Not a hunter but a question just crossed my mind

FITASC, Florida solved that problem years ago. They did away with the old Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission and the old Florida Marine Patrol (salt water fish game wardens) and combined them into a new Florida Wildlife Commission. When they did that, they also gave them full state-wide police powers.

Those guys can get in and make drug busts when nobody else can.
 
I own quite a bit of land and lease a couple thousand acres, and I have never seen a warden on a 4 wheeler or tear up one stalk of anything.

And, the last two posters be careful , they will be explaining to you how a wildlife officer can do nothing any other officer can't do.
 
FITASC, there were several reasons we always took the game warden. None of those reasons involved him having any more powers to search than we had.
1. He knew the land better than we did.
2. He had keys to all the gates to the private roads. The reason he had them was because he asked for them and all the land owners gave them to him. (The funny thing is that 99% of land owners like the Rabbit Sheriff. It seems to be those who lease land, hunt public land, sneak on private land, etc. that do not like him.)
3. He had neat toys like Mules, Rangers, Boats, and other off road vehicles.

**Just as a side note "Rabbit Sheriff" is not a derogatory term in this area. The DNR officers actually have a lot of fun with the use of the term.
 
are there tags for all deer-animals?

are all tags finite?

slightly different from my kind of hunting, we get tags for one area and most of the hunting is communal in teams, my lease is part of a bigger area (my lease gives me the right to hunt the whole area)

in the area we have different teams(about 10 of them ranging from 4 guys to 25) that hunt together that get a certain amount of tags, this is mainly the moose hunting so my team had 4 adults and 4 calfes to hunt (this depends on year, sightings and last years results)

reddeer is like 10 tags for the whole area and when they are out they are out

only small game + roedeer and boar are tag and baglimitless
 
Husqvarna, it entirely depends on the state (or even the section of a particular state) you are in. For deer here in Mississippi, it is 3 bucks and 5 does per season but no tags to enforce that. In some areas of the country, it is only one tag and even that might take a draw (lottery) to get one. In other parts of the country (like Florida) it is one deer per day for the entire season with no total limit.

When you start moving up to larger animals then it is almost always by tag. Some places you can get tags over-the-counter and in others it is a complex draw system.

For hogs, only California is stupid enough to try and actually control hunting for them. In every other state I know of, hogs are unlimited kill. The state wants them gone because they are an invasive non-native species.
 
are there tags for all deer-animals?

are all tags finite?
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ahh, finally a topic we can all agree on or at the very least prove. it all depends on state-by-state basis. in my state, it depends on the animal and the hunt. for instance you can buy a regular tag which is good for whitetailed deer and mule deer, however the seasons do not last very long and the regions within the state you are allowed to use those tags are limited. the whitetail tag is generally available to more regions for a longer season, do the the fact that whitetail are more prolific than mule deer. all Elk, Moose, and Mule deer specific tags are part of controlled hunts, which are issued through a lottery type basis, you apply for the specific region and period(usually a short, no more than 2 week long season) you intend to hunt and based on the number of tags that are available, they will issue to individuals at random(like a lottery) and those people are restricted to a single area and very precise time slot that they can hunt.

I have found a late season cow only elk hunt that few people apply for so my odds of being drawn for that tag are pretty high so I generally apply for it, even though I never get a trophy out of the deal since I hunt for meat first and foremost. I'd rather get drawn and eat than not get drawn and have to wait for next year so I never put in for the moose, bull elk, and mule deer tags since odds of being drawn are much lower and I don't want to be sidelined over a want for a pair of antlers.


we get tags for one area and most of the hunting is communal in teams
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in my state, party hunting is illegal. you can hunt in groups, but you are not allowed to focus fire on a single animal nor are you allowed to shoot an animal for another individual.
reddeer is like 10 tags for the whole area and when they are out they are out

only small game + roedeer and boar are tag and baglimitless
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sadly we have a limit of one per person on all deer species, one caveat being that some regions allow for a controlled hunt(lottery) for an extra tag which is only good for anterlerless of a specific species. there are no boar in my state thankfully, but most states that have them treat them as vermin and have no tag or bag limits. the only animal I am aware of that has no limit and no tag requirement is the coyote. Wolves are getting there with the debacle of bringing down Canadian Gray Wolves which are destroying native wildlife, we are up to 10 tags per individual and seasons run from august to march in most areas.

it's a shame, I would love to add a sweden elk hunt to my bucket list.
 
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gotcha

and just to be clear we don't focus fire:D on the moose

we spread out (still plenty of space for the game to get away) and the dogs finds the game, either bays it so I or another doghandler can shoot them, or it gets the animals moving so it passes by a hunter in the blind so he/she can shoot it
 
one obvious reason would be disturbing crops. some wardens prefer wheelers to walking and if you're going where the people are, that means they might just go tearing up freshly planted fields or fields with delicate crops, ruining a portion of your harvest. other reasons are that some wardens, pic a spot they like and frequent it, just like hunters, and if people are constantly being accosted by the same warden having to take time out of their hunt to provide ID and permits, then odds are they'll decide to hunt somewhere else. last time I checked, most farmers don't enjoy deer, at least in my region. if nobody is hunting your land because of a rogue GW, then something should definitely be done.
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Obvious? Again, what we have is a assumption that all Wardens are slobs/jerks with no respect of the land they protect and the rights of the owners of that land. You give two disturbing scenarios, but odds are you don't have any credible evidence it's ever been done. First, as has been said here, Wardens don't have the right to enter private land without probable cause. So joy riding around on private land in a UTV tearing up crops is not really an issue. Add to the fact that in the case of probable cause, the sneaking/walking up to the suspicious person and getting to them before they know you are there, generally works better than roaring up to them on a UTV. Most wardens I know spend more time behind a spotting scope or binos sitting in their truck, than riding around on their 4-wheeler. They have to much area to cover to spend all their time in one place without a good reason. Then, consider that the majority of Wardens are very conscientious and value the perception they present to the public. Last thing they are going to do is to do criminal damage to property(tearing up crops with a UTV is just this) just to show their presence. As for the land-owner that has deer problems, the last thing he has to worry about is a warden driving off hunters. If there are deer there and someone wants them shot, there will be plenty of Law-abiding hunters that will show up regardless of a warden's presence. Those dirtballs that don't follow the law and poachers would be the ones that leave and what decent land-owner wants them there in the first place? Folks that have stills, meth labs, pot fields or any thing else to hide should know the risk of being caught, and any law-abiding land-owner is not going to stand for them on their property.

You keep trying to convince folks that the presence of a warden on private land is a bad thing and keep coming up with off the wall scenarios to try and prove your point. In actuality, other than those fantasy rogue wardens in your head, there is not any significant evidence to validate it.
 
For over fifty years, I've seen the occasional game warden in his observation of open country, looking for hunters. I've never seen one in a vehicle that wasn't on a ranch road or jeep trail.

They rely on cooperation from farmers and ranchers. Why would somebody think that they have no concern for any sort of property damage? Silly idea.
 
although I agree with all points made by buck and art, I have seen more than one rogue GW behave in the manner described. none that operate where I currently live, but where I grew up they were not so well mannered. police corruption was rampant in every department, including fish and game and there were a couple that for some reason did indeed pick a specific location to hang out day after day. don't ask me their reasoning for this, they were never very cordial or professional in their dealings, and I know of nobody that ever willingly stuck around long enough to ask questions.
 
If you are abiding by the law, the warden is on your side and an attribute to your land.
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In Ohio most of the private land deer hunting is on small farms, and deer season is one week long, so the idea that increasing human activity in the woods by 25-50% should be a welcome "attribute" to the law abiding hunters on the property would not be met with wild enthusiasm here.
 
In Ohio most of the private land deer hunting is on small farms, and deer season is one week long, so the idea that increasing human activity in the woods by 25-50% should be a welcome "attribute" to the law abiding hunters on the property would not be met with wild enthusiasm here.
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Very similar to Wisconsin's general firearm deer season. This means that the Wardens, stretched thin already, don't have time to randomly walk every sq. foot in the state checking licenses and being a arse. They are generally running from one call/complaint to the other following up on legitimate violations from long before sunup till the wee hours of the night. If not they are patrolling from a distance and watching thru optics, as this proves more productive than walking two or three farms a day looking for a single violation that probably isn't there in the first place. The odds of a Warden entering any private land without prior probable cause is virtually non-existent. They just don't have the time during a short busy hunting season such as yours. The odds of them entering a neighbor's land and spooking deer from there to you is probably better, if you are law abiding and your neighbor isn't. If they do enter the woods without probable cause, it' generally on small parcels of public land where hunters are in higher concentrations and folks tend to be less informed of the regs.

Again, let's be realistic in our scenarios, and not let our imaginations run wild.
 
Some have stated that you "can bar a game warden from your private land."
What is your legal standing for doing this?
You can not "bar, ban, prohibit, restrict, etc" any Sworn peace officer with jurisdiction from being in an "open field" while he is in lawful discharge of his sworn duties. Like it or not, until the SCOTUS changes their minds, you are out of luck.;) I can not count the times I have been told "this is my property" or "this is private property and you need to leave." My answer is always "I will leave when I get good and ready and not one second before." The funny thing is, the only people who have ever tried to run me off are the ones who were committing crimes. Go figure.:confused:
Curtilage is a much more complicated matter. What is and is not curtilage is open to wide interpretation. Of course plain view and plain smell both over ride curtilage, so curtilage is usually not usually a problem either.
 
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It's probably a reasonable thing to assume the game warden knows his authority a bit better than you or I. Depending on where and when you are talking about it might be much different from the police.

Back in the 70s, in New York, a murderer was caught (after weeks of manhunt) by a CO (Conservation Officer =Game Warden) because he was not under the same rules as the police.

In that place, at that time, police were forbidden to shoot without being shot at, or a clear threat. Game Wardens were not under that restriction.

police nearly caught him a couple times, but he escaped, because, while armed (rifle), he ran, did not point gun at police, they could not shoot.

They are law enforcement officers, but in many (if not most) places, they are not police. Duties and authority may overlap, but are usually not identical.
 
44, a lot has changed. The States used to decide when deadly force could be used. For example, Georgia law said peace officers could shoot ANY fleeing felon. SCOTUS has in the last couple of decades taken those decisions away from the states. Individual states can limit the powers of arrest of certain peace officers, but the states can not give any peace officers outside the Federal guidelines.
When I worked at the Sheriff's office, I enforced game law when the occasion arose. We had the exact same juristiction in our county that the game warden had in our county.
 
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