Pearl Jam.. let me start by saying that I am not intending to stir up anything but feel I need to voice my concerns as another hunter..I would like to address your use of the term Truck hunters when refering to anyone who hunts with dogs. I will strongly disagree with the lumping of all houndsmen into a sterotype because of a few individuals. I grew up a still hunter and still do a great deal of it. I had alot of friends who hunted with dogs and about 10 years ago I went with them and have been doing it ever since. It is like the addiction of pulling a bow back on your first whitetail. I still hunt a few hours everyday form the opening of archery all the way through black powder. Once general fireamrs season starts I still do alot of still hunting but I also go hunt with a group who runs dogs. I have even still hunted a property that we ran that morning and saw deer that were relaxed.
But back to your statement, I know there are some poachers who try to call themselves hunters that drop the dogs onto someones land and go to the other side and wait for them to come through or drop them onto land that is beside theirs and run the deer onto their land. Those people I have big issues with as they are not hunting they are no better than someone who spotlights a deer (killing it with a spotlight not just shinning and watching them). But there area lot of hunters that run dogs that do it like it should be and on their property and dont hunt off the public roads! I know alot of groups around here have rules that if someone has to leave a section of property to try to catch the dogs that whoever leaves must leave their gun with a memeber who is staying on the land. That way if they were stoped or someone sees them trying to catch a dog in the road and stops and questions them they can not be blammed for road hunting. NOt all of them do it but I know some that do that, but even still I know some that still leave to catch dogs and wont shoot anything where they are not suppose to no matter how big it is.
I also am sickend by the people who are saying I am going to shoot any dog I see running deer. First off in Va it is a felony to kill a sporting dog no matter if its a lab someone uses for ducks or an old hound running deer. It is not the dogs fault at all, I knwo some people say they cant read signs while this is true it is not the argument i have. The dog is only doing what its instincts are telling it to do. It is natural for a hound to run things.. now where that hound is let out to start running is not up to it. It doesnt make the choice to stop the truck and open the dog box doors. Now it does make the choice once it hits the ground to start doing what it is natural for it to do. The owners are the ones who control where they let them out to do it. Yes you can let them out on your land and they run onto other peoples land because they dont know where the lines are at, in this case no one is wrong and the dogs should be caught as soon as possible and most clubs I know do this and have good relationships with the landowners aournd them and the hunters who hunt there so they can retreive their dogs soon as not to disturb others that badly. BUt why shoot the dog??? they are not in the wrong and should not be held responsible... call the sheriffs office or dept of game and inland fisheries to handle it.

I do not mean to stir up anything just trying to open up some eyes that not all hunters are as one bad apple is!! It would be like catching a still hunter that was trespassing on land i was hunting then me saying all still hunters were poachers(trespassers) not very fair huh!! I will get down off my soap box now!! JMO