Did you ever catch anyone looking at you through a rifle Scope?

[Harve Curry]

When hunting or guiding I have noticed 3 times in about the last 25 years a hunter look at me through his rifle scope.

Once in Arizona, Catalina Mountains.

Second time down inthe Black Range near the Aldo Leopold Wilderness of New Mexico. Deer season I was on horse back and could see the guy plainly about 300 yards below.. He turn and looked right at me and when I dismounted he looked some more. SOB. I went lookin for him and he disappeared down a canyon. Where he had been was marked by a Coors Silver bullet can stuck on a juniper branch that still had fresh beer in it. He would not answer my hello call to him.
I felt like I had a target on me so got out of the area.
When I told the G&F warden this story I asked him if I could shoot him for that, he said not unless I see smoke first

Third time in the San Mateos guiding a bow hunter, a boy with a scoped 22 on a 4wheeler stops and looks at me across a pond threough his scope. I got up and let him know I was , he ran off to his daddy like I did something wrong to him.

In the 2002 season a elk guide was killed by his hunter near Reserve, NM, when the hunter watched him through his scope and the elk he'd shot. When the guide got out across the canyon to the downed elk and moved the antler the hunter shot his guide through the head at about 400 yards.

 

[Nathanael_Greene]

It hasn't happened to me, but the thought of it makes my blood run cold.

 

[mummac]

The guy instructing the hunter's education class I'm taking, mentioned that today. Personally, I wouldn't even think to use a rifle scope to look at something I wasn't getting ready to shoot, but looking around the class and seeing how seriously some people weren't taking it, I can see it happening. The thought kinda turns me off of the idea of hunting.

 

[Harve Curry]

I think this is done mostly by people who have not taken a hunters saftey course.
They beer drinkin dude I mention is of an age group who never had to do a hunters saftey course. Plus he has no respect for the land, or hunting by drinking miles from camp in November at 10am and littering.

The boy is an extension of his parents, driving around fast and shooting at anything that he thought might be a target, his parents are the ones that turned him loose and he learns by example. He will have to do a hunters saftey someday , but if it's not the normal mode for his parents what good is it.

 

[anapex]

It happened once to me while my Dad and I were hunting on some state game land in western PA. We were on the lowside of a valley when bubba came up over the other side and decides he wants to try and figure out who we are from a distance. I was like 15 then and my Dad's not much of one to confront someone so we high tailed it to where we were headed pretty quick. Pretty much the rest of the morning though was him enforcing why you bring a pair of binoculars along on a hunt with you.

 

[hps1]

Having taught rifle safety/marksmanship and conducted highpower matches for more years than I care to admit, I am not bashful when someone steps over the (safety) line. First offense earns a quick safety lecture. Second time and one of us leaves the area (Who leaves depends upon how much control I have over the situation/premises). I realize this is probably not possible when hunting public lands.

You know the old saying, stupid is forever, ignorance can be fixed! If it can't be fixed with one reminder, consider it stupidity and move on to safer area or remove the offender.

Perhaps The most important benefit of the lease system that prevails in Texas is the fact that you have some control over who hunts the area that you hunt, either directly or indirectly.

I sometimes envy those who live in states with lots of public hunting land, but then I recall the horror stories I have heard (and a couple I have witnessed) and am more content with paying trespass fees.

Regards,
hps

 

[HankB]

Even when I was hunting in Africa, I carried - and used! - a set of compact binoculars to do my "glassing."

Only when I was considering a shot did I switch to my riflescope.

 

[Larry Ashcraft]

When I took Hunters Safety over 30 years ago, the instructor was man enough to tell this story on himself.

He was sitting at the edge of a clearing when he saw a horse across the clearing. He looked through his scope and it was a horse and rider. The cowboy rode slowly up to him, got off the horse, unfolded himself to about six and a half feet, looked down and said:

"The next time you point a rifle at me, boy, you'd better pull the trigger."

 

[Art Eatman]

I don't know if anybody has ever looked at me through his scope. I've mostly hunted on private lands, though, so the odds are against it.

Back in my much younger and poorer days, I'd sometimes look country over via my scope. I once accidentally swept another hunter--and that gave me pause, for sure. Yeah, my finger was off the trigger. No, the crosshairs were never on him. So? Wrong. Thing. To. Do. I played the "What if...?" game with myself.

Lotsa lightweight binoculars out there. I even seen 'em at WallyWorld...

Art

 

[JohnKSa]

When I told the G&F warden this story I asked him if I could shoot him for that

If you can hit him in the eye through the scope I think you'd be justified. That should pretty much answer any questions that might come up.

Using a scope to find game/identify targets and gun mounted lights are a pet peeve of mine. Both imply that you're pointing the gun at something you haven't fully identified -- a really bad idea.

 

[Harve Curry]

QUOTE: If you can hit him in the eye through the scope I think you'd be justified. That should pretty much answer any questions that might come up.

Since I been hunting with a 1881 Marlin 45-70 for the last 12 years or so, that would be a tuff at 300+ yards.

 

[BLUEDOT72]

A bunch of illegal Mexicans were hunting in the San Bernardino mountains a number of years back and I "felt" a scope on me. It didn't take long before that "wet" felt my rifle butt on his head!!!!

That is why California doesn't require Orange clothing and it is very logical to wear camis.

 

[spectr17]

Back a few years I had a father/son team glass me with their rifle scopes all the way up the canyon toward me. I finally got behind a rock and started cursing them to no end. They saw my movement and of course glassed all around and then finally heard my shouts and backed out of the canyon.

LAter at camp a truck pulled up and asked my partner and I how we had done that day. As I walked up to the truck I noticed the distinctive camo pants the son had on were the same as the squarehead who was glassing me earlier. I calmly pulled my .45 out and screwed it in the kid's ear and asked how it felt to have a loaded gun aimed at your head. The father started babbling about having to get home soon and we waved adieu as they roared off down the dirt road.

Never saw them again on that mountain thank god and hopefully they took up golf, they looked more like the golfing type.

Looking back it was a dumb thing for me to do, I was fresh out of the military and a bit rough around the edges then.

 

[ID_shooting]

"calmly pulled my .45 out and screwed it in the kid's ear"

Hmmm, there is no "high roadish" statement I can honestly say about this other than one lame mistake followed up with an even worse "dumb a@@ish" move.

 

[ojibweindian]

I calmly pulled my .45 out and screwed it in the kid's ear and asked how it felt to have a loaded gun aimed at your head.

I understand the sentiment, and realize that you now recognize it as foolish. You do realize, don't you, that depending on who papa bear was, you could have been in serious poo.

 

[torpid]

"I calmly pulled my .45 out and screwed it in the kid's ear and asked how it felt to have a loaded gun aimed at your head... Looking back it was a dumb thing for me to do"


If by "dumb", you mean "criminal" and even worse than their offense, then yes.

ojibweindian is 100% right- it is fortunate (for you) that you didn't get "glassed" again by the boy's father.

If you think that being scoped filled you with righteous rage, imagine being a father and watching someone put a gun to your son's head...

 

[Frohickey]

I know that this might be off topic, but there are a small group of hunters out there that definitely look at you with a rifle scope mounted to a rifle, and this is definitely a bad thing.

But, there are also a small group of hunters that have an optical device, such as a rifle scope or spotting scope that is mounted to a rifle stock like object, WITH NO RIFLE. This allows more easier more comfortable scanning of the area. From a distance, it could look like they have a rifle pointed at you.

 

[444]

Yes, I had it happen to me a few years ago while elk hunting in Arizona. I was sitting on the ground and saw another hunting walking toward me. I waved so he would see me and recognize that I was a human. He immediately looked at me through is rifle scope. I didn't say anything about it for two reasons: #1 I was a guest of my friend's cousin and so was the guy who "scoped" me. I didn't want to make trouble for my friend. #2 The guy that did it was an old man.

That was the one and only time I am ever going to let that pass. As Larry mentioned above, if you point a rifle at me, and put the sights on me, I am going to treat that action just like the deadly threat that it is. There is going to be physical violence: I am almost certainly not going to use deadly force but at a minimum you will be punched in the mouth and probably have your rifle wrapped around a tree.

 

[spectr17]

ojibweindian is 100% right- it is fortunate (for you) that you didn't get "glassed" again by the boy's father.

Fortunate for me? he he, I had just gotten out of the air commandos and I can assure you the tussle would have been over rather quickly. Even if the guy had been a bad motor scooter he would have wished he hadn't gotten out of bed that day if he had cleared the truck seat. Fortunate for the oxygen waster in the truck he went home to mama and was still able to eat apples that night. I think that's why he backed out so quickly, he saw a little fire in our eyes and realized him and his kid had screwed the pooch. That and they had also glassed my buddy and he wanted a piece of them too. Something about looking down the wrong end of a barrel and knowing the havoc it can wreck that gets your heart moving and your hands wanting to strangle someone.

I'm not sure about you boys but I don't take too kindly to idiots pointing loaded guns at me ON PURPOSE, I don't care who they are or how it's done. I've smacked a couple people with their own guns after they refused to watch their muzzles or safe their guns. Not being a jackoff, it's just that if you're around me I'm not getting maimed or dying because of your stupidity. Either handle the weapon properly of get the you know what out of my AO. More than one hunter in our party has been kicked out of a blind or hunt after displaying inept gunhandling.

In hindsight, maybe just rubbing a few knots on the guy's head would have been a more appropriate response. Of course now days, you'd lose in court and end up picking trash on the highway for a few weekends and a little lighter in the wallet. On the other hand I bet the guy and his kid wouldn't ever dare glass a hillside again with their riflescopes.

Oh, by the way, we just had some idiots out here in SoCal doing some early quail hunting (poaching) and one shot and killed his buddy. So there still a bunch out there. Stay safe.

 

[Art Eatman]

spectr17, I can understand and agree with your emotion about it, but pulling your own weapon is not justified. That's a revenge thing, not a defense thing. And, had your rage resulted in an unintended Bang!, you'd have had no real defense in court against a charge of voluntary manslaugher (Murder 2, in some language). The core of all this discussion, really, is "self control".

Now, courts have held that such an action as somebody looking at you through a scope is a provocation. You'd probably get a freebie for one or maybe two good, solid punches. (This is second-hand experience; I was not the provokee, but a friend of mine got off for just that very reason.) A thorough beating, of course, would be different in the eyes of the court.

There's a reason for my signature line...

Art

 

[ojibweindian]

I take back my previous comment. You haven't learned a thing, judging by your last post.

 

[IMTHDUKE]

Only one that I know about....he was shot dead....."Vietnam 67 Chu li"

 

[Swamprabbit]

Happened to me about 12 years ago. I was in a field blind and there was a hunter in a tree stand on the adjoining farm. I was using binoculars and saw him looking at me through his scoped Marlin 30-30. He was about 400 yds away. I didn't like it at all but smirked when I realized that my 03-A3 Springfield I had with me would have definitely out classed him should he pull something stupid.

 

[unreal45]

It has happened to me on public land.

The kid walked up to the otherside of the ravine from me and sat down.
When i saw he was looking at me through his scope.
I yelled "WATCH WHERE YOU POINT YOUR GUN!" and left to find a new location.
I figure i let him off easy




You can go a long way with a smile. You can go a lot farther with a smile and a gun.
-Al Capone

 

[torpid]

spectr17-

Your pride in your dubious choice of actions speaks volumes.

"Oh, by the way, we just had some idiots out here in SoCal doing some early quail hunting (poaching) and one shot and killed his buddy."

And screwing the muzzle of your .45 into some kid's ear is safer how?

RULE I:ALL GUNS ARE ALWAYS LOADED.
You either ignored this rule or knew it was loaded already.

RULE II: NEVER LET THE MUZZLE COVER ANYTHING YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO DESTROY.
So you chose to ignore this as well, or were you just actually willing to take the chance of executing this kid with a ND in your righteous indignation?

Yes, we all see that you were 100% totally wronged by unsafe idiots who showed blatant disregard for gun safety and possible lethal accidents.

The part we don't agree with is having a pleased chuckle in looking back at the way you acted even worse than they did.