgun over a handgun for a charging animal be it 2 or 4 legs. That’s saying a lot considering my name handle.
 
I always carry if my scattergun is smaller than a 20. Or if I'm carrying a 22. I just feel better.
 
I guess I should clarify, if push came to shove, I’d naturally use my shotgun with bird shot first in a very close situation, but I can drop that sucker and be firing a lot more rounds if needed, faster than digging around for shotgun shells and reloading. Like I said, I first started carrying for wolves and/or coyotes that might jump on a dog, cuz I could be more effective with that at a distance until I can reach my dogs, not to mention having more shots. Once you’re used to carrying it in wolf and bear country, it just seems like a good idea to carry it all the time. I had a buddy who came over a hill to see a pair of coyotes running down his bird dog. A little more range than bird shot would be nice in a situation like that.
 
I had some jerks block me in a parking lot once. I really don't understand guys like that. Did they think it was funny? I started out to go find them but had a change of heart, sat in the truck for a while and calmed myself down. It was not worth what could have happened. I thought about flattening a tire or two but decided to keep my cool. I got out but damaged a mirror on the sign.
 
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