I wouldn't approach hunters trespassing on my land unless I was armed. Your wife is "brave", as most women are, because they know someone else will fight their battles they start.
I disagree with the No trespassing signs but they are cheap enough to buy and post. Maybe even No Hunting signs.
It would be interesting if you could be liable for theft if they find out you took their deer stand? I hope not. If you sell it or destroy don't say anything about it to anyone.
Been busy at work....first chance to sit down and see I have pages to catch up on.
I found this interesting. Earlier (in this thread) I think I recall someone saying that the land has been (or looked) abandoned for 30 years... so who can blame someone for thinking they could perhaps hunt/trespass there....
Well... so we walked the land and found (thus far) two tree stands. How do I know how long they've been there? Maybe they've been abandoned for 10 years!??
How long do I wait for (what could be abandoned property) for the owner to come back to get it? How long do I wait for their abandoned tires, 5-gallon buckets to be picked up by the rightful owners who simply placed them there until they could return to get them? We all know that's simply discarded trash.
Seems to me you can't have it both ways.... if someone has the 'right' (I use that term loosely) to traipse on property that isn't theirs because they can't tell it's been visited (we've been there a number of times now and other than the signs we have up and the painted trees, there's STILL no way to tell that we've ever been there.....so what would their sign be that it's abandoned or not?)
No, one can't have it both ways where someone can traipse all over land that isn't theirs, then, the SAME person leaves some of their property..... and have a hissy fit when someone ELSE comes along and finds their abandoned property.
How can they be cited for trespassing if it's abandoned? How can "I" be cited for theft if what I found, was abandoned?
To make another comment about a previous thing someone wrote.... we ALSO have issues with trespassors here, on our local farm.
We're on/in hills and surrounded by a couple hundred acres of TVA land so someone IS allowed to hunt/hike/whatever on TVA land. We share a border with them that is probably over a mile in length. People trespass all the time and play the ignorant card. "Oh, we didn't know this was private property.... (in spite that they walked through mowed fields to get to the place where they were caught.... using the cut field as their target zone)
I've heard it all. If someone wants to hunt/hike/other around here, I really don't care. Just be respectful about property that isn't yours. (like don't leave your gutted deer carcas at the base of our driveway for us to drive by when you could have instead, left it in the woods or elsewhere)
We've had issues with people trespassing (mostly hunters). Had a big meeting one morning with TVA, Sheriff, Wildlife Resources.... all down at the base of our driveway. It was caused because of the 12-15 trucks that lined our driveway on first day of open season. Had I had a car bigger than my Miata at the time, I would have barely been able to get out to go to work. So they marked the area no parking AND they (TVA) had a couple parking areas built for people/hunters/hikers...
During this meeting, the Wildlife guy got about 12 inches from my face and in a raised voice was yelling at me that I'm anti-hunter, anti-hunting and all of this is to impede the hunters who wanted to come out here to hunt since I was so against hunting. He was so exasperated (or realized he made such an azz of himself) he then got into his vehicle and left.
It was very ironic when literally 5 minutes later (they could have passed on the road) a vehicle came out.... was NOT a family member.... and drove onto the property. He was someone who was coming out to hunt because he had permission. His arrival though 5 minutes late, poetically showed those who were still here that we can't be anti-hunting if we are allowing hunters onto the property.... gee....maybe this really WAS about simply keeping the roads passable.