Regs test

[GW11]

Been there done that. Have been checked over the years more times than I can count from while trolling for salmon on Lake O to back lake duck hunting. Even been cited for not immediately picking up a duck. All and all part of being out there. I for one love seeing them out there and don't mind being checked. I appreciated seeing them out there. I can only imagine how hard their job is considering that even people in the clear don't want to see them.

I like that they're out there doing their jobs, but it doesn't mean I personally want to see them. Same thing with police. We like to know they're around but nobody likes having one in their rear view mirror.

My buddy told me that the hardest part of the job for him when he started was starting in a small town and knowing everyone personally. Everyone expected a break because "we played hockey together" or "went to the same school".

[welsh]

You never ran into them at Hullet? Don't know if its an area legend but heard of a guy that got nipped for crossing one of those gravel dead end roads with a loaded gun was following his dog that was trailing a pheasant.

Never. But I always unload approaching a road just in case ... shells out of the chambers.

[greatwhite]

Just like Cops there are good and bad. I have met many good ones and a few idiots.

[Bushmoose]

Since most poachers don't wear tee shirts that read " HEY I'M A POACHER" it takes some investigation to determine either way. Let them do their job be polite. They are not out too get you. Just enforce the rules and regulations we all agree to abide by when we purchase our licences.

I don't see a lot of folks wearing tee-shirts announcing they commonly speed or go through stops signs either and yet as many times as I have gone through ride checks, I have never heard the officer asking how fast I was travelling down the highway or street, prior to being stopped? No trick questions to trip you up. No assumptions on their part to try and get you squirming? Just a simple "Hi, we're checking for drinking and driving" "have you had anything to drink today?" and away you go.... Pleasant and cordial the way it should be unless of course you've been drinking? They're not "investigating anything" because there is nothing to investigate and they don't assume that you've done anything wrong. Pretty simple interaction in my mind?

See your painting them in a negative light. We all whine that they are not doing enough to catch poachers yet when the investigate something we are all to ready to jump on them for being thorough. They were just making sure everything was legit. They weren't trying to make you slip up that can only happen if you weren't forthright right?

See, there you go with this "investigate" thing again. What are they investigating? What reason do they have to "investigate" a couple hunters driving down a road? Stop them, yes. Ask to see their license, yes. Ask them if they've been successful (whatever?) and away you should go. Driving down the road or sitting outside at the hunt camp does not and should not give them suspicion that you have done anything illegal. Yet time after time, they will prod and poke and make a complete nuisance of themselves over nothing. Its the game they play constantly and they get no respect what so ever from me for playing it. Most of them now are wannabe cops that don't make the grade and settle for being a fish cop.

[finsfurfeathers]

I don't see a lot of folks wearing tee-shirts announcing they commonly speed or go through stops signs either and yet as many times as I have gone through ride checks, I have never heard the officer asking how fast I was travelling down the highway or street, prior to being stopped? No trick questions to trip you up. No assumptions on their part to try and get you squirming? Just a simple "Hi, we're checking for drinking and driving" "have you had anything to drink today?" and away you go.... Pleasant and cordial the way it should be unless of course you've been drinking? They're not "investigating anything" because there is nothing to investigate and they don't assume that you've done anything wrong. Pretty simple interaction in my mind?





See, there you go with this "investigate" thing again. What are they investigating? What reason do they have to "investigate" a couple hunters driving down a road? Stop them, yes. Ask to see their license, yes. Ask them if they've been successful (whatever?) and away you should go. Driving down the road or sitting outside at the hunt camp does not and should not give them suspicion that you have done anything illegal. Yet time after time, they will prod and poke and make a complete nuisance of themselves over nothing. Its the game they play constantly and they get no respect what so ever from me for playing it. Most of them now are wannabe cops that don't make the grade and settle for being a fish cop.

Really than why all this fuss about carding than? In reality your response to the question is irrelevant its done so they can catch your breath for a whiff of alcohol sneaky eh? If they a sniffing around you its because something stinks.

[Bushmoose]

Really than why all this fuss about carding than? In reality your response to the question is irrelevant its done so they can catch your breath for a whiff of alcohol sneaky eh? If they a sniffing around you its because something stinks.

Carding? Who's said anything about carding? Really, is this the best response you could come up with?

[Duckguy]

I don't see a lot of folks wearing tee-shirts announcing they commonly speed or go through stops signs either and yet as many times as I have gone through ride checks, I have never heard the officer asking how fast I was travelling down the highway or street, prior to being stopped? No trick questions to trip you up. No assumptions on their part to try and get you squirming? Just a simple "Hi, we're checking for drinking and driving" "have you had anything to drink today?" and away you go.... Pleasant and cordial the way it should be unless of course you've been drinking? They're not "investigating anything" because there is nothing to investigate and they don't assume that you've done anything wrong. Pretty simple interaction in my mind?




See, there you go with this "investigate" thing again. What are they investigating? What reason do they have to "investigate" a couple hunters driving down a road? Stop them, yes. Ask to see their license, yes. Ask them if they've been successful (whatever?) and away you should go. Driving down the road or sitting outside at the hunt camp does not and should not give them suspicion that you have done anything illegal. Yet time after time, they will prod and poke and make a complete nuisance of themselves over nothing. Its the game they play constantly and they get no respect what so ever from me for playing it. Most of them now are wannabe cops that don't make the grade and settle for being a fish cop.

Wanna be cops. Lol. Harder to get a CO job then a cop job. If you feel you are being harassed by a CO call the district office and talk to a supervisor.

CO's have to follow the same rules as cops.

[welsh]

I don't see a lot of folks wearing tee-shirts announcing they commonly speed or go through stops signs either and yet as many times as I have gone through ride checks, I have never heard the officer asking how fast I was travelling down the highway or street, prior to being stopped? No trick questions to trip you up. No assumptions on their part to try and get you squirming?

But these stops aren't really similar. If the cops stop you because they're looking for a vehicle that left the scene of an accident, you can bet they're going to be asking what you were up to before they stopped you. Of course the CO who stops you isn't going to stop at "You guys hunting? Okay, then."

In both of the situations GW described on this thread, the CO had clear reasons to investigate. In the first instance, you have two guys riding with a shotgun in the cab during a gun season for moose, sans orange, and GW already told us that their original plan was to keep an eye out for grouse. In the second instance, you have hunters with a deer after the season has closed. In both cases there is reasonable cause to think you might have an offence. You can't fault the CO for investigating, because investigating is the job you pay him to do.

Tricky questions ought not to bother you. You're not obliged to answer them, you know. Identify yourself, provide your licence, and beyond that any answers you give are voluntary. You can't be held for refusing to answer a question.

[Waftrudnir]

Definitely agree with that one.

Another example from about 5 years ago...

My Dad, brother and I were hunting some public land for the ML season, which falls around the 1st week of December here. My brother was only going to hunt 2 or 3 days so if we got a deer within those first couple of days we were going to use his tag first. As it turned out, I shot a buck in the first 15 minutes of opening morning. We made the collective decision to tag the deer with my brother's tag, hang it in a tree overnight and bring it home the next day. The main reason being that we all came in an SUV and didn't really need to stuff the three of us, all our gear and the deer in it when we could bring a trailer in with us the next morning.

The next afternoon on our way back home we were pulled over by an unmarked truck about 10 minutes from home. We had already driven at least 30 minutes from the land we were hunting. The CO said he saw the deer in the trailer and "had to stop us" as part of his duty, but I'm not so sure. My feeling is that someone saw the deer and some blaze orange in the SUV and called the TIPS line on us thinking that there wasn't a firearms deer season in December. Our route home took us through a couple of small villages so it's entirely possible. There's a tip - if you don't want to be pulled over when driving to and from your hunting spots, lose the blaze orange. Just make sure you're no longer "hunting".

Anyway, this fellow DID NOT like the fact that we shot the deer the day before and were bringing it home that day. I think (and I can understand his position) that he had convinced himself that Dad or I had shot the deer the day before, hung it up without a tag and brought my brother with us the next day to tag it and bring it home. He asked each of us in 3 or 4 different ways - "So, who shot the deer?" "When did you say it was shot?" "How many of you were hunting yesterday?" "Sorry, you say you shot the deer, but it's his tag, have I got this right?". Then he would repeat all those questions with the next guy but in a slightly different way.

Then he was back and forth from the trailer, sticking a thermometer in the deer I think, then returned to the window for a few more questions. He was being thorough, but definitely trying to make one of us slip up with our answers. We weren't doing anything wrong, he just didn't couldn't wrap his head around why we would shoot the deer one day and bring it out another.

Eventually the mood relaxed and it ended with some small talk about deer numbers and he told us that additional tag cuts would be coming soon, which ended up being true. All in all not a very comfortable experience. We definitely felt like we were treated a little like poachers first, outdoorsmen second, but as said above, they have to find a way to do their job.

Definitely nothing wrong with getting pulled over for a check, but the question is where it stops.
The situations people use the expression 'poaching' always gives me a chuckle: Not encasing a firearm on the way in/out, wearing camo on the orange hat, having lead shot in the glove box, etc. Really that's what they worry about?
To me poaching is taking game out of season, wrong gender/age, not having a licence, letting meat spoil.
That's what they should be after IMHO, but giving insignificant tickets to the average guy takes less effort and yields a higher turn out.
Treating hunters by default as a bunch of rednecks won't get neither of us anywhere. The vast majority of hunters follow the rules and want that hunting will be around for future generations. The MNR cannot be everywhere, where hunters are. So instead of capitalizing on that, they continue the "policing" rather than supporting their customers. I'm not putting the blame on the COs; the rules are set up to toss out little tickets instead of major fines for actual poaching.

[finsfurfeathers]

But these stops aren't really similar. If the cops stop you because they're looking for a vehicle that left the scene of an accident, you can bet they're going to be asking what you were up to before they stopped you. Of course the CO who stops you isn't going to stop at "You guys hunting? Okay, then."

In both of the situations GW described on this thread, the CO had clear reasons to investigate. In the first instance, you have two guys riding with a shotgun in the cab during a gun season for moose, sans orange, and GW already told us that their original plan was to keep an eye out for grouse. In the second instance, you have hunters with a deer after the season has closed. In both cases there is reasonable cause to think you might have an offence. You can't fault the CO for investigating, because investigating is the job you pay him to do.

Tricky questions ought not to bother you. You're not obliged to answer them, you know. Identify yourself, provide your licence, and beyond that any answers you give are voluntary. You can't be held for refusing to answer a question.

Thanks you always have a better way of saying my thoughts.