who are the poachers?
From what i have observed they fall into a couple of categories:
Spring Poachers
Summer Poachers
Fall Poachers
and the wild card, the ones with drug addictions.
Typically most spring poachers are also \"turkey hunters\" sometimes they will access your property from an adjoining farms, if they don't get you at that point rest assured they have logged the location of any plants that are up and they will be back in the fall. Also beware of people wanting to hunt morels or mushrooms that way you wont lose 2 crops.
The way to combat this is by being in your woods at various times during the spring hunting season. You have to become an avid turkey hunter you have to become an avid morel hunter.
Fall Poachers are alot easier to catch but the problem is there are alot more of them. You will see cars and trucks parked all along side any back roads near your property, some will even raise the hood of their vehicle or open their gas door to make you think the car has broken down, go ahead and get their tag number,take pictures of the car, drive by it real slow several times, pull up to it get out of your vehicle walk around it several times slowly, slam your car door, lay on the horn a few good times. if they are close now they are very uncomfortable and will scat out of there the first chance they get, but also at this point it is a good time to check your patch, and maybe it would be a good time to also do some target practice with your loudest gun. you know just to get ready for fall hunting season. If they haven't left by now their heart is racing 100 miles per hour. Take proactive steps in the late summer and as soon as reasonably possible top your ginseng.
The Summer hunters are a different breed, these people dont have jobs or are loggers or even construction workers, they are more predictable in their behaviors,
Most of the summer poaching will occur on mondays, fridays and days during and following wet periods or several days of rain, not thunderstorms just rainy wet times when other work slows down, on days with thunderstorms or in the 90's with high humidity it is clear sailing for your crop, nobody wants to be in the woods on those days not even the loggers. so during mild/wet summer days if you have the time check your crops. oh and it may be a good time get your gun sighted in \"you know for fall hunting\" by firing off several rounds in rapid sucession.
And finally the \"special needs\" children.
These guys are looking for a fix, they are trying to do the right thing but you know they are the victims, its always someone elses fault, they are changing their ways, they just need someone to give them a chance. blah blah blah..
These \"Pill-billys\" are the easiest to catch, all you have to do is go out into the woods and shake a bottle of oxycotin or loratab and they will come running in from all directions, im not kidding...try it and see. These are the wild cards the ones you gotta watch, their favourite digging tool is a screwdriver and in some cases car keys. Your'e not gonna stop these guys at all. they will take you for all you got, and in this case i would suggest not to take a gun of any sort into the woods, now is not a good time to get that gun sighted for fall hunting, if they find out you have guns, guess what your'e surely in line for a home invasion next week. The best way to handle this is at the dealer level. No not that kind of dealer, im talking about ginseng dealers, if they get some toothless bastard bringing them in some crappy ginseng that looks like it had been dug with a pair of needle-nose pliers, please only offer these guys pennies on the dollar. These \"slick-gums\" have been in the game a long time, they won't/can't work a real job,and they will not be stopped until chronic liver failure occurs, then guess what. You and I will be left to foot the bill for their healthcare or funeral expenses, what a deal right?
