ESTESBOG

by Peter Walker

(Maine whitetail photo by David Walker)

One of my favorite game warden stories was told to me years after the fact over cups of coffee with two of the three Maine wardens involved in the caper. Roger and Danny were in the same Maine Warden Service training class in the early 1970s. As the end of several months of training drew near, they spent more and more time in the field being mentored by experienced district officers.

The fall night of their big adventure, the two were assigned to patrol for night hunters in eastern Maine under the tutelage of Eric, a tall, gruff, deep-voiced veteran of the Maine Warden Service. The three were sitting in the dark in a pickup truck pulled into the edge of the woods off a large field. The field was well off the highway and accessible via a one-lane woods road.

Catching “deer jackers,” as they are known in Maine, is a game of patience. It takes long hours of sitting quietly, waiting for the bad guys to make a move. Even then you must witness them at least using a spotlight in order to make a pinch. In Maine, the fields are carved from dense woodlands. So that narrows the playing field a bit for the game wardens just as it concentrates the whitetails for the poachers.

That long ago evening the veteran and the two rookies sat for hours crammed in the single seat of the truck in pitch darkness without seeing or hearing a thing. Finally they decided it was time to stretch. Getting out, they walked to the side of the little cove off the main field and were relieving themselves in the bushes when a car came speeding up the road and caught them by surprise.

The wardens and their pickup were back just far enough that the headlights of the poachers’ car missed them. As the three stood a short distance from the car, it swung so that its headlights swept across the field and illuminated a whitetail doe. Almost as quickly a shot rang out from the car window and the deer lay flopping on the ground.

The poachers must have planned a hit and run caper where they would return to get the deer after making sure no one was around. The car spun around and headed back out the access road.

This action was the first the two rookies had ever witnessed. Young Roger yelled, “Let’s get ‘em!”, then raced for the driver’s side of the pickup.

By the time Danny scrambled into the passenger’s side of the cab, Roger had the engine started, the blue lights flashing, and the siren on. “Go, go, go, go, go!” yelled Danny as Roger pushed down on the accelerator.

A half second later it occurred to both young men that they had forgot something important. As fast as he’d gunned the big V-8, Roger slammed on the brakes. Eric, as it turned out, upon missing the bus had opted to hop on the rear bumper and climb over the tailgate into the bed.

The older man had one long leg over the tailgate when Roger hit the brakes. The sudden stop caused Eric to vault forward down the empty truck bed and slam into the back of the cab. Danny, upon seeing his instructor was “safely” aboard, yelled, “He’s in! Go, go, go, go, go!”

Roger again tromped down on the accelerator and the truck surged forward. Eric, still stunned from his rough boarding, found himself sliding back down the truck bed like a human bowling ball and slammed into the tailgate with a loud, bear-like “Oooof!”

By this time the poachers, aware that they were being pursued, had enough lead on the game wardens to probably have made a clean getaway if they had gone in either direction once they reached the highway. But the panicking driver made the mistake of crossing the highway and driving down a dead-end woods road on the opposite side in hopes of hiding there while the warden truck sped off left or right. Unfortunately for the bad guys, the wardens glimpsed their headlights out in the woods and knew they had them.

When the two poachers reached the end of the road it was decision time. With the wardens coming up fast, the driver jumped out. In his state of panic he apparently thought there was some merit in unloading the rifle they had just used in the crime. As the warden truck arrived, they found the man desperately trying to jack cartridges from the lever action gun as fast as he could.

Those of you who have ever used such a firearm know that it is critical not to get your fingers in the way when you unload one or you can easily discharge it. In this instance the hapless poacher forgot the rule and, just as the wardens pulled up, blew a .30 caliber hole through the brand new front tire of his car, then dropped the gun and surrendered!

Meanwhile the other poacher decided to flee into the black woods. With young and lanky Roger in foot pursuit, the bad guy ran headlong into the forest without benefit of a flashlight. He did not get far. Following by sound, Roger later told me the fellow’s luck ran out completely when he struck a 2-inch aspen sapling from nose to crotch dead center. The tree bent forward from the blow, then sprang back sending the limp and badly stunned poacher right into the arms of the pursuing game warden.

Game over.