There were a number of people there over a number of days. One group in particular had 3+ people there over the span of 2-3 days, which included the killing and recovery of the elk.

As fate would have it living in a small town, I got a call from a local letting me know what happened at about 1pm today. A guy took an acquaintance of mine's son onto the property to chase the elk, meaning to have them chase the elk off of the property (still trespassing), but the 14 year old shot the elk, roughly 5-6 times. Ran out of rounds, had to have dad bring another rifle or rounds. Dad apparently brought another rifle, or rounds, and the elk ended up being killed and then field dressed and quartered.

It puts me in a bit of a quandary. Decided to give a 1 strike only warning to the friend of my acquaintance. Pretty direct, "don't come back on the property again, ever. I have multiple pictures of you on multiple cameras that you didn't see. Continued trespassing will result in WDFW getting hold of the pics and carcass for prosecution." I'm sure he'll talk to my acquaintance, who's wife is friends with my wife. That'll be interesting for sure, but I'll let them approach me on that and explain. It is a small enough town, so we'll see each other soon enough. I've made mistakes in my past, so I'll give them a pass on this, for now. I think we all have made judgment errors in our past.

Now I need to explain to the landowner, who lives in Germany, that I have figured out who shot the elk, and why I suggest that the verbal warning is all that needs to be handed out. Hopefully I retain rights to the property because of someone else's screw up. I think they'll see it my way.

You see, last year when I shot my bear on this property, I had been accused by another good ol' boy, not directly, but to the adjacent landowner that I had shot the bear on the neighboring property. The adjacent landowner complained to my landowner. Good thing I had pictures of the recovery to prove my case, as the bear ended up by some very specific landmarks, and I was believed.

As the world turns....in McCleary.