Dealing with people on lease

We have a great lease but seems there is always 1 guy on every lease I have ever been on that seems a little more "difficult" than everyone one else to deal with. Here is the situation.

Last year this guy "Joe" shot a 3.5 yr old 8 point that had 9" brow tines. Several people had pics of him, I even drew on him just to see if I could, but everyone agreed he was off limits. Joe shot him anyway.
Then this year Joe decides to move locations and take a spot that was vacant from a guy who left our lease. But he doesnt just go to that spot or even spread out to make it better for all, he moves 450 yards closer to my stand. With the number of acres and number of hunters it wasnt necessary.

I told the guy who runs the lease about it and Joe was told to move to the the spot that was vacant but of course he is pissed. Me and Joe already had it out lsat year about the buck he shot.
I know some people will say shoot whatever makes you happy but this isnt the kind of lease we have and it has always been clearly communicated what we want to shoot.

How do you deal with guys like this on your lease?

Easiest thing, lease rules should all be in writing and all agreed to via signature on the document, with stiff penalties up to and including 'see ya later but not around here'. You have a lease manager, if rules are broken just hand it over to him to handle, like you did with the new stand location.

Put expectations in the lease agreement and make sure you have someone in charge that is willing to enforce them.

That buck you described would get you a minimum $1,000 fine or booted from our lease. And it's written as such into the agreement.

All of above - well written, SIGNED set of rules by each member - knowingly breaking the rule? You are gone. Honest mistake? That happens.

PS: I predict this to be a very long thread

Who ever is in charge of the lease should set the ground rules. Everyone needs to agree and sign off on them.

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This. We had a similar situation. He got the boot.

Hit him in the Head with a Steak...

It worked

He's never popped off again

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Or ram his deer blind with a Jeep

I know what I would do. Sometimes a person has to do things that some may think are over the line. Me, I am old school. I don't tell or ask others what they think should be done. I just do it and keep my mouth shut.I have had trouble with hunters on my land and and on neighbors bordering me. When I did what needed to be done I no longer had any problem. Asking others what needs to be done with a problem usually results in the problem still there. Everyone you ask has a different opinion on what to do. You know what needs to be done. Do it.

I have learned that if someone starts out on a lease as a problem then it will not get better - it will only go downhill as you move forward - cut your losses

Just curious if "Joe" shot the big brow 8 point knowing it was him or if he thinks it was a different deer? He should be booted off if he shot the deer while knowing all along it was a "non-shooter".

Good leases are hard to come by and everyone including the lease manager should be held accountable. We just got on a new place that has some rules that I'm not certain ALL our owners are going to follow.

We have shared enough game pics with one another for everyone to know what can be shot and a baseline for new deer coming through the property.

I would quit deer hunting if I had all of the rules some of you do on your deer lease.

Mature deer (5.5 yrs) and NO axis. It's not hard for me, but I have yet to decide on a few others.

I shot the same buck last season, except his brows were more like 5". He was doggin' a doe and I had a little premature 'eraculation'. Sometimes it happens. If I was on a lease it would have probably gone bad. Beautiful buck. My brother wasn't real happy. Oh well, it's a new season. Don't sweat the small stuff.

We booted our problem child off the lease 2 years ago. The current members absorbed the extra cost of the vacant spot, and the place is the best it's ever been.

Whoop Joes [censored]

We did the same thing, it is a great lease now. I even kept my spot after I got my own place to hunt. It is great to have hard working people with the same goals and good attitudes on a lease.
If you don't want to absorb the cost, finding another leaser is not a problem.

Me, I am old school. I don't tell or ask others what they think should be done. I just do it and keep my mouth shut.I have had trouble with hunters on my land and and on neighbors bordering me. When I did what needed to be done I no longer had any problem. Asking others what needs to be done with a problem usually results in the problem still there. Everyone you ask has a different opinion on what to do. You know what needs to be done. Do it. [/quote]

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I'm guessing you don't have written rules?? I'm also guessing that when "everyone agreed" not to shoot that Buck , that "Joe" was not part of everyone??

Im lucky to have hunted two different family tracks of land for the last 25 yrs. One was sold about 10 yrs back. I was bringing friends and then insisted on us paying just to make my guys have a stake in the deal, but we are hunting dirt cheep. We have simple rules , that are not written either.

1 Don't piss off the Owners!
2 Do your share of the work
3 Kids can kill any legal deer
4 Adults must Shoulder Mount any Buck they shoot, or be verbally shamed by others
5 Don't piss of the Owners!

To be honest in all the years , we have never put a "Don't shoot" mark on a buck. Back when we hunted my step dads place in Hardeman , I took pics of a nice 8 that I was not going to shoot , but my buddy got all excited to shoot it because it would have been his best ever. I wasn't going to stop him. He never got it , but was happy to have the chance. I don't post much but read often here. I know Im lucky not to have to hunt with strangers and have a contract that looks more like the deep sea scroll.

Its great to hunt with the same life long friends for so long and just let commonsense rule

Like your style buddy and couldn't agree more!

Have a list of rules and management guidelines that each hunter acknowledges and agrees to follow by signing a copy. Also, the lease manager and several of the other more senior members should compile a list w/ game cam photos of bucks that shows shooters and non-shooters for each season. Email the list and photos out before the season starts, and require that each hunter respond via email that they have studied the photos and will follow the harvest guidelines for that season.

Not only will this provide hard, visual evidence of which bucks are off limits for each season, but it eliminate the problem of different hunters having different opinions of how to follow your original management/harvest guidelines. I've found that a lot of guys can read the same statements about deer management and have significantly different interpretations of what kind of deer represents what is being describing in your formal management plan. Hunter A may know not to shoot a nice 3.5 year old buck because he hasn't reached his full potential, but Hunter B may see the same buck and age him at 4.5+ years old and shoot him. Hunter B thinks he was following the rules and didn't do anything wrong, but Hunter A is pissed because a promising younger buck was killed. I have found that most people want to follow the rules, its just a very few "bad apples" that purposefully disobey clearly stated rules. Providing pictures of specific deer to visually show what you are talking about in your management plan should help to eliminate the difference in opinions about aging/harvesting deer.

This was that one spot on the lease that seems like it always comes open. A guy for a year, a guy for two years, when the rest of us have been on there 15yrs or longer. Eating that last spot keeps us from having to look for a new guy, wonder if he'll fit in, follow the rules, or in this case turn out to be an entitled, self-aggrandizing, bi-polar, cheater, liar, and thief.

Wow, that feels good to get off the chest. I gotta come here more often.

Somehow I don't get excited about hunting a property that I have to get a pre approved email list of the deer that are/aren't ok to shoot.

Joe knew exactly what buck he was shooting and didnt care. We dont list every buck that is a shooter or non shooter but every once in a while there is a buck that everyone knows is young that has great potential that everyone agrees should be on the no hit list. We have all agreed nothing is to be shot under 4.5 yrs old

Possibilities are endless whenever 2 or more folks are involved in the same thing, it happens, just have to weed them out.

We only did that for cull bucks that could be taken. Everybody knew the rules for our place for mature bucks. Yes, there were a few times a younger buck was taken. I'll say I have been guilty of that. I guess the difference on our old place was that all of us were personal friends and didn't give a hard time about it, especially when it was one of the kids. We had pics of cull bucks that were fair game and guest were allowed to take those deer. Even then there were some mistakes, but our rule was, if it is your guest, it comes off on your tag, cull or not. Of course it was actually the guests tag, but that lease member knew and respected that he couldn't take another buck. Seems leases these days are filled a lot of times with folks who don't personally know each other.

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LOL- We are on 7,000 acres. Good luck with that.

Yeah, I wouldn't want to do that and I have never been on a lease that did anything similar to what I described.

But, my point is a lot of folks have different opinions of what a mature deer is vs. an up-and-comer, or a cull vs. a deer that is still young. Just having the rules isn't always enough, everybody needs to have the same definitions and the same ability to judge deer in the field. If you don't put in the work ahead of time to get everybody up to speed, then you are going to have problems with hunters taking the wrong deer. Maybe you could put together a picture book like the one I described of previous bucks from the ranch, showing what shooters look like, deer that need one more year, culls, etc. so that they have a visual example of deer from your particular ranch for each hunter to learn how to implement the management plans of your property.

There a lot of ranches that size and larger who have rules in place like this.

Send "Joe" down the road. There are plenty of good management minded folks that will stick with the program looking for a lease like you have. If you ever have two openings let me know.

Joe should go on down the road talking to himself.. And I'd just absorb the cost. I've put up with way too much BS on leases it's manufactured drama at best. But some have a sense of entitlement and believe the rules do not apply to them. I lease the whole place I'm on now so I don't have to deal with BS. The LO is the best a man could ask for!!

Judging by the posted photos on the forum, many people here have difficulty judging the age of deer.

I would never get on a lease that had "spots" or guys like "Joe". I would pay two or three times the lease rate to avoid "spots" and guys like "Joe".

If it were me, I'd run Joe off the lease and spread his annual fee out among the other guys. A little more per man, but then you don't have to deal with Joe.

All of our members enjoy hunting and get the most out of the family experience when a kid takes his/her's first/best deer. I don't think we will have too many issues, but the one thing we all agree on is not pissing off the land owner. We will show the LO print outs of our ideas of mature deer and if he agrees we'll be in business.

1.) Feel thankful you have a place to hunt and enjoy it.

2.) Follow the Owner's rules and possibly have a place for many years to come.

They must have a Jim Dandy assortment of cameras to be able to monitor every buck and determine what is on / off limits.

We supply examples of what should / should not be taken but the idea of "a list" is preposterous. What if the buck I'm looking at is not on said list? He'll be gone before I can scroll through all the pics. I think we may be saying the same thing, only different.

IMO the list helps the members become better hunters. It makes you slow down, observe the animals behavior, and betters the whole experience instead of getting so pumped up and shooting quickly at the first big deer that comes out.

You shouldn't have to look through pictures to recognize a particular buck. Time in the stands and enough game camera evaluation should point out certain antler characteristics when a deer presents itself.

we have done it for 8 years and I think our results speak for themselves. Everyone has the freedom to make their own call on a trophy buck if they think it is 6 years or older. But we help that process by many many camera pictures - we post them in our camphouse and we have a Do Not Kill board plus a Kill board. If someone is unsure we encourage (but do not require) them to video the deer and get other opinions on its age. It is structured but our guys like it - last year our trophies taken were all between six years old and 8-9 years old. It can be done

I don't know where you hunt but where we are in the panhandle,if you see a big buck and want him you had better take him then. Odds are you'll never see him again.

Cut the cancer out of the group, the negativity is contagious. There are plenty of people that are looking to get on a good lease and no reason to keep someone like "Joe." We have a large lease with a lot of members. We have our normal drama of having a big group, but we keep problems to a minimum. Rules are only changed after the season and before money is due for the next season. If there is an issue with 2 people or a group, we sit down like grown men and discuss it. If you don't like it, you don't have to pay your money.

Sounds like the lease boss needs to get on it and take care of the issue.

One ranch has 48 cameras running on 11,000 acres. So yes they can monitor every buck they have on camera. Sitting in blinds and taking videos/pictures and then flying helicopter survey also taking pics helps also. One person makes the calls on bucks killed or let live till they mature. They keep pictures from year to year and that give them a history trail on buck. If they loose one for a year or two they can go back into old pics to find them. Sometimes they can't.

Seeing the same bucks year after year is what I'm looking forward to. Watching bucks grow into a mature animal isn't something I've been able to do on the old ranch.

I understand - and as stated here many times before it is all relative. Different ranches, different leases, different people with different objectives. The beauty is a hunter can seek out what type of hunting they are looking for and join a lease that is run in the manner that fits them. Problems arise when someone knowingly gets on a lease that they don't buy into the way it is run but get on it anyway and then disregard the set up

We have 24 cameras running on 1,800 acres. Also take photos during the helicopter survey. All photos of bucks are printed off and put into a binder before the season begins. On each page we write the age and "HOLD" or "KILL". But this isn't a lease. Just trying to manage for the best deer we can.

Lot of times we have to get to the end result, the mature deer you kill then rummage through the last several years of tc pics and all of a sudden he sticks out like a sore thumb, but you had no idea what deer it was from last year just looking at him. Some deer with unique characteristics stick out, others you have to look a bit.

Throw a rope with a hang mans noose over a tree limb near the hunting camp, and when the new member asked what that's for, you tell him it's for the guy that shoots the young buck that had potential, or the guy that breaks the lease rules.

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