By JEFFERSON WEAVER
Staff Writer

Mitchell Cox is angry.

The Dothan area resident was in his shop on a recent evening with several friends when they heard a shot in a nearby field, more than an hour after legal shooting hours were over.

“We knew what they were doing when we saw the vehicle,” he said. “Somebody’d shot another deer.”

Cox and his friends jumped into their own vehicles and gave chase. They spotted the suspected night hunters and were able to get a license plate number before the vehicle escaped.

The poachers left behind a dead whitetail buck that Cox said “might have weighed 200 pounds.

“We didn’t find the deer ‘til Sunday,” he said, “and it wasn’t any good by then. They just cut the head off and took the antlers.”

They gave the information about the suspected poachers to Wildlife Enforcement Officer Charles Hinson, who is investigating the incident. He said he is looking for four suspects, including a female who drove the getaway vehicle.

“This hit home even harder because I just finished teaching another hunter safety course,” Hinson said. “Ethics and not wasting a game animal is a big part of the course.”

Cox said there have always been night-hunters, also called jacklighters and poachers, in the area.

“In the past few years,” he said, “it’s just gotten worse.

Wanton waste

“People don’t take them for meat,” Cox said. “They just shoot’em for the antlers. Sometimes they might take the backstrap, but most time, they just cut the heads off and leave the rest. All they want is the rack.”

Cox said the problem is aggravating to avid deer hunters who follow the rules. State law forbids shooting deer later than one-half hour after legal sunset.

“We all hunt down here, and it makes all of us look bad when somebody does this,” he said. “Everything we kill, we either eat or give away to folks who need the meat. There’s no reason just to kill a deer and let it lay.”

Law officers have also been busy lately dealing with illegally dumped carcasses near Whiteville, Riegelwood, Dothan and elsewhere.

Bodies of deer – some missing the antlers or a small amount of meat – often turn up on roadsides or other public property.

Dumping of remnants on a highway right-of-way or without permission on private property is littering, punishable by fines up to $1,000. Dumping of remnants into a creek or waterway is littering and a pollution violation.

Cox said some of the poachers are so brazen that they shoot deer almost in people’s yards.

“One of the fellows, the spotlighters, shot the deer less than 50 yards from his house,” Cox said. “His children were there, and that’s just dangerous. That’s happened four or five times – these people don’t care. They’re endangering everybody, and all they want is the horns.”

Cox said his community has had some success with getting license tags of suspect vehicles and reporting illegal kills to the Wildlife Commission.

“It takes everybody working together to do it,” Cox said. “If everybody makes an effort, then the Wildlife can catch ’em – it’s hard to hide when somebody has your license tag number.”

Poachers active

Reports of night hunting have been up this year, according to Lt. Matt Long of the Enforcement Division, and local Wildlife officers have been targeting the poachers with some success.

“My guys have been doing real well, “ Long said. “They’re catching some of them – more than usual.”

Long said his officers get multiple calls each year from deer carcasses dumped illegally or allowed to rot in fields.

Oftentimes just the antlers, hams, or backstraps are taken, he said, but some shooters just kill the animal and leave.

“It becomes a littering issue and sometimes a health issue,” Long said. “Sometimes people just shoot a deer and dump it in someone’s yard because they have a problem with the person.”

Hinson said the waste of the game animal is “ridiculous.” He said wanton waste isn’t just a problem with night hunters, but with some who shoot deer in daylight as well.

“Why are you going to kill something and not take the meat?” he said. “There’s so much that is just wasted when somebody does this, and it makes all hunters look bad.”

Hinson said people are sometimes reluctant to turn in people they know are illegally shooting, and sometimes wasting deer.

“They hate to turn in their friends,” Hinson said.

Many spotlighters eventually cause their own undoing, Hinson said, especially when trophy-size bucks wander into farm fields and pastures during and just after the rut.

“They’ll shoot a big deer and have to brag to somebody,” Hinson said. “It gets back to us eventually.”

People who suspect violations can call 1-800-662-7137 24 hours a day, or call 911 to report illegal shooters.