Back about 1984 my hunting buddy Ray and I were drawn for a primitive weapons hunt at Chickasawhatchee WMA in south Georgia. On the morning before our departure I asked my wife if there was anything that she wanted me to do before leaving. She asked me to clean out the barn. She has been asking me to do this for about a year. I told her that I would and she left for work.

I had all day to do this chore and took my time. Ray was to pick me the next morning and we were going to ride down in his truck. I began pulling junk out of the barn and loading it into the back of my pickup to haul to the county dump. There was an old set of bed springs, a lawnmower frame with no engine and three wheels and other assorted junk. When finished, my truck was nearly full. I finished at about 4:55 that afternoon and it was too late to get it to the dump because it closed at 5:00

The next morning Ray pulled into the driveway and I was starting to put my hunting gear into his truck when I noticed something dripping from under his engine. Upon looking we noticed that his water pump was leaking.

I told Ray that we could just take my truck although it was full of junk and thats what we did. We made the trip in a little over two hours. It was on a thursday and we had a little over a half day to scout for the Friday and Saturday hunt. We were allowed to check in early so we could go directly to the woods that morning.

We found an area with deer sign and put up our portable climbing stands and returned the next morning before daylight. We hunted all day without any luck. We returned the next day and decided to hunt untill 2pm and start back home.

Saturday I came off my stand, packed it up and began walking back to my truck and Ray was there waiting on me. There was another pickup truck parked behindmine. Just before I reached the truck we heard a shot close by from the opposite side of the road from where we had hunted. We waited a few minutes and a lone hunter emerged. He told me that he had had surgery the week before and asked it we would help him with his deer. We agreed . I field dressed his deer and we drug it out of the swamp and loaded it into the back of his truck and he left. we put our equipment in back of my truck and left a short time later.

When we went to check out the barrel bellyed game warden asked if we had any luck. I told him no and he replied that I had traces of blood on my hands. I explained what had happened and he asked who it was and I explained that we didn't ask his name.

The Game warden walked up to my truck and announced that he wanted to search my it. I said,"Aw, you don't want to do that." He stated ,"Oh Yeah, we're gonna search that truck!"

He and another game warden started pulling junk out of the truck and it was about 80 degrees and humid. They worked about 30 minutes and were sweating so bad that neither had a dry thread on them . When finished he told the other warden, "Well,the're clean." All of the junk was piled up in a high pile behind my truck. I asked him, "What about all of this stuff" pointing to the junk pile. He sneered and said " you can load it yourself if you want it. I told him that I did not want it and we got in the truck and started driving off. As we were driving through the gate he was screaming, " HEY, HEY,YOU COME BACK HERE!"

We didn't get a half mile down 62 hwy before he had us pulled over. Ended up getting a sheriffs deputy there . I explained my side of what had happened and he asked the G.W. if thats what had taken place. The G.W said "Well Yeah" they walked back to the deputies car and talked a few minutes. The deputy walked beck to where we were standing and told us we were free to go.

We laughed all the way home and to this day have not been back to Chickasawhatchee WMA