Who's been stopped while night hunting?

Never been stopped here, but just though i'd rant a bit since this thread is about the cops. I had just walked out to my truck from deer hunting this week, and was thinking about calling the woods for coyotes just down the road from where I deer hunt. When I saw somebody spotlighting bout a half mile away, so I sat and watched the car which came my direction at the corner. I was gonna spotlight the car if it spotlighted the woods I was getting ready to walk up too. Well the car went by and it was a county officer, needless to say I didn't shine it! But it proceeded to shine the woods almost right in front of me where I was planning on hunting!! Dang county sheriff's car was out spotlighting for deer, and we all know they had a gun in the car!! All I could think, was sombitch. If I was to do that my arse would be grass!!!

Thanks for listening

Alan
 
Quote:
Dang county sheriff's car was out spotlighting for deer, and we all know they had a gun in the car!!



Cool how you could tell his intentions and purpose as he drove by. Where do you get a buy on one of those crystal balls for accurate assesments and predictions such as this? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif
 
GC, In most states that do not allow night hunting, Casting a light from a vehicle (especially while having a firearm/means of taking game and we all know police have guns ALWAYS) will get you a citation weather you were actually looking for deer or not. Lights+guns=citation in most states that don't allow night hunting from vehicles.
Just my guess a to what he was trying to convey.
 
Quote:
Quote:
Dang county sheriff's car was out spotlighting for deer, and we all know they had a gun in the car!!



Cool how you could tell his intentions and purpose as he drove by. Where do you get a buy on one of those crystal balls for accurate assesments and predictions such as this? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif



He shure wasn't looking for donuts!!!! (sorry to all law enforcement officials)

Well for one, if he would have been looking for something/somebody he would have been driving a lot slower, and he would have been spotlighting the fields not just the edge of the woods. He also would have stopped and talked to me. 2nd, he did not shine my truck or the woods I was parked in front off.

Crapshoot pretty much has it dead on. In IN you can legally use a spotlight to hunt as long as you aren't in a moving vehicle or any vehicle and you are in the act of hunting. And you can legally spotlight deer or any animal as long as you don't have any means of taking game in the vehicle(guns, bow, pellet gun, etc...)

Alan
 
Never been stoped calling at night. 1/2 the time we are using filtered lights, the other NV so, they cant find us then anyway. I have only been stoped and checked one time, dove hunting, outside of Waco. I had known the game warden all my life, hunted with him at a lease for over 10 years. He didn't even check my bag or gun (luckily /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif) but he did everybody else and wrote a friend of mine a ticket for no Hunters Education. He had taken the course, just did not show up on his liscense for some reason. Know, that is the first thing I look for everytime I get my liscence /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif.
 
Im good for it at least 2-3 times a season. Mostly because I just pull off the side of the road and head a field only to come back with a cop or ECO behind my truck running the plates thinking its broke down. I was stopped the second of october this year on a back seasonal road by 2 encon officers. I just got done calling and I hear another truck by mine so I figured its either the locals getting restless at 1AM or an ECO, sure enough I start walking out and I got lit up like a football field. They checked my license and shot the bull for a bit and that was that. Never had any real problems to speak of. Thats why Iv got a decal on my back window of the truck now that says "PREDATOR HUNTER" with a pic of a guy holding a dead yote!!! I think that gets the message accrosed to the cops that think its a broken down truck now. Well see Im sure I will get one or two this year. Ive even thought of getting custome plates (YOTECLR) on it so when they run them they just might put the two and two together.
-Yeti
 
I also hunt IN an I get stopped 2 to 3 times a season because of other people think I'm out spot lighting deer or up to no good....The last time I ended up spot lighting a spot lighter it ended up he thought he would be a smart a** until he seen me carrying a gun then he sped off...Normaly it works out for the best cause the cops help me find other places to hunt yotes since they get alot of complaints about them.....
 
Crapshoot,
Naw, he's convinced the officers are poaching or somehow breaking the law themselves. He knows this because of all the information he's privy to. The difference between him and the cops are, that the cops have to have evidence to convict someone. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif
 
If it was a deputy I wouldn't want to have to explain what I was doing to the sheriff (grounds for termination of employment).

What he saw was just enough to have you trying to talk the game warden out of arrestting you around here. Of course the gw would have to see you do it.
 
i have never been stopped.i hunt so much at night around my place the game warden got tired of me calling and told me i didnt have to call him anymore.i have called him quite a few times when i have been out at night and caught people that where infact poaching.i have about 6000 acers that i am the only person that is aloud to hunt on.so if i see spot lights from the road someone is up to no good.last time i called him it was tp&w doing there road spotlight counts on deer.they got a good laugh out of that.the guy thats over my mld plan called me the next day and poked fun to the fact i thought i had caught someone trying to kill one of my bucks i have been hand feeding for the last 5 years.wish one of them hand feed bucks would get close enough to stick a arrow in.i am going to tell you guys something i tip my hat to anyone that gets a big buck in east tx.i have hunted all over tx and these bucks here in east tx are the tuffest by far.
 
Quote:
Crapshoot,
Naw, he's convinced the officers are poaching or somehow breaking the law themselves. He knows this because of all the information he's privy to. The difference between him and the cops are, that the cops have to have evidence to convict someone. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif



/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused1.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused1.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused1.gif

No, i'm not saying the officer is poaching at all in any shape or form. I never said anything like that. The point I was trying to make that you missed, is that in IN it is illegal to drive around and shine a spotlight with a gun in the car. Period

Granted he is an officer of the law and therefore has plenty of excuses to get around that accusation. I was never trying to get the office in trouble, and I know they drive around on 3rd shift and just shine around for something to do to kill time. What more evidence do I need that he was shining a light from his car and had a gun in the car???

What would be the difference: Of me driving around spotlighting with a hand gun in the car, and an officer driving around in a car spotlighting. Neither of us has any intention of shooting anything, we just have a gun for self-defence????

The difference: That same officer could arrest me, and take my gun or guns away. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif

Alan
 
Last edited:
Al's right on this one GC.

When I was a kid in CA, my dad got stopped after a doe hunt. We caught a big buck in the head lights, and Dad's friend spotlighted him as he walked off the road. Not 30 seconds later we were "talking" to a GW.

We had the (unloaded and not readily accessible) rifles back in the camper, but the game warden was ready to confiscate everything (truck too). I think the only thing that stopped him was my little brother starting to cry and beg, he definitely had the legal right.

Shining a light and having a firearm anywhere in the vehicle, loaded or not, is prima facia evidence in many states. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.

Leon
 
Al,
Missouri is the same, however, my point is that you really do not know what he was actually doing and seemed to draw a conclusion from no actual information or facts. Sure the Deputy was shining his spotlight and of course he's armed. So what? If he's doing something related to the job there is no wrong in this and he's acting within his authority. AND, with that said, he may well have been doing exactly what you think he was. The key is - how do I (or you) KNOW what he was doing or WHY he was doing it? Yet, the inference was that he was acting improperly and just doesn't seem like an open minded and intellegent conclusion to factually state. I've stopped plenty of people here for the same thing. Some were family folks just wanting to oggle the local deer herd. We had no problems, I would inform them of the law and let them know that while I was not going to write them a citation, another officer could do so if they were "caught" by someone else at another time. Occasionally I would catch guys that clearly had other intentions. These guys got thier money's worth. Selective enforcement? Yep, but I always operate under the premise that decent people deserve a break. And every craphead I catch goes to jail everytime.
 
LMAO at Grandpa Fudge.....Had almost the same thing happen to me once in California. We had been calling and it strated to rain hard. While we were in the cab of my truck a sheriff's deputy pulled up behind us and came up to the driver's side. I rolled down the window and he asked us if we'd been raping someone. I laughed and told him no but we were trying to call predators. He said some woman called in and said she could hear the screaming. We had a couple of cats in the back and he was interested in how to go about it. We had a nice conversation then he went about his business.

Another time a CHP drove up to where we were calling. He saw our lights off the hiway and thought we might be poaching elk. He was cool as we weren't breaking any laws.

My favorite time was one night when we were on public land bordering private a rancher drove up on us in the dark as we were calling. He got out mad as hell and asked us what we were doing. When I told him we were calling coyotes he opened his ranch to us and fed us breakfast the next morning. We killed 7 coyotes on his property that night.
 
This happened to my dad and one of his friends about ten years ago.

They were out night hunting yotes and stopped about 12am by two township officers and arrested for hunting endangered coyotes /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif They were held for about three hours while the officers searched the Ohio Revised Code, and could not find exactly what my dad and his friend had done wrong. They were released after the 3 hour span, but their rifles were taken as evidence. After much arguing over the phone for several days to get the rifles back dad called the county Wildlife Officer, and told him what had been going on. The officer was not amused and went with my dad to get the guns at the station. The officers at first refused to give back the guns, but the Wildlife Officer managed to 'convince' the department to hand them over.

It wasn't the last time these two officers would cause them problems so they ended up not hunting in that area until the department was disbanded.

Most officers are polite, but I've had a couple deputies in another county that have been downright rude in the past (they don't believe in night hunting, and feel they have to tell it to everyone they catch doing it). I ended up talking to the Wildlife Officer in that county, and that solved my problem with those deputies.

Most officers just ask what I'm doing and leave--they seem to think anyone making dying animal sounds hoping to call in a hungry coyote is crazy /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused1.gif
 
I don't remember ever even seeing a game warden or sheriff's deputy while calling at night. I always lock the gate behind me and go out a different one though. I have seen vehicles drive along the fence that probly were law enforcement looking. most of the time when i see a vehicle coming i just dont shine the light in that direction so it doesn't attract attention. I'm not doing anything wrong but I'd rather be hunting than having a chat with a fellow leo. i can do that at work. I do however call the dipatch office in the county I will be hunting in. I know them all and i just tell them that if they get a call of spotlighters in the area im in to call me on my cell before they waste their time sending someone out.
 
No, but I do place a sign on the window of my "hunting" van, which is normally parked where a ranger or WCO would also park that says I am hunting predators on that property with permission (I have several signs with the property owners name on them), NOT poaching...using a red light, etc.... and DO NOT come out into the field unless you can properly identify yourself with a strong flashlight, etc. My sign also says that if the person is an LEO or WCO to either honk their horn 3 times or try and flash their lights if they want me to come in and get checked......My stands are usually not too far from my vehicle in most cases where I can at least hear a horn

We can also call our local regional game office here and let them know we are predator hunting in the area that night. They don't mind and it keeps them informed that at least one legal night hunter is in the area in case they get any calls.....
 
Last edited:
Last year I had some run ins w/ the county mounty's. One time last year hunting a full moon in mn. I took my friends 13 yr old boy out and we got a nice red fox. He had to be home 11pm so I went out again, I forgot to take a pic, so when I got to the next spot I took out the fox and took a pic on the snow. Well a little blood got on the snow by my car, so when the sheriff came by later to check my car on the side of the road, he noticed blood and called it in, while I was hunting I saw a car drive by slow on another road. When I looked back at my car 500 yd I saw cherries. SO I get back and there are 3 squads and no one around? Here I look out and see flashlights looking in the treeline for the drunkin bloody guy. I told the story a they went back home. One night I had 2 diff sheriffs pull behind me and check, no problems. I hunt from about 8pm till 4am. THe later the worse it gets. All in all about 6 times run into cops last year. not counting the 3 in one night.
 
Back
Top