Poachers should be shot.

I've never had to call TipMont (the Montana Hotline to report violations to the Fish, Wildlife & Parks people) before in my life, but had to today. The gunshot I heard Friday night turned into the rotting corpse of a buck (deer, not sure if it was a mule deer or a white-tail) that my husband and I found on our property after we got home from church...... minus it's antlers, of course. What a shame and what a waste of meat. It really makes me angry on many levels.

I didn't call it in Friday night because, like most people, I was afraid. [And I've reported gunfire in the past and had little happen towards investigation.] I was home alone and I was shutting down for the night and I saw car lights though the kitchen window. It wasn't unusual to see cars, but it was to have them parked on the side of the road. So, I watched. Soon, one car drove away and I followed it to see where it would go. I didn't see, but I heard a gunshot. I turned off the house light in the front room and watched the other vehicle from the dark. I saw and heard nothing until the vehicle pulled a u-turn and drove away. In the headlights of oncoming highway traffic I could see it was a sedan type car, but couldn't tell anything else about it. I told myself that I'd go look in that area the next day, but exhausted sleep and a ton of housework distracted me... I forgot about it.

This morning, on the way to church, we noticed ravens in the trees (not completely unusual because of the small town dump about 5 miles away) and saw some things on the property that we didn't recognize (specifically brush piles). Last week we did give our neighbor permission to cut up dead & downed trees on our property, but we didn't know where he was going to start. After church, we went to look at the tree cutting and then we found the deer body. [The brush piles and the deer were not in the same place, just close enough to catch the attention from one to the other.]

It makes me so angry! To selfishly destroy and mutilate an animal for a trophy and waste the meat that would feed a family for a winter. It disgusts me. It also makes me realize how that bullet could fly into any of the homes in the vicinity not to mention the possibility of it straying into the highway traffic. So frightening to think on the "what if". I thank God that it was only a deer that was hit.

I can say that I did have a good experience talking to the TipMont fellow that was on duty. He took down my information and my numbers and told me that he would contact the Warden in our area. [However, being the first day of hunting season, it might be a while before he can get back to us.] He also encouraged me to call them if I ever hear gunshots after dark. "After dark, it's pretty much people up to no good." So, I've put their number on the same phone card as the local sheriff's number and I'll not hesitate to call them should it happen again.

But frankly, I'm going to hope that it doesn't happen again... ever.