This is Virginia
On Posted Property:l
It is unlawful to hunt without written permission of the landowner and is punishable by a fine of up to $2500 and/or 12 months in jail.
On Property Not Posted:
It is unlawful to hunt any unposted property without permission of the landowner and is punishable by a fine of up to $500.
My land is clearly posted.. have walked the entire border posting and marking it according to Virginia law. Soon after I did that, an adjoining 100 acres was posted by the hunt club there. When I was hunting with my daughter a few dogs came thru....they chased a few deer thru the property at warp speed. Not what I was hoping for. I don't hunt with dogs, but many people in VA do. One of the dogs camped out below our stand until his owner came thru to collect him. In Virginia it is legal to enter another person's land to retrieve a dog but you may not carry a weapon. He was not armed. He was cordial. I got down and said hello. He took his dog and left. I wasn't particularly pleased, as they had to drive up the private road and dump the dogs out of the truck for them to come across the land like that, but for all I know the might own one of the parcels above me (up the mountain) and the parcel beyond me. He obeyed the law and was respectful of my property. I'm fine with it. Tomorrow I will stop at the neighbor's house around lunch time since I am hunting in the morning. I will introduce myself and point out the no trespassing signs. I will give him my phone number in the event that there was an emergency...as I said before, unforeseen things occur.
Concepts of ownership are different in different places. I have busted my butt all my life to be able to buy land that Is mine, so that I can hunt on my own land. Partly because I want to hunt without having some dipstick stomp all over my hunt. There are a lot of people I have run into on public land who just didn't handle themselves in a safe or respectful manner. I am also building my home here and will be farming it ( and orchard). I don't own the land to show off, I own it because I wanted it and so I saved and sacrificed for the last 20 years to get it. He could have asked permission....he didn't. He saw the signs....all of them, and he did what he wanted on my land anyway...he wanted to walk around. He has 3.5 acres that he rents...not a lot but definitely enough to take a stroll or do some target shooting since his place is tucked in agains a 65 acre parcel with a small barn and house on it and beyond that is a huge multi hundred acre parcel with a single house on it. Heck, his land is enough to hunt on. But he wanted to take a stroll on my land. So he did. Having someone just decide they want to waltz all over my land doesn't sit too well with me. The previous owner might have had a ***-bi-yah attitude but I don't. I want my privacy. I want to be able to hunt with my kids and not be disturbed. I want to plant trees and not have someone walking around touching my fence (which may be electric ) or my tractor or my supplies that I leave on the farm in a shed. The other picture is someone checking out my tractor and it is absolutely not visible fro the road. It's 1/4 mile thru the woods from the road to my tractor. You don't just happen to end up there. you go there for a reason. If you see no trespassing signs and private road/keep out signs and go there anyway, you go there because you are a criminal.
