Big news at the farm

Pet peeve: people who show up and sit in my driveway waiting for me to tend to them, as if I do not have anythign better to do than drop everything and come running to be at their service.

I was in the pasture hunting the elusive runaway weanling last nite when I saw a blue truck I did not recognize in the drive. I had to come up through fence after fence after fence to find out who it was and was ready to be ugly, as I was in a mood. Don't these people know I am a hermit at heart?

My first reaction when I see people is that something is wrong, and it will be one more thing to deal with it. That was not the case this time so I did not get to be ugly. It was the hunting outfitter who has leased the land around us and who is all of a sudden full time present. Not only was the dude Matt super nice, but he seems very responsible, which is a great relief to me.

He wanted to know if we knew who was riding back there on the leased land--which comes to over 400 acres all told (who know, I thought it was 260)--and I do not. I told him we had been out once a few weeks ago, but well ahead of the deadline he imposed. Might as well own up, they have cameras all over (which I waved at and put right here on the blog for petes sake).. ..plus we had permission.

Someone is destroying their food plots and 4 wheelers are driving through the crops. People so suck. The game warden is now stalking our property which is AWESOME security and is much appreciated at this time of year of pranks that quite often get serious in a hurry.

I learned some amazing things about outfitters. For one, this one will only be having bow hunting on this particular property. He has four hunters out on this section this week--all of whom paid $2K a week to do so. He said the price goes up as it hits mid-season which is prime hunting. This will go on until January 15. Someone from the outfitter will be on site full time--before sun -up til the catch of the day is brought back. I have contact and vehicle info on all of them now so I do not have to be concerned about who is authorized to be there and who is not. I also gave him the heads up on the problem areas, where to look for methlabs, etc....he was glad to hear it so he can keep an eye out and thinks he already ran off one cook on the very first morning. The country is getting dangerous, folks!

Every hunter must provide a surety in the form of a credit card with 20K availability should damage be done. They keep this on file before the hunters are ever brought to the property. This is great news for us, as things happen no matter how careful you are. He told us how stringent his requirements are, how seriously they take this, etc, so I feel much more safe that this is not a fly-by-night operation. I particularly enjoyed his stories of people who did not make the cut.

Meanwhile, he is thinning out my coyote population! He has gotten one a day since Oct 1 when the season started. That would be two, so dont get your panties in a wad over senseless killing. It is quite sensible here. He said he had been watching them chase the horses so when they are a safe enough distance away, he plugs them. He is also happy to do in the possums, coons, and those damned groundhogs for me! They are eating me out of house and home and the property damage those groundhogs are doing to my barns is incredible. I can just holler when they are at it, and he will shuffle right over from the next driveway and address it.

A fun thing that is going to happen is that a film crew is going to be there for 10 days--I think they are from the Outdoor Channel. It will be around shotgun season which is the weekend before Thanksgiving, and then some other time--it is going to be a huge production. That will be fun to see--although what in God's name they will be doing for 10 days, I cannot imagine.

This whole hunting thing has been weighing on me more than I thought, as I felt a huge sense of relief after talking to him personally. I probably acted like a doofus, but he will get used to it. Well he better if he is going to be here all the time, huh?