Ethical herd management

I have an issue that I would appreciate some feedback on. I am fortunate enough to have a couple of hundred acres of prime hunting property, just north of Paducah, Tx. My late father and I built a cabin on the place and it is every bit my heaven on earth. Over the years, I have been very careful and conscientious about herd management and to not take too many deer off of the place, to help promote good numbers and great bucks. It is not unusual for me to go 2 or 3 seasons without pulling the trigger.

My issue is this: across our south fence, it looks like the landowner has leased out to a new group of hunters. I see different trucks than last year, coming in and out. The problem is that now, every weekend that I am there, it sounds like the battle for Iwo jima goin on over there. I get in to my set up early and hear these guys getting dropped off at their stands. About.the time you can barely see the mil dots in your reticle, the booming begins...and not 2 or 3 shots on the morning. I'm talking about the same stand, popping off 3-4 shots, in rapid sucession on the same animal. Then an hour later the next stand starts shooting up the place. I have always been of the opinion that if you shoot and miss, your hunt is over. You should pack it in and take your rifle back to camp to see if the rifle shoots straight or if you had a case of "the fever". I understand that these guys probably paid a kings ransom to hunt the place but the amount of shooting going on over there is wildly larger than the population of deer to support it and at unethical shooting light hours. I'm not sure what, if anything, to do.

Thoughts?

High fence. It's the only thing that you can legally do. I'm personally not a fan of doing that, but it is an effective tool to limit deer movement from you place to theirs.

Talk to them or call the GW to check on them. I would just ask them what they are shooting so much of. Some of our kids take 4 shots at a turkey...

Are there lots of hogs in the area? Do you know whether the adjoining LO has leased his property? Have your deer sightings suddenly diminished?

I'll admit hearing 'hunters' being dropped off is concerning, but more info needed. If it's only one side of 200 acres, then I agree that a high fence, + a couple corners, may solve the issue w/o much pain.

p.s. - get to know your neighbor.

How do you know the 3-4 shots are on a single animal and not a group of hogs? Sounds like a lot of speculation.

X2

Pay them a visit and be neighborly.....Don't go in with an attitude.....Jes my

Great advice. Kill 'em with kindness. At least initially.

I tried that a few times over the years and was told by different groups to mind my own business. Go to hell we can do what the hell we want. We don't tell you what you should or shooldn't do. And so on. The HF was the solution in the end.

I understand, Don, but you have to start somewhere. Starting off being an arsehole is guaranteed to fail.

If you have any kind of relationship with the owner of the land I would go have a chat with him. Like others said be nice and don't act like you can tell them what to do because you cant.

We were on a lease for over 20 years with some great land owners, never had a cross word with them, but it was there opinion that landowner rights were way greater than lease hunter rights, I feel like if we as lease hunters were doing something that would upset the adjacent landowner they would have put a stop to it.

You have a right to an opinion but your rights end there. Does anyone really think talking and negotiation will result in any changed views/opinions? How many of us agree on which/how many/ when/what gun etc??

Exactly.

Just put up the high fence, or learn to ignore what your neighbor does (which from your post will include seeing less and less game animals for the rest of your life). Or buy another “little piece of heaven” and hope your new neighbors agree with your management philosophy (odds are very slim).

I'm a firm believer in landowner rights. No one has the right to even suggest I change what I do on my land as long as it's legal.

I still say have a conversation with your neighbor. He may not know or care about what the lease hunters are doing, but he may care enough about good neighbors and knows the place will lease next year no matter what he does to tell them to slack off.

I did not start being an AH. It came about after many years of trying to be a nice guy and then being told to go pound sand. I am still a nice guy except to those that treat me like crap. I now get along great with all my neighbors. They shoot what ever they want and I could care less. You can look at what I raise and what they don't raise and see who is doing the better job. You have probably heard this before but here it is again. I had this one neighbor. He did not lease.He had 3 sons. He told me that they never shot any Does. What they did is shoot every Buck they saw. That way his Does would draw in Bucks from all around for them to shoot. Nice guy heh? From what I have seen around here is when folks lease for hunting those that leased the property for hunting are going to try to get their moneys worth. The person who owns the land doesn't care as long as they get the lease money. It may be different in other parts of the state but that is the way it is here. Most places around here are not large enough to do any type of game management unless you could get everyone within a 2 mile radius to adhere to the plans. And good luck with that.So you are left with a couple of choices. You either HF. You stick to your game management plan which is not working because you are the only one doing it. Or you shoot every Buck you see before the neighbor does. And as I always say. This is only my opinion.

Meet with the neighboring LO and offer to lease his property in the coming years, in other words lease it out from under current & future lease hunters.
Buy the neighbor out.
High fence.
Ignore what happens on neighboring properties.
If you have enough acreage for the area improve yours so that it supports more resident deer or is the most attractive in the immediate area as to hold more.

No matter what everybody has to 'deal' with neighbors, some folks just get lucky with theirs.

tough situation, especially being the LO. If it was a lease, you could always just go somewhere else ... as stated, you have limited options.

yeah I see a couple options here:

1. HF. Easiest although probably not the cheapest. Would work to keep the deer on your side, unless the problem is you want the deer on the other side. That possibility hasn't been brought up but is a real possible, so maybe not so keen on this idea.
2. lease out from under the current LO. There is a price he would be happy with, talk to them and figure it out. More epxnsive int he long run than number 1 above, but might solve your problem.
3. talk to the hunters and see what they are shooting. I would approach it as a "I heard a ton of shooting over here, what all did you guys get?" as a curiosity more than a probe, and then see what they say. If it is all legal deer then see above. If it is hogs or squirrels or something, well you may have your worries allayed.
4. continue to worry like an adolescent and let your piece of heaven be ruined by the neighbors....not my cup of tea, but to each their own.

i agree with lots of the suggestions above... talking with landowner and/or leasers in a civil manner to start with (could be pigs they are mostly shooting at), possibly putting up high fence on that side of your property if it comes down to it and wouldn't cause a problem with your relationship with that landowner, or just move your sets further off that section of your properly and feed well with low pressure to keep the deer attracted/comfortable on your property. but like said above, try not to let in ruin your 'slice of heaven' if possible. that's my two cents. best of luck on your decisions.

I had forgotten another neighbor we had who has since passed away. He "Day Leased" his property which was a little over 100 acres. Not sure of the amount of blinds and feeders he had but it must have been plenty. At that time if memory serves me he charged around $50 per day. And you know that someone who has paid money and there were no rules as to what they could shoot is worried about management. Needless to say after a few weeks the deer numbers were lowered there and for the rest of us.

Inquisitively ask what they are seeing/shooting at. The most concerning thing would be the non-legal hours shooting, prior to 30 minutes before sunup. You could casually say, "I heard some early, early morning shots, "what was moving at that time" and see what they come back with." If they are outright rude or evasive, I would likely put a call into the GW about non-legal shooting going on. Otherwise, ignore it or as others have said, "Fence it up high" or "sell it" and purchase elsewhere.

So you haven't actually seen these people hunting, just hearing shots, and have determined how and what they are shooting and that it is unethical because it isn't how you do things. Sounds like a case of "If you don't hunt the way I hunt, you're doing it wrong" syndrome.

You can put up that high fence folks are talking about, but that isn't going to make you happy. There will still be people next door shooting in a manner that you just don't like and you will still be able to hear it and it will still make you unhappy because they aren't doing it the way you think they should be doing it. My suggestion to you is that if you want to control what happens on a given piece of land that you buy that piece of land.

I agree with Don K. My family owns 300 and some odd acres in San Saba. Despite years and years of attempted management, nothing was working. A new neighbor bought 90 acres next door and began day leasing. We went from only seeing a few does and young bucks to no bucks and a few does. I tried to convince my grandfather that we should just high fence our south side to cut it off, but he wanted nothing to do with that. Eventually, I gave up trying to hunt it. My cousin still hunts it and still hasn't killed a mature buck. I quit hunting the place in 2003. It was just a waste of time and resources. it's sad that you can't even enjoy your own property, but such is life. I've lease ever since and haven't regretted moving on.

That sounds really frustrating. I would have either leased or bought the 90 acres, or leased out the 300 and used the proceeds for a good lease elsewhere.

I own 40 acres in the middle of 3 large ranches.... I usually shoot 1-2 deer a year... and will shoot a spike if im hungry enough.... I may bump it up to three now seeing this

Very much so. Your ideas are solid, however, the family property is locked up in a trust and you can't everyone to agree to the same solution. So I did what I needed to do to achieve my own goals.

I also have a small 17 acre place where I don't know about management but the neighbors ether don't hunt or have too many Deer.
This was from this afternoon at 5