SC man ordered to pay $132K for shooting hunting dog 🐕‍🦺

I’m currently at the “it’s Thursday already?” phase of the workweek and am unsure as to whether or not that is a good thing as of yet. For those of you who have also made it through, a pat on the back is deserved.

With that in mind, let’s all take a minute to grab a coffee or whiskey (no judgement) and get this Thursday morning dispatch out the door.

Here's what's worth reading about today:

• Hound killer - S.C. man ordered to pay $132K for dog killing 🐶

• Something’s fishy - Cali fishermen nailed poaching in Wyoming 🎣

• Drone hunt? - Maybe, but only for hogs says new SC bill 🚁

• Remembering the King - Great footage of a deer that was taken too soon 🤴

NOT THE WAY TO HANDLE THINGS
SOUTH CAROLINA MAN ORDERED TO PAY $132,000 FOR SHOOTING HUNTING DOG

A South Carolina man was recently ordered to pay $132,000 for fatally shooting a hunting dog while he was sitting in his deer stand back in the fall of 2023.  

It was September 23, 2023 when William Gray had settled in to chase a large mature buck he knew was roaming his private property in Sumpter, SC. According to accounts posted to Facebook by Gray, he was sitting in his stand and minding his own business when he heard a pair of hunting dogs heading his way. According to his post, Gray then went on to say that he climbed down out of his stand and at that point saw the two dogs coming down a path towards him.…

🎣 Three California anglers fined for exceeding fish limits. A trio of Californian anglers have pleaded guilty to exceeding trout possession limits and violating size restrictions in Wyoming. A resident reported the anglers had been using their shop to process game meat and store fish, including 32 brown trout (18 of which were over the 16-inch size limit). The anglers initially claimed they caught only three trout per day, but later admitted to exceeding the daily and possession limits and size restrictions.

Regulations for the North Platte River where the anglers were fishing allow a daily and possession limit of three trout, with only one fish permitted more than 16 inches long. Each angler was issued citations for exceeding the limit of game fish and violating size restrictions.  They subsequently pleaded guilty to pay a combined total of $1,140 in fines and $1,500 in restitution. They also lost their fishing privileges in Wyoming and 48 other states for one year.

🚁 New South Carolina bill would regulate drone-assisted hunting. Introduced by State Representative Richard Yow, bill, H. 3945 would authorize the SC Department of Natural Resources to regulate the use of drones for locating and eliminating feral pigs on private land.

The proposed regulations are modeled after those in Texas and would require drone hunting properties to be registered with the SCDNR, much like the state's current night hunting property registration requirements. Landowners could use drones to hunt on their own land or hire others with an SCDNR-issued "aerial management program" permit to eliminate the hogs. Drone operators would be required to maintain flight logs and would be limited exclusively to land management purposes - recreational hunters would be prohibited from using such permits.

If passed, the new regulatory framework would also apply to the targeting of coyotes. The bill unanimously cleared a subcommittee in the S.C. House last week without material amendments. It must now pass through the full committee.

👑 Awesome footage of the buck they called "King Louie" in upstate New York. Unfortunately, the King was poached last fall as he stood in a pumpkin patch under the cover of night.

He’s since been caped out and will be mounted for the state’s DEC as one of the state’s largest bucks on record. Although he has not yet been officially scored, it’s rumored that he may very well eclipse the measurements of the current record held in New York State since 1939.

Terrible to see a great go down like that.

To read our full coverage of the King Louie saga - you can read it here.

🪤 Steel Trap Richard : A fully-grown Mississippi beaver can weigh upwards of 70 pounds and is immensely strong. The traps used to snuff these creatures are comparably swarthy. To cock such an imposing contrivance, you typically have to stand on the jaws before engaging the trigger. It takes a grown man’s body weight to overcome the spring pressure. Once my friend had the trap armed, he wriggled into his neoprene waders and got to work.

The plan was to take up the trap, slip into the water, and secure the thing at the base of a prominent beaver slide. As luck would have it, my buddy entered the murky water holding the trap by each side with the mouth facing toward him. This turned out to be a really bad idea.

Thusly oriented, he inadvertently encountered an underwater stob that tripped the mechanism. In an instant, the jaws leapt from his hands and closed on the front of his waders. As cruel luck might have it, the massive trap also caught the poor guy’s penis. Read the full story.

🌄 Caribou of the Colville Country: The headwaters of the Colville River begin along the northern edge of Alaska’s Brooks Range, and from there the river runs north and east for about 350 miles before it spills into the Arctic Ocean west of Prudhoe Bay.

Along its course the Colville, located entirely above the Arctic Circle, doesn’t pass anything resembling a town. When the river flows (it’s covered in ice for more than half the year), it passes through hundreds of miles of empty, treeless tundra. Researchers have named the confluence of the Colville and its tributary, the Etivluk River, the most remote place in all of North America. 

After ten hours riding upstream in a Zodiac loaded with caribou-hunting gear, I had no trouble believing this was indeed the most far-flung destination on the continent.  Read the full story.

👮‍♂️ Gang-Busting Game Warden:  The young game warden had known what he was going to find ever since he first spotted the big Lincoln in the forest clearing and saw the machine gun lying across the back seat. After glancing quickly around him, he had moved quietly and carefully through the woods toward the dam, and now, standing on the edge of the riverbank above the rushing water, he could look down and see them. He stood there silently in the shade of the trees, nervously rubbing his hands on his trousers, knowing that only a fool would try to go down there and take them alone.

All I have to do is turn around and get the hell out of here, he told himself, and nobody will ever know. With those guns, they could cut me to pieces before I’d gone two feet. His eyes traveled from the automatic rifle that was leaning up against the sign reading CLOSED AREA. FISHING PROHIBITED to the heavy pistol butts that protruded from the pockets of the three fishermen. Why should I get myself shot over nothing but a few lousy fish, Ernest Swift thought. Read the full story.

Oh, and one more thing…