Unfortunately....you're right. Idiots like that exist everywhere.
Several years ago I was out "groundhog hunting".....(of all things)....with my brother, his son, my brother's friend, his son & daughter, and myself. We all were armed......chuck rifles various sorts and sundry......and went to a farm in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, that we had permission to hunt chucks on....and had been there frequently in the past.
We parked, (two vehicles), near the farmer's barn.....where we had been told to....and walked several hundred yards down a tractor path towards the corner of four fields. As we neared the corner, there were some trees on the fence row, with a little edge cover, we observed a pick-up truck we hadn't seen before parked 100 to 150 yards or so out in the far right field. We saw a man with a rifle and binoculars and decided to go left another 150 to 200 yards away from the corner....putting us about 300+ yards from the other hunter. And just so there is no misunderstanding......he had a great field of view and field of fire from where he was seated. Only a small degree of it overlapped where we had move to. Most of our field of view...and field of fire.....was obscured from him....by another fence row, and line of trees. (So we weren't shooting chucks "out from under him".) All of the kids we had out were teens...and we set up so we had adults interspersed with the kids, but were within quiet conversational tone of most of each other. The adults were primarily interested in getting shots for the kids.
About 30-45 minutes after we set up....the guy got in his truck....spun a little tire....and took off down the tractor path. As it was getting on late afternoon....we thought nothing of it. Probably a little less than an hour later....I heard the crack of a bullet passing maybe 100 feet or so overhead...followed by a report several hundred yards from the direction of the road. I was looking to see where the shot had came from and saw two trucks...two hunters looking our direction......and I looked up the hill into the treed section to see what they were shooting at. They were shooting too high to hit anything in the field in front of us....so I figured something had to be on the hill in the woods. I couldn't see a thing. A moment or two later......CRACK - boom....another shot maybe less than 100 feet or so overhead. Again I looked.....checked the hill....checked the hunters....and sure as heck couldn't see what they were shooting at. At that time the 3rd CRACK - boom, and now I was getting "upset" to put it mildly. I picked up the binoculars and glassed the hunters and they were looking through their rifle scopes.....sh*t eating grins on their faces. We discussed it several moments...and started walking back the tractor path. As we neared the road I recognized the one truck.....and hunter....as the guy that was 300 yards or so away in the other field earlier. I asked them what they were shooting at....and hadn't they seen six people directly under their line of fire. The "new" guy says, "my brother came and got me and told me you all jumped his spot". I said, "what?" He repeated himself. I tried explaining to him when we saw the truck we quietly, quickly, carefully, moved away from his location so as not to interfere with his hunt....and were watching a part of pasture he couldn't see because of tree line. The guy didn't want to hear it....was belligerent....and I actually believed for a moment that he was going to force someone to shoot him because of his behavior with his rifle. And all over ground hog hunting...and someone being greedy with another person's property. Of all the stupid s**t! (Fortunately I had not unloaded my .25-06.....because I'm not sure what he would have done.....if it wasn't for the six loaded rifles there. What an idiot!)
We did mention to the farmer about the incident....(wanted to make sure he didn't hear just one side of the story).....and upon us describing the characters...he told us he had received numerous similar reports....and had banned them from hunting his property again. Unfortunately, I couldn't get around either of them to copy a hunting license number.....and both trucks had fresh mud on the license plates. So I didn't push the issue by trying to touch a truck. I filed a police report.....to insure if there was any further contact with these two miscreants.....and self defense became a real issue.....there would be a case already established as to "character" and "need".
That's about all you can do!
P.S. Haven't seen either of them since!
