ORIGINAL: davidmil
Against my better wishes and new signature I'm going to give you advice. First off, realize it is HIS land to do with as he wants. You are a paying guest. Secondly, you have to be reasonable. Expecting him to lock up his critters every day of the season is unthinkable. Cattle have to feed and pasture. You're a guest. Work around them. Get off the pastures and in the woods. I don't think you should even consider the land lord wanting to shoot on his land as a breach of contract. I'd say he's the one exception to the rule. He can at any point he wants terminate your agreement I suspect. You have to learn to work WITH him, not find fault and fight with him.You didn't buy the land for Pete's sake. You're paying for the priviledge of hunting it. Farmers work long and hard hours. He has to do what he has to do when he has the time. If that means moving some equipment while you're on stand. Well just TOUGH. You say you have feeders set up you're hunting over. Put them off the beaten path. A feeder doesn't have to be in the middle of the mans pasture. Always practice LOW IMPACT MINIMUM INTRUSION. The guy doesn't want to see you driving through his yard 2 or 3 times a day. Surely there are other access routes that are less visual. Maybe the farmer said he'd pen his animals. Maybe he didn't understand you or you him, but his lively hood comes first and your pettiness about OUR LEASE OUR LEASE is the last thing he's worried about. You ask my opinion, you're just as wrong as you can be. You can't get in a bitching session with the owner and expect it to go your way. At a minimum you'll be given your walking papers as there are more people waiting in the wings to take your place. My advice, put yourself in his shoes. Follow a farmer for a couple days. You don't like it, you don't have to stay there.
Wow did you make alot of assumptions.
I will quibble with your term guest. After paying, that makes me a
Customer.
As far as the cows go. We didn't mind them being in the field at all. As I said earlier, they were grazing on the game trails. I should have noted that the game trails were not on any field but far back in the woods. We had a couple of tree stands and bow blinds far off the trail. We did have rifle stands on the fields, but our feeders were just on the other side of the fences so the cows could not get to them and they weren't in the way if he did need to do something with the field. (read: LOW IMPACT MINIMUM INTRUSION) Another note, he had about 75 acres of grazing land that he could have used that had electric fense and was nowhere near our hunting area.
While I understand that he must make a living, I also need to point out that the entire time we were there, he planted no crops whatsoever. If he was actively farming that land, we would have never leased with him in the first place.
As far is driving through his driveway, we weren't. In fact, we have no idea where he lived. There was a condemned shack on the land with no floors and no roof, other than that, there were no buildings at all.
If he has other pasture land and isn't actively farming the land we are using, I expect him to respect it as hunting land and treat it as such. We paid alot of money and put alot of work into that land to make our hunts successful.
We consulted him before we put up some of our stands and blinds specifically because we were worried about the cows. There was no misunderstanding. He was aware of everything we did.
Another note. His identifying that he saw my footprints all over his land lets me know that he has also walked the land after we left. I don't know how you guys feel about it, but I want to do my initial scouting and then place my stands and then get the hell out till it's time to hunt. I want the deer as comfortable as possible.
This was our very first deer lease and since my buddy bought some land and is building a lodge, it is most likely our last one. If, however, I ever do get a lease again, I will make sure that what we are expected to do and what the landowner is expected to do are very clearly defined.
We didn't so much mind him hunting the land when we weren't there, but when you come back to your blind and find that trash and casings you didn't put there, it's a bad feeling.
EDIT: As far as the rut goes. As I stated earlier, it was on the edge.. the very edge of the field. It was in the tracks of where the farmer himself drove. It was not in the field itself. (the unused field) We called him to make him aware of it and did offer to fix it when we came back. He told us not to worry about it and then later complained to the contracting agent about it. I thought it was rather two-faced of him.