[DeadEyeGardner]

This is the first season I’ve set up a portable ladder stand on public land. I expect to see other hunters and hope to have some good experiences. I scouted the area several times and didn’t find anything that would make me think someone else was in the area for the last 5 weeks. No one on my trail cameras either. I did find a tree, in a good spot, that has lag bolts left in it from previous year(s), and a bow hanger up in the tree. The lag bolts are pointed downwards on a 30-45 degree angle as the tree has grown (obviously) and they didn’t take their lag bolts out at the end of the season. It’s not climbable. And there’s no stand/climber in the tree. I set up my stand in the same area.

Personally, I think it’s wrong to use someone else’s stand without permission, regardless of where it is. I wouldn’t lean on a strangers vehicle in a parking lot or on the street either. I wouldn’t get on a bike laying on public land and go for a rip. I don’t touch anything that doesn’t belong to me, because that’s how I was raised.

If I end up hiking in to my stand and find someone in it, I’ll have a laugh and ask them to kindly swap me places. Or it’s gunna get pretty crowded up in my single seater because that’s my chair and I’m sitting in it. If there’s a problem after that, Since it’s my stand, I guess I’ll start to take it down and move it somewhere else then, and the ****** is gunna get down one way or another.

I’ll add this... my name and phone number is on the stand, as is a tag labelling it’s an active stand 2019/2020. If someone was to call me and ask to sit in it sometime, I’d be more than happy to let them.