If you catch someone on your land? can you get their info and tell them this is their one warning, disarm them? What is acceptable? I know confronting them with a weapon may be excessive so how far can a person go if they find someone on their land and be legal?

Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again....

Call the Sherriff and the Game Warden with a description with as many details as possible as soon as you see them. These days, you have no idea what you're coming up on, so I'd be extremely cautious.

This. Lots of big talk regarding trespassers but at the end of the day it’s like anything else - best left for the authorities to handle. I have confronted, warned, even taken photos of trespassers/vehicles - but was cautious, armed, and on alert as I did so. I would never attempt to disarm, hold at gunpoint, or chase anyone.

I would just call the GW or the county sheriff.

Being 70, 5.6" a bleeder and an easy bruiser I'd call the Game Warden / Sheriff

TMI!!!!!!!!!

Let the law handle it.

Have your proof and report it. If they have weapons it’s will raise the bar

As has been said many times already, let the law handle it
Much safer that way

We drive up on and check all unknown vehicles that even approach our ranch. The county road dead ends into our place, so no one should be driving the last several miles unless they have business with us. Catch a lot of road hunters this way. We typically get pics of vehicle and plates and tell them to go about their business. If we see evidence of road hunting such as rifles in the front seat or pointed out the windows the Game Warden is called immediately. If they have actually come onto our property by cutting a gate lock or jumping a fence, they get held at our place until the Sheriff arrives. We'll also place a call to our Texas Special Ranger (Supplied by the Texas and Southwest Cattle Raisers Assoc) if we know he's in the area. This is not BS, and it takes balls to do, but we have done it numerous times. We've lost very expensive cattle and even a buffalo one time to poachers/trespassers, and take it serious as a heart attack.

Yes, it is perfectly legal to confront a trespasser at gunpoint, and disarm them if they are armed. Would the safer,more prudent thing be to watch them, photograph them, write down their licence plate, and call the authorities? Maybe so.

Where is your land and how well is it marked?

If there is nothing but private land surrounding your land then the people have no business there and it's not possible they made a mistake being there. Call the sheriff and GW.

If your land is up against public land AND fenced in, call the sheriff and GW - a fence is a clear sign (even absent actual signage) that the proper is private property.

If your land is up against public land and it isn't fenced, I would just take a walk out there and let them know they crossed onto private property and they can't hunt there - point them back to public land and explain to them your property boundaries. Not everyone uses GPS when they hunt public and even those that do - sometimes GPS can get funky in the woods and make people believe they're 20 yards away from where they are. If it happens again, then it wasn't a mistake, call the sheriff of GW.


Essentially, don't be a dick unless you have to. Treat others the way you would want to be treated in that situation. If it's possible the people made a legitimate mistake and wandered onto your unfenced property - just be nice about it and let them know. 99% of hunters are good people and wouldn't intentionally trespass onto private property while hunting. Don't treat the 99% poorly because of the 1%.

Under NO circumstances should you ever approach them in an aggressive manner, attempt to disarm or prevent them from leaving. Private property or not, if you provoke a confrontation and get yourself killed - a good attorney will argue their client mistakenly wandered off public land and had no intention of harming anyone, that you provoked a confrontation and they feared for their life and defended themselves (and it's their word against a dead man). End of the day, you're dead and they're sleeping in their comfy bed. There's nothing worth that risk and anyone who says otherwise or advises otherwise is not someone you should be listening to.

Fortunately I've never had to deal with them while hunting on my own land. I have had people drive up my driveway and pretend that they are looking for a friend. I make it obvious that I'm getting their license plate number while telling them that nobody else has ever lived on my land.

A buddy of mine has some land that bordered a City Park. The Park people hated that we hunted his land, but since we where always legal when the Game Wardens checked us, there wasn't anything that they could do about it. On a Saturday, two hikers decided to jump the fence and explore my buddies land. He caught them and told them to get off of his land. It was the two of them against my buddy. They got in his face and asked him what he would do if they didn't leave. He told them that he would shoot them and he showed them his rifle. They left. A couple hours later my buddy was arrested and charged with Terrorist Threats. He sat in the jail cell until Monday morning when he saw the Judge. The Judge dismissed the charges and let him go.

Better to let the law handle it if possible.

I don't think you can shoot them. But if you do I don't think there is a set limit on them.

winner

I think a lot of trespassers are not really trespassers at all from what I have seen. Last time I was at the lease we had a white chevy crew cab come into camp and do a circle and leave. My first thought was it was probably a new oil well guy that got lost. Then they came back and tried to get out the locked gate in camp which they didn't have the combo to. At that point I noticed there was 4 people in the truck (not normal for a oil well checker guy) and they obviously didn't know the lay of the land so I jumped on the ATV to chase them down and find out some more information about who they were. Turned out they were the landowners to our east and they were fixing some fences that were damaged by the rain. They were friendly and everything they said seemed to add up so we parted ways. That aint the first time something like that has happened and everything proved to be legit.

So my point is be sure you know who you are dealing with before you go sticking a gun in someones face.

This will be on a friends land in Kimble county so just wanting to give him heads up on how he should handle it...calling law with as much info possible sounds most prudent! Need to look up county LEO numbers for him to keep handy. He is city type guy and amazed by fact he owns land! He is avid hunter and can handle game when down but locals that "have always hunted there", or lost weekend warriors would be different. My family land is in Oklahoma and everybody knows not to cross fence! Mental case brother has that effect! I am just going as tourist on this place just giving info where it might be prudent, he is good buisness man and pretty decent outdoorsman but never seen anyone as awestruck when he walks out on his land and admires the pasture maggots (goats) and one donkey left by previous owners. Want him to be able to inform his wife and daughter of who/what/when scenarios when out away from town. Thanks guys!

Start screaming it's a bigfoot and start blasting away into the brush.
If it's a trespasser he will probably clear an 8' fence in one jump.

No season, no bag limit. God bless Joe Horn.

about 5 years ago i was at another lease in Vancourt..east of san angelo was up in the tower blind about to lower the boom on a nice 10 point about to jump our boundary fence,,just waiting for him to jump and go tend to some does on my side..had the crosshairs on him waiting for him to cross..when all of a sudden i hear a truck and barking dogs,,really pi@@ed me off..the buck whirled and took off the other direction..i crawled down and started walking toward the truck..long story short..the land owner had leased the bird rights out(unbeknowst to us deer hunters) and the dumb guy with the dogs had misread his lease agreement and went hunting a week early..i called the lease boss on the spot and handed the phone to the dumb asses..they apologized and were on there way..As it was my last weekend of hunting that season..i never saw the buck that year.. ended up taking a mature 8..not as good as the budk i had in my crosshairs.....i left that lease!!!

Every instance is different. If you need to ask someone how to handle it, you should prolly just call the game warden. He will give you advice that won't get you in hot water.

On my owned land, I find that a warning shot is about as effective as anything, cheaper, less risky, and less time consuming, than most any option.

If I am on leased land, I get pertinent info (plate, vehicle description, etc) from a distance, if possible, and let the LO or Warden handle it, in that order.

I have that problem now. Actually had it for the last 3 or 4 years. Sooner or later, I'll catch the guy. Not sure how I will handle it. But I wish he would just go away. I put out some no flash game cans but somehow they disappeared.

I've talked to the GW but, I would have to catch the guy, call the GW and hope he would be nice enough to hang around until the law showed up.