I reach the gate, get out of the truck and introduce myself. I'm greeted with "you're property is too small to hunt on and all that you're donig is taking deer from me and your other neighbors". Huh? Well, good make your acquaintance. Then he says, was that you that coughed in your stand this morning? I nodded to the affrimative. He then tells me that it messed up one of his clients and that if I was going to be in there, on my property mind you, that I would need to be more quiet and respectful of him and his clients because they are paying $200 a day to hunt and it's not right to have some guy on a small parcel mess up thier hunt. This from the mouth of the guy who's set hunters on ALL of the trails leading to my property and has killed SIX deer in one day, including a spike buck, as they attempted to make it to me. Yeah, I'm being real freaking disrespectful alright. I slowly sense that this bad night is getting worse. It was only the beginning. He proceeds to scold me about how I'm being irresponsible hunting where I am because he has hunters just over the property line and in the line of my fire. Now remember, my in-laws have owned and hunted this land for twenty years. This guy has owned his land for 30 DAYS and is now acting as if it is he who will make the rules and enforce them. All the while he has a client with him who seems a little shocked at the exchange that is going on.
Well, one thing leads to another and he meets me in the woods just over the property line to help look for the deer. We search but find no sign. He says that he thinks that I missed the deer or just grazed it. I insist that I hit it solid. I show him where the deer crossed the line at, through a hole in the fence. Well, he goes crazy about the hole. "Who cut this hole in the fence"? "I'm plugigng it up"! I informed him that the fence was errected by my in-laws over ten years ago and if they felt that they wanted to cut holes in it, then so be it. He then says, "well, your fnece is over the line anyway". I said, fine, we'll REMOVE it. As you can see, this is just getting worse. Anyway, he comes on our side of the line because he wants to see where the deer was shot at (read: wants to checkout what we're doing). I agree, we've got nothing to hide. He comments that he knew we had a feeder because he was burning on his land one day and he heard it go off (read: I've already snooped on your land and knew where the deer were going to). He then scolds me for having a food plot saying that, "this is why you're pulling deer off of my property, they're coming in here for this rye". Well DUH! He then says that he has no more time to spend on my deer that he has to locate one for his client. He says that he has my number and will call if they find it. Yeah, whatever. He then states that he wants to be a good neighbor but can't be if what we're doing is hurting him. We'll see. We have discussed it, as a family, and have decided that we will NOT change what we're doing because someone else has come in and doesn't want us there. We also found out that we have a 15' easment on his property. My father-in-law is thinking of changing our entrance to now go through his property and his gate to access ours. Anyway, our little honey hole has suddenly turned into a hell hole. But we won't be run off, I can assure you of that.
He did, however, thank me for calling to gain access and not just taking it upon myself to tresspass. And his client seemed to be a very well mannered man who didn't get involved in any of the proceedings and made an honest attempt to help locate the deer. I wanted to thank him as it certainly wasn't his responsibility to do so. If I knew who he was, I'd thank him personally.
As for the deer and no sign. Best thing we can figure is that the balistic tip bullet fragmented upon striking a rib and didn't get penetration. The deer was probably bleeding badly internally, but nothing externally. I can tell you that when the deer left the plot, it was hurt bad and barely had the strength to move. I'm sure that it went no more than a 100 yards inside of his property, layed down, and expired. But I'll never know and can only wonder from here on out. I'll never use those on deer again. Needless to say, it was a BAD DAY IN THE WOODS! =(