O.T. The nerve of some people... (rant)

2 rants, I'll try to keep them short. My uncle is a retired farmer had 60 acres of woods near us. His son usually takes care of all the needs there, but this year, my uncle has some health issues, and this has taken up a lot of my cousin's time. He has not yet been able to make firewood. We decided to help out with it. I contacted a family friend, and it sorta snowballed from there. Saturday we had 10 people show up and cut well over half of the wood they will need for the winter.
Now for the rant. Uncle has a neighbor, early 20's, never held a job, southern transplant, He lives on a half acre of brush, weeds, and old foundations of an old farmstead, in a rundown moble home abandoned by his new stepdad 15 years ago. he fixed up the plumbing to have sorta running water, and has walled it off and lives in the kitchen. He cooks on a gas grill and heats it with a wood stove. He asked my uncle if he could cut firewood on that woods, and my uncle told him "take all you want". He has taken this to mean he has the rights to all the firewood on this lot. at about 3:30 in the afternoon Saturday we had to stop cutting for a half hour as he had 3 county squads there screaming at them to arrest us for stealing "his" wood!!!!. He argued with my cousin that my uncle had given him all the wood there. We just explained to the officers that the wood was going to the land owners home and that was the end of it, But the kid followed every load home to see that we were not stealing any of it.

Rant 2. in the last 2 years one person aproached my uncle about walking across ( not hunting on) this woodlot, to get to his deer stand on ajoining land. When I was skiding out the trees to cut up I found 7 homemade tree stands put in over the last two years.

#1 Whip the kid's a$$ and give him a load of firewood (his last free load or "freeload")

#2 make firewood out of the trees

Dave

Sounds like a big ol can of whoop a## would fix this problem

Your uncle needs to tell the guy next door that he is not to cut any more wood on his place, have the sheriff's there to witness this event and put it in writing. As far as the hunting goes there needs to be NO HUNTING NO TRESPASSING signs but up. If you uncle is ok with it and he says it ok to, take down those deer stands down and post a NO HUNTING NO TREASPASSING sign on the tree were they were. But your uncle has to authorise this to make it right. Bandit

if this fella gets hurt on your uncles property cutting wood, could get messy i would get legal advice quick. al

Neighbor will be over to borrow from your uncle's new wood pile so you had better get busy and cut enough for both places.

Reminds me of Briscoe Darling on the Andy Griffith Show. Ernest T Bass was giving them trouble and Andy asked him if he and the boys couldn't handle it themselves. He said "well,we thought about killin him,but we kinda hated to go that far".

I'm thinkin' a couple nice wide rings of tanglefoot on the trees with stands would be a nice start. If the feller complains, just tell him you didn't want him to be bothered by bugs when he's poaching.

Your Uncle need to serve notice that the neighbor kid is not to be on the land anymore. As someone else stated, if the kid gets hurt and has your Uncle"s permission to be cutting on the land, then your uncle can be held liable for damages. Here around Dubuque Co. Iowa it has happened several times in the last ten years. So most land owners will not let firewood be cut or hunter hunt.

I have become a real hard butt on it myself. NO none family member can hunt on my ground(No guests either) and no one can cut firewood but me. I had two beautiful two foot diameter white oaks cut down by a ex brother-in-law. He turned a thousand dollars of timber into hundred dollars of firewood then got huffy with me when I chewed him about it.

As for the deer stands. Could that be the same neighbor??? If he has no job how is he living? Welfare or stealing?

The old saying goes, "give someone an inch and they take a mile"

I would tell the low life to NOT come back,talk to your uncle let him know all about the guys actions ,put up lots of signs,amd offer him a wall to wall counceling session if he comes back

Well, the uncle is in the hospital for about another week then will be in a rehab ctr for a couple more weeks, so him talking to anybody will have to wait. The kid cuts downed wood with a bowsaw and drags it out to the car with an old car hood behind an old riding lawn mower, so he's not much of a threat to the quality trees.
Don't think the tree stands are his because we can't imagine him working up the ambition to make one, let alone 7.
Don't know how he makes what little money he is living on. but he seems to be sleeping in the day, and cars come and go all hours of the night.

I agree with dave2, I found tree stands in my Dad's timber, he said nobody asked his permission, so the trees made good firewood and some people were disappointed opening morning of deer season.

Crazy isn't it? I bought some land a few years back with an eye towards retirement. Working under the belief that if no one hunts it, everyone hunts it, I offered exclusive rights to the fellow across the road. It was 100 miles away from me so I couldn't keep an eye on it myself. By exclusive, I was very straight with him that he and he alone had permission. A friend caught him that year with 'his brother' and I ran them off. He complained that his 'brother' was really his boss and had no where to hunt. You can actually see the national forest from my land. Had to close it down for 2 years before a buddy retired down that way and hunts it now. No problem since.

And gall? This guy heats with wood so I offered some timber as I cleared. He said that was great and would I cut and deliver it to him? Grrrrrr.

Perhaps he's selling and/or using illegal substances at night??? Best to tell him he's no longer allowed on the property and can get his firewood elsewhere after abusing the priviledge. A sheriff or deputy may be able to help in that regard.

Your Uncle needs to serve him LEGAL notice. Not just talk to him. Your Uncle will need to be able to prove in court he told him to quit cutting wood/trespassing. That takes a officer of the court delivered or/plus a registered signature required letter. Why go to this trouble? The kid is bad news. He called the law on you. Do you think he will honor any verbal agreement??? I don"t. He is not being a normal upstanding citizen. Not to many honest endeavors happen at all hours of the night. I would bet drugs or stolen property. Any pot growing on the ground?? He might have a cash crop hide there as well.

It toke me two years to get all of the low life off of a farm I bought several years ago. Had to go to court on some of them. They all claimed they had easement rights. Nothing was on record at the court house but I ,as the owner of record, had to prove that there was not right of egress (crossing my land with permission).

I know to some people here it may sound like I like to cause issues. That is not the case. I just believe that if I own something it is mine to do with as I want. My neighbors have that same right too. I never have complained about them using their property. I get along with most of my neighbors. A few are not here much so not anything wrong just not here.

That's for darned sure. I had a neighbor who put up a stand on my land,probably 20-30 feet from his own land. Probably 4-5 years after he put it up without asking,I strung up a new 5 strand barbed wire fence around that 40 so I could pasture it. He had the nerve to ask me if I'd put a gate in the fence so he could ride his 4 wheeler to his deer stand.

I would say you have a good reason to rant there. A few years ago I was walking a tre line on one of my farms and came across a guy hanging no trespassing/No hunting signs on my land. I asked the man what he was doing and he told me he owned that property and was putting up signs to keep people out and then told me I was trespassing and needed to leave. I played along for a minute and asked how long he had owned this property and who did he buy it from. He gave me some year and bs name. Buy now the man was gettin mad and called the law. So we all met up on the road and i pulled out my plat book and showed the officer and the man that we owned that and he was trespassing. The man got several tickets for trespassing and damaging property for hangin his signs. I had to go to court over it but nobody else goes on our land now without permission because of it.

Don't think he is growing a crop there, My uncle rents it out in the summer to a Amish neighbor for pasture, and as hungry and skinny as the cattle and horses they pasture there, any medical crop there would be eaten up really fast.

Funniest part was waching this kid have to admit to the cops he called that, no he didn't own the land and, no he didn't have a signed document to prove his right to the wood.

You and i see it the same way we pay the taxes but are the bad guys to the free loaders!!!

That is your vault for letting it stay there for 4 or 5 years. It would have been torn down in about 1 hours after I found it. You have to man-up and protect your land. Tom

I think I'd be waking the woods a little bit more often he may be farming your land too.

For Medicinal purposes of course. HMmmmmm!!

First the legal issue. Your Uncle is liable if this loser gets hurt on his land. Some states are different but if he gets hurt he can sue you. If he's growing his own wacky weed on your Uncles property, guess who can go to jail? We have a huge problem with this in my area.

They tore it down themselves before I even strung the wire.