When I read the title of this thread, I thought it would be about something along the lines of a game warden hunting without a license or ignoring bag limits. But not wearing blaze orange while working, trying to catch people doing something illegal?

It makes it kinda hard to approach someone and detect wrongdoing if you broadcast where you are and give them advanced warning that you're coming. Were you more upset that he was coming to check you and possibly interrupt your hunt, or that he wasn't letting you know from 300 yards away that he was coming?

First, having a hunt interrupted by a warden performing a license check is part of hunting. When you buy and carry a hunting license, you should know that it can be checked at any time by someone with the authotity to do so. It's not an all-day interruption, but it's a necessary thing. If you're totally legal, instead of getting bent out of shape about it or being angry with the warden, you should understand that the warden doesn't know you're legal and has to check everyone the same way. If you want to blame someone for you having to be checked, blame the idiots who have no licenses, don't tag deer, shoot overlimits of X or Y, and generally make it necessary that we ALL get checked. It's like my Marine Corps drill instructor used to say: "we all have to pay (for us, payment meant pushups) for the 10% of us who can't get their sh*& straight and do things the right way..." That's how society works, to include fish and game enforcement.

Second, I consider a game warden not wearing orange to be about as "above the law" as a police officer working undercover, buying drugs from a dope dealer or speeding to catch a speeder. Is he technically breaking the law by buying the drugs? Yes. But it's a necessary breaking of a law in order to do his job. More importantly, he's not breaking the law for personal gain, benefit, or convenience, but in the furtherance of his agency's mission.

Not wearing orange during deer season - even for a game warden - is certainly dangerous. It's about the same as driving at night with no lights on in order to look for people shining deer: a danger and probably illegal, to boot. But it's a calculated risk that most wardens will accept in order to effectively do their jobs. The other option is to wear it, be completey overt, and let wrongdoers keep on doing what they do.