Having a Visitor

[Swede]

You arrive at your tree stand location ten minutes after daybreak. As you start to hook your harness strap to your safety line, you hear a soft cow elk sound nearby. Your bow is already tied to your drop line, so you want to hurry up quietly to get set. You believe you have elk close by. Just as you start up the tree you hear a loader cow call, and you look out and see a hunter standing and waiving you off. He is set up next to a bush on the opposite side of a spring near your stand. Your stand is in his plain sight, so you know he is aware of its presence, and that you have been using it.
What would you do?

[Lefty]

On my private lease Im sending him away. But since I only hunt public ground its his for the time, and Im off to plan b, or C or D

I had a gal sit in my blind,,, I could still smell her perfume a day later.

[Deanmac]

agree with Lefty,

/but no way I would set up near someone else's stand.

[Lefty]

agree with Lefty,
/but no way I would set up near someone else's stand.

Ill say a lot depends.. Two years ago we were the benificiary of a 347 bull that bedded the herd on private ground. A local guide kind of suggested to other hunters that was my daughters bull .. He just steered guys away,,, and his client killed it Oct 1st

I had my ground blind along an active trail and crossing,, I expected other would hunt and work the area. I never had anyone beat me to the area but I would have continued on.
This was the blind perfume girl sat in

2011-10-01 00-00-06 (Small).JPG (53.76 KiB) Viewed 82 times

[Elkhunttoo]

Either way the other hunter is going to be mad at you….if you take a couple minutes and un hook you might scare off any elk this guy is calling to. If you hurry into your stand you get your wind out of the way and you out of the way fairly fast. If this guy happens to call something by you you can let them pass for him. I think in this situation it would depend on if I know elk were close. No reason to blow them out if I can get into my stand. I would essentially be getting out of this guys way and letting him hunt the elk. Leave my bow tied to the string and just hang it without knocking an arrow so he can see I’m not going to disturb his setup. Once he is done with the setup talk with him and go from there

Definitely a tough situation. Lots of these can be avoided at the road (trail) if someone is already parked. This season I was really early one morning and decided to just walk into my stand and sit the extra time in the dark. I was almost to my stand. I could see my pickup down on the road and another pickup pulled up next to mine. 2 people got out and I could see them walking around with headlights to see what way I had gone. Pretty sure they wanted to walk up the other side of the mountain then I was. They jumped back in their pickup. Sat for a few minutes and then drove off to their next spot.

[Timbercarper]

Your only option is to get down and find a new spot. I have experienced this scenario albeit after packing the stand in with me two miles also. Elk hunting is hard enough with everything perfect. No reason to spend your time at a sub par setup. If you have done your scouting you will have a backup spot.