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Hunter Comments

The outfitter kicked off their full staff bow season with this week and my group. There had been a couple guys hunting before us but only a bare bones support staff till us as it was told to us. My group being from Alabama does not normally hunt over corn so we expected corn to have been out well in advance and well established stand locations set prior to us hunting so deer would already be using the areas freely. What we found was that stands were placed a day if not hours ahead of us hunting and corn was used too sparingly as over half of our sits were done on stands with no corn. As a matter of fact, the corn supply exhausted two days before our hunt was over and one of our party actually had to purchase his own corn. When we arrived we asked to hunt green grass or food plots if they had any and we were told they had none. Mid week while hunting a corn stand I walked through a volunteer clover fescue field with tons of sign and glassed early one evening sit and witnessed ove 30 deer and 4 shooters. We asked to set stands to hunt the field but was told it would take a couple days. We offered to help set and were told that wasn't allowed and they had no stands. We offered to set our own and was told that was frowned upon. While we probably shouldn't have done it, we burned a morning hunt and set two stands and hunted them the rest of the week. We saw tons of deer and I unfortunately made a mistake and shot a small buck. I honestly thought I had seen more horns but as any bow hunter will tell you sometimes it happens so quickly you have to make a quick decision. When we returned there wasn't a saw to cut horns or anything. We had to use a tree saw. Supper was provided and the cook was very friendly. Supper was adequate but we found the choices for lunch was poor considering the duration of our sits. I was truely remorseful for tagging a small deer and felt that the outfitters' ill preparedness for our hunt should have waived the penalty but he wouldn't. He did work with us on the price so that was a gesture. His reasoning on why he couldn't waive it was they used the $ for planting plots and to buy more corn. I found this hard to believe since there were no plots planted and they ran out of corn. If the outfitter is going to depend on corn for drawing deer, it should be expected if the deer ear 50 lbs per day that several hundred pounds should be placed right before hunting so the hunter doesn't have to hunt over dirt. There are deer here but the guides are marginal hunters in my group's opinion at best. I have been on 7 outfitter trips and this was by far the worst I have ever had. On a positive note, the lodging was good.

Was the outfitter notified of problems? - NO

Outfitter's Response

I can't sit idly by and let this nonsense go unanswered. Every year we manage to get a "Todd" in camp. A guy who tells his side of the story but not the real story. Let's brake it down.

1. Book a hunt a year in advance and then hunt till 9:30am every morning but not before getting out of your stand at 9:00 and walking all over the area looking for sign.(we know that based on conversations over heard about landmarks no where near the stand) 2. And while your at it pull the sd card out of the trail camera and take a look.(big no no anywhere you go) 3. Gets worse, guide shows him trail cam pics on his personal phone sets it down and walks outside to do something and when he comes back in " Todd " is on the guides phone scrolling through it like it's his. ( that takes balls) and he should have been punched in the throat ! 4.Like Todd said when he got down early and was walking around( oh I'm sorry glassing) he did see some bucks in a planted foodplot (clover,wheat,rye) I know because I did it along with 25 other acres of food plots ! 5. Came back and did ask about putting a stand up on the field. And like he said was told no. We frown on stands on edges of fields because we don't want hunters taking hale Mary shots. Not that we didn't have stands because we had 8 sitting in the carport.(Is everyone starting to get the picture?) 6. And Todd and Guy didn't burn a morning hunt to put up their own stands they lied and said they were going into town for lunch and drove to the farm and put their stands up without our knowledge. Then proceeded to let the guide take them back to the farm and dropped them off at their stands 1 mile apart. Once the guide left Guy walked the 1 mile back to the field where Todd was waiting at the "field" stands. At dark both were picked up at one spot and at that point had to come clean about their clandestine deception! And even volunteered that one of them took a 57 yard shot at a buck. (My first knee jerk reaction once I was notified of this situation was to tell him to pack up their shit and get the hell out ) But the 2 other guys in their group would have to suffer for Todd and Guys actions so I took the high road and let it pass. 7. We did run out of corn for one day because our farmer was cutting beans and couldn't fill our 3ton bin. The guide took one of the other hunters in their group up to the co-op to buy bagged corn and the hunter insisted on buying the corn! The guide said no but Robert stepped in front of the guide and paid. 8. While on the subject of corn. We have been Corning these stands since August like we do every year and we do put corn out the day before it's hunted. It's common for our deer to eat 100 lbs in 24 hours! These bait sights become Community gathering areas where bucks come to look for does . Just because there is no corn doesn't mean that bucks won't come in to look Scent check it. 9. Day 4 Todd comes back from hunting the foodplot stands with a muddy arrow and the guide calls him out about it. Todd claims to have drawn back on a doe ( for practice ) and when he let down it went off!! Ha ha I call bullshit (another hail Mary shot) 10. Last day thank god!! Todd and Guy both sitting on foodplot stands and Todd kills a 70" buck with a perfect double lung shot even tho he claims it was in the brush and he made a quick decision ( my ass !! Wide open field mind you) And Guy makes a 48 yard shot and shoulder hits a buck and gets 3" of penetration ! The guides spend till 10 pm tracking the buck Guy gimped and gave up. Todd wanted to cut the antlers off his trophy 70" so we gave him a pruning saw and a $200 break on his immature buck fine.

After 17 years in Business I thought I have seen it all. But I was wrong Todd and Guy were the worst customers I have ever had . And the funny thing is the other 2 hunters in their group both said they would never go on another hunt with Todd. One also said that out of the 7 different outfitted hunts they had been on Todd pissed off every single one !!!

No I would not recommend this hunter !!!!!!!

Sorry for the long rebuttal but you can't make this stuff up!!