Poaching bear baits

Now that the baiters season has started in Wisconsin the bait poachers are out in full force. On two of my baits guys have shown up, found the bait sites and bear trails leading in and out and now set up 3-400 yards away. It just chaps my butt. Now I get that these baits are on public land but to not bait a lick and then set up on someone else's hard work is very irritating. My son and I have a lot of time and money into these baits. Trail camera pics show that these two have never been in the woods to bait before Friday when they baited and sat. Yes I have a trail camera at the trail head that tells me who comes and goes. I do this to avoid this type of situation or to catch the thieves that seem to be everywhere now-a-days. There's my rant

For your own peace of mind and enjoyment in the woods just try to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they were planning on hunting that site well in advance and when they seen someone set up there they went what they felt was a respectful distance away and set up, is any of that true? Probably not but it may help you relax while sitting on the stand.

Sorry someone set up on you like that, has to be frustrating.

Oh we are going to sit the baits. We have good pics a few nice bears. But this was done purposely. We purposely put our site deep to get away from the hounds poaching baits. Just lazy inconsiderate people. I didn't think that anyone in their right mind would go that deep in the woods. No I am obviously not in my right mind. We can't run wheelers back so anything we bring in or have to bring out is going to be by Mr. Stongarm

And you do not know how to make your antagonists spots so no self respecting bear would come anywhere near them?

I know full well how to get that done if I wanted. Believe me

Sometimes, you got to fight fire with fire........

Claim-jumpers are out there, that is a fact. I have had those types rattle my chain a time or two. The sad thing is this.....as long as the land is public your screwed and can't do a thing about it that may not put YOU in the hot seat. I have had guys so brazen that they actually just sit on my baits like they were theirs. We get the usual houndsmen that will start bear off your bait station too......or very close to it because they know its there. I had an old customer and friend that did a bit of public land guiding and set baits in a very popular area. He was territorial as heck and when anyone moved in too close he made it clear he wasn't happy. He'd usually not cross the line as far as what would be considered legal harassment, but he'd sure lean over that line as far as he could! I told him to be careful with his antics, as did more than one DNR officer. After several years, this bad juju became personal between his camp and some other guys in a nearby camp. In the end, my friend ended up in very deep doo doo. There was a pre-dawn confrontation between him and a guy from the other camp one opening day.....I wasn't there and can't tell what really happened, but suspect each side may have doctored up their story to the law to make it seem better for them and worse for the other guy. At any rate, my old friend was charged with Felonious Assault because he supposedly waved a handgun around a bit! The charges stuck. The whole thing was a real cluster, but it destroyed my friends guiding business, as well as his own health from the stress involved. He was dead within a year or so. He insisted to the day he died that he never did what he was accused of, and that may be true, but he was the one that got splattered the most when the stuff hit the fan.

How do you know they know you had a bait there? Did you get them on camera by your bait? Not saying you're wrong but is there a slight chance they just found a good trail and set up on it?

Backtrack your bears and set up where they come out
This also works for big old bears that visit baits late near or after dark.

We all know one another ADC, and some of these guys will brag about it. As far as it being an accident they start bear near your bait....happens all the time, they are slow-rolling along with a rig dog on the box and BAM, it starts sounding off when it smells a bear that crossed the two-track coming or going to the bait. Can't be helped if the seasons overlap. I have had several bait hunting sits ruined by that happening. I've also had it work to my advantage when the dog crew were friends and I came out of the brush when the chase started, only to be invited along. Shot my heaviest bear doing exactly that. The houndsman whose dogs rigged that bear was an old friend I used to run hounds with. His dogs ran right down across one of my baits that a pal was sitting on, I was on another close by bait and came to the ruckus when I heard the dog pack open up. My pal and I both had hunted 'cats with this old houndogger, so he and I were soon in on a wild chase that ended when I pistoled the bruin to death. One other time, maybe 18-20 years ago, my boy and I were freshening our baits when we came apon a dog crew right near (100 yards) a bait we had. Their dogs were in full chase right back near our bait. Of course the pack moved off as the bear ran off. We re-baited and that p.m. my son said he wasn't gong to hunt that bait on account of the a.m. dog deal. I decided to hunt it myself and shot a bear that evening. You never know. It's the Public Land Crapshoot!

Its a real circus when dealing with public land. Just keep your nose clean gentlemen.

The only way we will be able to smooth out the ruffled feathers here would be to have a split season....bait only, then dog only. The DNR has tip-toed around this problem for decades. Maine does it well. Maine also has a sort of "registered bear baits" deal on all commercial forest land. Here, even though we have 3.3 million acres of CFR (Commercial Forest Reserve) land it is still a free-for-all there as well. The Commercial Forest Act needs to be amended so these companies can actually be allowed to charge for a bait station, and be able to limit the number and location so people don't have anything to bellyache about. As it is, guiding isn't allowed on that CFR land, even though gobs of Yoopers did it for years. The only commercial use/monitary gain of such lands is through timber harvest. Technically, you aren't even allowed to set and leave a trap, or leave a tree stand on that land overnight w/o the landowners ok. Cluster City.

Sure glad that we have all leased bait sites here in Northern Maine. It is nice to be the only baiter in 400 - 500 sq. miles.

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Where we hunt in Northern MN we haven't had any issues with other bear hunters being around luckily but I have also hunted the No Quota area just North of the Twin Cities and that can get crowded. No bear is worth getting in trouble over so make sure you keep your cool, in spite of the frustration. Whenever possible I do things to hide where I am baiting; like parking a ways down the road from where I am baiting and walking down the road and also walking in streams or other water on the way in to not leave a trail. By doing this I have been able to keep people from finding my baits; and I do have cameras on them with no people other than me on camera. As you mention it normally helps to get in off the road a ways, most of the other guys I see in the No Quota area are within 50 yards of the road.

On the other side of coin, several years back I was heading out on our first day of baiting and the tranny in my truck blew up. By the time I got it repaired and got baits out I was almost a week behind. Went to set one spot that I had scouted and there was a bait set 20 yards from where I was planning to put mine. It was a good spot but I just let it be and moved on. I ran into those guys later in the season and there were three buddies all hunting there, on separate baits, all within 300 yards of each other; glad I stayed clear of there.

Good luck on your hunt and I hope you get one. As mentioned by others, hunting the bear trail further back can work very well in situations like this.

We are just rookie baiters, our 15 hunters only killed 12 bears.

every year I have problems with dog hunter running my land ,but the way the laws are there is nothing I can do , I own 200 acres ,an roadways on two side an private on two, so there is no way its by accident ,they let dogs out on public road

Cry babies. Side baiting aint nothin new. If it aint happened to you, you aint huntin. It usually a bait sitter to cheap to hire a guide or put in the work. They just look for a good used trail, then bait next to it. Aint right but its public land, deal with it.

I have people set up to close to an area I scouted, baited or set up stands or blinds. I may have done it to others but not on purpose. If someone is stealthy about those activity on state land it may be hard to tell they are there. It's not if you know they are there it is what you do after you realize they were there first.....everyone has a right to be on state land. Unfortunately not everyone understands sportsman etiquette. If that makes me one of the so-called crybabies so be it. How would you feel if your kid acted like those without etiquette.?

My kids wouldn't.

Bear hunting can bring out the worst in some people, that's certain.

Public land...private land...it doesn't matter.

Most I've come across are good people, but there's always a couple jackwagons. Some of it is due to guys coming up from southern Wisconsin. They're quick to say "screw you...it's public". That goes for fishing, deer hunting, etc.

That's a thing all parents say. I hope you are correct.

OK, my kids haven't and I do not see them doing so in the future.

Bear baiting is big business that really helps a lot of families out. Last thing I want is for that business to suffer. I'm next to thousands of public acres but I stay out for the most part until the 1st or 2nd week of October.

Bear hunting in zone C has been turned into a regular circus! When I first started bear hunting, it took about 5 years to draw a tag. If you didn’t have a kill tag and wanted to bait, you needed to buy a baiting license. A lot less completion for baiting sites and success rates were respectable. Now, they hand out tags like they’re candy. I’ve even heard of guys drawing with only one point. No need to buy a baiting license anymore either.

From my observation, the bear population hasn’t changed. But now there are baits behind every stump and success rates have declined. Competition for sites is furious. More tags, more money, lower success rate, same population. It’s a money game!

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve filled 75% of my tags on public land. But it came at a very high price; gas, bait, and stolen cameras. Last tag I had, I used 25 barrels of bait and put on over 4500 miles. Three cameras stolen and multiple bait stations vandalized. Even had one guy who was nice enough to put his bait in my stump! I never saw a shooter all season!

I really don’t care if I ever shoot another bear. But if I ever get the itch, I’ll gladly pay a guide in Canada. It’s cheaper and a whole lot less work!

Just like fight club you don't talk about your bait sites!

My son called me yesterday whining that some guys set up a moose cow decoy 300 yards from him and his buddy hunting a small clearing. The guy knew my son was there too. He wanted to know what to do. I told him to tell the guy that there was 570,000 square miles of Alaska and ask him why he set up on his square mile? Then I explained since people are scum, this is why we cut 7 miles of trail up a mountain to avoid this. However, if people (who did not cut this trail) find it, they will use it because people are scum.

Glad Arkansas doesn't allow baiting on public land. Seems to bring out the worst in people. Actually this reminds me of public land duck hunting. Without the baiting of course.

Not a chance on stumbling onto this trail. Like I said nobody in there right mind would be out that far. There are no bear trails until after a bait has been established so they knew full well what they were doing

I'm not going to make a big stink about it. If and when I see the guy I may ask a few nonchalant questions to see what his response is but that will be that. We moved the bait 600 yds SE along the two heaviest trails and direction shown on the trail camera. I was avoiding doing this as to not be too close to a highly productive deer stand.

Seen guys in the UP strike up a conversation in a restaurant and start asking about baiting in the area that they say they wanted to avoid only to see them work that exact road days later.