The Stolen Trail Camera

Citrus 5 point

My deer season started on the highest note possible; a doe and a buck opening week of archery in Ga, then two more antlerless deer during muzzleloader, not to mention a nice hog and a bobcat with my bow while deer hunting. But when I climbed a tree with a modern rifle, my luck fizzled out. I did three hunts in Ga without getting to fire my Savage 30-06 and decided to give it one last chance in Florida for the last day of general gun at Citrus WMA.

I brought my brother Buka who was in town from college for Christmas Break. We arrived at our spot nice and early and after taking Buka to a tree and leaving him with my climber stand I headed to my lock-on stand. I had a trail camera up near this stand during archery season and there was a nice 5 point buck that was frequenting the area. My nephew Noah had even missed him once from this stand during archery season. My hope was to finally catch him with a rifle and put one last deer in the freezer.

It was a beautiful cold morning as light began to dawn. Then through the trees I saw a flashlight shining. It soon disappeared and I thought maybe the guy would pass without disturbing me too much. About 7:30 a.m. the guy reappeared shining his flashlight in full morning light and came tromping through the brush right towards me. I began to whistle and it took him a while to figure out I wasn't a bird. He tromped off leaving me a bit aggravated.

I little while later a deer began blowing up wind from me. My morning was shot, thanks to a hunter that preferred to tromp through the woods at first light rather than get to his spot and sit tight. The joys of public land, but wait, they get better.

Dead headless buck

I climbed down and put up a trail camera with new batteries where I had it earlier during archery season. I wanted to see what bucks survived the season. Hopefully that 5 point had made it and would be on the hit list for next archery season. I then walked out to the trail to meet up with Buka for some lunch. On the trail I found a dead buck with only his head cut off. I was pretty sure it was the 5 point that lived in that area and that ticked me off to see it dead and wasted.

I met up with Buka and after eating lunch together I headed back to my stand. When I arrived I found my spot had been disturbed. Two scent pads that were hanging off branches were on the ground at the base of my stand and my trail camera was gone. I left it for a half an hour and it got swiped! I hurried back to the parking area to find a single green Ford pick-up truck. Near the truck was a towering man with broad shoulders and arms that stretched nearly down to the ground. He was wearing an army jacket and a camo hat that seemed to barely contain the crazy curly brown hair that protruded from beneath it. Wild blue eyes pierced out from his face that was smeared in camo paint. He looked like a bad guy off an A-Team episode, a worthy opponent for Mr. T.

I confronted him about the camera and of course he denied it, quickly citing the possibility of someone parking miles away on the other side of the property and coming to the front to steal my camera. There wasn't much I could do so I began walking back to the woods. On the way I met another hunter coming out. Trying to be more tactful I struck up a conversation with him. I learned that he had come with the guy in the green truck and I was even able to learn where they were hunting. Sure enough, the other guy was hunting down the trail I was at. He must have been the guy who walked up on me and then came back later to check out my set-up, finding my trail camera and helping himself to it.

That pretty much ruined my day. I went back and moved my stand before he came back and swiped that too. The ironic thing is that I recognized the guy from my neighborhood back here in St. Pete. He's a regular at Biff Burger. I've had thoughts of showing up at his house with my iphone's map app and telling him that I have GPS chips in my trail cameras and I traced it back to his place. "Give me the camera or I'll call the cops." He looked like the kind of guy who would believe such a story. He also looks like the kind of guy who might just shoot me and throw my body behind Biff Burger.

Oh well, it's just about $90.00 in camera, batteries and SD card. I have two more cameras anyways. Hopefully he'll figure the camera out and get some enjoyment from it. Before I see him at Citrus again and follow him to his spot and ... well it would be a fun topic to think about while I'm passing time in the tree stand. Forgive and forget, that's the right thing to do, Lord help me.

Hunting can be such a fun, challenging and natural experience until some bonehead comes by and you find yourself facing the problems you went to the woods to escape, namely stupid people. But hey, now I'm just whining. All in all I had a great deer season and I am already looking forward to next Fall. For now I must turn my attention to hog and small game, then comes turkey season, "Gobble, gobble, gobble!"