Good news came last night on new hunting spot

Chances are nothing will happen. Go have fun and don't worry about it, that's what people that don't want you there want you to do(worry about it so you won't go). If it's as big an area as it sounds, you can find a place by yourself. Even if you're disrupted the first few times, they will tire of it too and accept you. I actually wouldn't tell anybody what I was going to do, except maybe the game warden you know (just for kicks).
 
Mark,

The floods this year will dump that structure and you'll be in. Good luck. You may want to invite the CO to hunt with you the first few times. He may agree to go in undercover with you and then if they harass you he can cite them on the spot plus it would offer you a little backup incase you run into confrontation.

Good luck and let me know if you want me to travel in with you. I'm just across the river and would love to drag my huff box in there.

Ron
 
Other than taking the CO with you on a couple hunts, the whole thing sounds bad to me.

Do you really want an armed confrontation?

Are you really going to take two boats and leave one beached/anchored/unattended while you are seeking confrontation with these guys?

I darn sure wouldn't hand them my name or contact information on a silver platter - you already know the location is trouble.

But then again, we all get to paddle our own canoes in life. Hope nothing really bad comes of it.

NR
 
Other than taking the CO with you on a couple hunts, the whole thing sounds bad to me.

Do you really want an armed confrontation?

Are you really going to take two boats and leave one beached/anchored/unattended while you are seeking confrontation with these guys?

I darn sure wouldn't hand them my name or contact information on a silver platter - you already know the location is trouble.

But then again, we all get to paddle our own canoes in life. Hope nothing really bad comes of it.

NR
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People like this count on people like you (not you specifically, you in the general) to take public resources that we all pay for and make it their own. This is illegal and they know it. I can promise you it won't be an armed conflict nor will there be slit tires and bashed boats. I know who the owners are (by reputation) and the last thing they want is to be called out on what they are doing. Very public profile people who know they are wrong, are using intimidation to keep the status quo, and have previously backed down when called out on their handling of the property in question. I don't expect trouble but I do expect to be spoken to.

Had the exact same thing happen when trying to fish a lake this winter. A road went right to the edge of a lake and I went out and fished it. It was a heck of a lake for crappies. While out on the lake, I watched as someone approached me from one of the houses. As they got near they started yelling that I was on private property and to get off - he was going to call the cops. I left as asked to do. I went back and did my homework. The edge of the lake was well within the rule of the roadway right of way rules so the only question I needed to answer was if this person owned the land up to the center of the road. While this is very rare in MN, you will see private land owners who own the land under the road and the whole shoulder and right of way etc.... Checking through the property records, it was clear that the land was not owned by this individual. A quick call to the CO confirmed what I learned on my own. I went back on the lake and fished again. Same individual came out to yell again and the same threats were made. I told him what I knew and that I had the CO on speed dial and we could both talk to him at the same time. He knew his gig was up and left in a huff. How was I in the wrong here? Should I have never gone back to fish just because someone wanted the whole lake to themself that they didn't own? Should that person be allowed to intimidate others who may want to go fish the same lake? I think you are dead wrong in allowing this to happen. Sure, some might say go somewhere else but why? I'm not the one in the wrong

Maybe you have lots of areas to hunt where you're at Nick, it isn't that way here near the cities. Plus the Fed's just took away thousands of acres of huntable land from us in 2009 down at Big Lake near Wabasha. That was a great spot within 80 miles of the cities that held hundreds of hunters. It has now been given to the canoer's to paddle around in. Should have seen the hotels in that area this past season - empty. Was never that way in all the years I hunted down there. Every year we lose more of our huntable spots. Every year we have to find new spots that have ducks and are public areas. There are way too few of them around here.

This is just how the country got to be in the mess it is currently in - IMO. No one wants to take the time and effort to do the right thing. Far easier to just go along with those in power and slowly lose the individual rights we have. Cave in rather than confront those who are wrong.

Mark W
 
Kudos to Mark for doing this, and for doing it the right way.

Every hunting and fishing season, I thank heaven I live in a rural state with a ton of water and an excellent law for public access on lakes and ponds. Here, any body of water over 10 acres is a "great pond". The state owns the bottom of all great ponds, and any citizen may cross private land to access any great pond, including to hunt and fish so long as doing so is legal. You can't cross "improved" land, and you can't hunt or fish from the shoreline, only from a boat, or from wading on the bottom.

Now, if we could combine that with Montana's stream access law, I'd be a happy man . . . . .

As it is, access to streams and rivers is rarely contested here, but I fear that some day the landowners will realize that they actually own the stream bottom. That means (I think) that they can't prevent me from navigating it, but that I am trespassing as soon as my foot or anchor touches the bottom.

Fortunately, I have not had to deal with much of that kind of foolishness.
 
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