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Don’t torch your spot

Years ago, Dad and I were watching a regional outdoors show. Our jaws dropped when the host was catching bass off a sunken barge that we fished.
 
I watched a general unit spot I had in my back pocket go up in flames on facebook today. Several hundred likes and the guy names the exact drainage. I thought about saying something, but is it even worth confronting? The spot is already toast and I doubt the poster changes his behavior based on anything I have to say online.
 
Sometimes during the off-season I'll just try and see if I can peg down some of the spots that the Youtubers are posting. I've never been to any of their spots that I have found, but I'd say I have at least a dozen pins courtesy of the influencers. It's just fun to me I guess?

While we are on this topic of torching spots can I just say STOP posting pics to online forums with the geotag attached to the photo information. I had a buddy a few years back share photos of our elk hunt with a bunch of his hunting friends... all the pics had geotagged information. The campsite location, the elk, and the kill site all given away. We all work our butts off to find honey holes. Take a minute and do all you can to protect those spots... but then again OnX gives away all my pins to elkshape and the BRO's haha
 
I sent a WY resident to where I saw a big 6x6 elk while mule deer hunting this fall. Fair or foul?
Had a couple guys this year, lets call them Bill and Mike, at work ask me if I knew anything about "xyz creek" for elk hunting. They thought that I might hunt near there. Said they got some intel on elk from a NR deer hunter from the year prior. He told stories of 350 class bulls littering the countryside. Told them I did and that the exact spot they were looking at is a place I hunt often. Public land so they ended up archery hunting the area for a few days. Missed a small bull one day. Left to go back to their traditional stomping grounds.

A few days after the opener of rifle in the area, another guy from work tells me he saw my truck at the spot he was going to hunt for the opener. He decided to move down the road 1/4 mile and hunt the ridge I was on. Brought two others along with him. When I asked what caused him to pick that spot, its kind of a non-descript spot, doesn't really lead to a place that would scream elk. He said that Bill told him to go there since he saw so many elk during his archery hunt.

One mention from one person lead to 5 more people hunting that spot, that year.

That should answer your question.
 
I’m my years of knowing hunters, I’ve found that 95% of the people who are out looking for where somebody else is hunting - to slide into something great, they just usually don’t have the interest or drive to get far with it anyway. I’m other words, lazy fuggs will still be lazy fuggs..
 
I watched one of Randy's antelope shows and found his spot via google and even told him, he was not mad and I never shared it with anyone.....takes 10+ points to hunt it anyway. It's like a challenge and it's fun :)
 
I’m my years of knowing hunters, I’ve found that 95% of the people who are out looking for where somebody else is hunting - to slide into something great, they just usually don’t have the interest or drive to get far with it anyway. I’m other words, lazy fuggs will still be lazy fuggs..
I've been guilty of trying to find spots where others have had success, but not because I'd ever hunt that exact spot, but because it can be useful to figure out what is it about that spot that is good, and where can I find more of that?

And to be honest, it's never worked, likely because I can't ever figure out what exactly is the draw for that spot.
 
I’m my years of knowing hunters, I’ve found that 95% of the people who are out looking for where somebody else is hunting - to slide into something great, they just usually don’t have the interest or drive to get far with it anyway. I’m other words, lazy fuggs will still be lazy fuggs..
Yes
 
Welp today I learned ol’ Ontario is a hardcore gym rat, so that’s neat.
Actually, I do have a gym membership. Hardly hard-core. I think I've been twice in the last two years. It was closed down for more than a year due to COVID and I also had injuries or surgeries that kept me sidelined. Push-outs from the dining table have kept my weight where it should be. I've always been blessed with strong wheels and lungs and I know how to make them work ... probably because I keep making them work. Walk to the grocery store instead of drive, etc. Good genes helps too. Diet plays no role. I eat a lot of crap.

Twelve years ago at age 58 I passed my last US govt firefighting physical test shortly before retirement. It requires WALKING three miles in 45 minutes ... while wearing a 45 lb weighted vest. First time I showed up they wouldn't let me take the test without a doctor's okay. I walked it anyway without the vest (they couldn't stop me). No problem. Next time with a doctor's note and the vest on I blew by a bunch of rock climber kids the last quarter mile to the finish. One in that group failed to cross in time (very fit but her legs were very short). I don't have a weighted vest but can still walk three miles at the gym under 40 minutes. Did it a week before coming here.
 
Actually, I do have a gym membership. Hardly hard-core. I think I've been twice in the last two years. It was closed down for more than a year due to COVID and I also had injuries or surgeries that kept me sidelined. Push-outs from the dining table have kept my weight where it should be. I've always been blessed with strong wheels and lungs and I know how to make them work ... probably because I keep making them work. Walk to the grocery store instead of drive, etc. Good genes helps too. Diet plays no role. I eat a lot of crap.

Twelve years ago at age 58 I passed my last US govt firefighting physical test shortly before retirement. It requires WALKING three miles in 45 minutes ... while wearing a 45 lb weighted vest. First time I showed up they wouldn't let me take the test without a doctor's okay. I walked it anyway without the vest (they couldn't stop me). No problem. Next time with a doctor's note and the vest on I blew by a bunch of rock climber kids the last quarter mile to the finish. One in that group failed to cross in time (very fit but her legs were very short). I don't have a weighted vest but can still walk three miles at the gym under 40 minutes. Did it a week before coming here.
 
Back in the seventies and eighties I found a good couple of mountains to hunt elk. Shot several there, usually every year, including one big bull in 1980. A friend of my dad's was always after me to show him where I elk hunted. Bob was a good guy and took me hunting when I was home on leave and Dad had to work. But I knew if I showed him the spot, the next year his school bus camper would be up there full of his family and in-laws. He even tried to hide on the edge of town and follow me. I caught onto same taillights in the rearview mirror for thirty miles and pulled in to a truckstop. Took a crap, bought a cup of coffee, then headed back home. Sure enough, there was Bob's pickup parked on the side of the highway waiting for me to leave. I flashed my lights and waved out the window as I drove by. He didn't follow. Next weekend Dad and I decided to have some fun and traded vehicles. Dad took off first with my 65 Chev pickup and then turned to go to Kalispell at the intersection in Creston. I left about fifteen minutes after he did and drove on to Seeley Lake. Bob gave up after that. I ALWAYS hid my vehicle up there. Eventually his son found it and that was that. I found a new and better place to hunt.
 
Finding the spots is the easy part on many of these. Difficulty of drawing the tags keeps it unlikely that forensic spot poaching will get too out of hand.

I have done some of that Sherlock Holmes stuff here and there. Never hunted any of it but it is always a fun puzzle and it’s interesting to see where people are hunting.
 
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