A hunter on Reddit said he got a call the day before opening day from a man who had pulled his phone number off his tree stand on public land. According to the post, the caller told him he had set up about 50 yards from “his spot.” The hunter said the guy claimed he did not care if he stayed there or not, but still made it pretty clear he thought the stand should be moved.
What made it more irritating was that the hunter said his stand had already been out there for about a month. He said he had put it up ahead of the weekend opener and never once saw another stand within range of his own. So from his side of it, this was not some guy barging in at the last minute and crowding somebody else on purpose. It sounded more like he had done the work, got his setup in place early, and then got a surprise phone call from somebody acting like public land came with reserved seating.
He posted the story because he wanted to know what other hunters would do. From the way the thread reads, he was not panicking, but he was clearly ticked off. He was trying to decide if he should move his stand or ignore the pressure and hunt where he had already planned to hunt. That is where the conversation took off, because plenty of people in the comments had strong feelings about the idea of a guy calling to claim a public-land spot like he owned it.
The comments came back the way you would probably expect. A bunch of hunters basically told him the same thing: it is public land, and nobody gets to call dibs forever. One commenter said if another hunter is too close for safety, that is one thing, but if it is just a matter of somebody being attached to “his” area, then that is his problem. Another said flat-out that on public ground, you either get there first or deal with company.
A few people did say 50 yards is tight, depending on the setup, and that safety and shot direction matter more than pride. But even then, the tone of the thread was not very sympathetic to the caller. The part that seemed to rub people wrong was not only the complaint. It was the fact that he got the number off the tree stand, made the call, and then tried to lean on the guy before opening day like the woods were already spoken for.
The hunter never made it sound like he was trying to pick a fight. He made it sound like he got put in one. He had a stand out for weeks, did not see anybody else around it, and then suddenly had a stranger on the phone talking about “his spot.” That is really all it took for the thread to get going, because every public-land hunter knows exactly the kind of guy that phrase brings to mind.
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