Exhibit Offers Proof Poachers Should Hang Their Heads

The deer hunter had never seen anything like it: a set of elk antlers with a six-foot spread and branches as thick as baseball bats.

It was mounted on a wall in the lobby of the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s headquarters as part of an exhibit that showcases the infamous trophies seized during investigations of some of Pennsylvania’s more notorious poaching cases.

Printed on an 8 1/2-by-11-inch sheet of laminated paper were the vitals. The rack belonged to an enormous bull elk illegally killed in October 2000 in Cameron County. The animal was known to many in the area because of the majesty of its crown.

The shooter left it where it fell. Elk were off-limits for hunting at the time.

“It’s sickening,” said Steve Lear, an office-machine repairman who hunts whitetail deer and game birds.

Bear Shot Inside Its Den

As he knelt before the dubious prize, he couldn’t help but question the injustice of such a kill.

“It’s upsetting to see there are people out there . . . who just do it for the killing.”

Wildlife conservation officers are still trying to arrest the person who shot the animal.

The head and hide of a 525-pound black bear is also included in the exhibit, called the “Wall of Shame.” The animal was shot illegally inside its den in Huntingdon County in 1998. Two men paid $2,000 in fines.

A black bear weighing a record 800 pounds and measuring 8 feet in length is displayed standing on three of its legs. The 19-year-old animal was shot near a gun range in Lycoming County by a West Virginia man and his two sons. They were fined a total of $3,600 for illegally taking the animal out of season.

The exhibit was created by Barry Leonard, a wildlife conservation officer. It will be on display through late February, then will travel around the state to various sportsmen’s shows.

Absent from the exhibit are the poachers’ names.

“The individual isn’t necessarily the issue. It’s the crime itself,” explains Jerry Feaser, a spokesman for the game commission.

The display is modeled on a similar one in Maryland, Leonard says.

“The idea is to allow the sportsmen to see something tangible that’s being stolen from them . . . to get across the magnitude of what does actually happen out there,” he said.

The trophies are the result of investigations in the state’s south-central region, but are “typical of the kinds of things we see happening all over the state,” Leonard said. Common violations include “jacklighting,” or hunting with lights at night, killing animals out of season and exceeding bag limits.

The commission doesn’t keep annual figures on the numbers of deer or bear killed illegally. It does, however, track elk because they were protected until November, when the commission allowed a limited elk hunt--the first in 70 years.

Fourteen elk were killed illegally in the last three years: six in 1999, five in 2000 and three last year.

Nearly 7,500 arrests were made last year alone for violations of the state’s Game and Wildlife Code, resulting in more than 1,000 people losing their hunting or trapping privileges. Commission officials said those numbers have remained steady over the past few years.

Hunters Urged to Report Poachers

Leonard said he hopes the display will encourage hunters who follow the rules to remain vigilant about reporting lawbreakers, even though some poachers never seem to get the message.

An entire section of the exhibit--nearly a dozen sets of deer antlers and a handsome mounted buck head--displays trophies taken from an Altoona poacher who officials said showed no remorse after he was caught.

“When the fall rolled around, this guy was like a buck in rut; he got the urge to go out and hunt, and he’d go when he wanted--at night, whatever,” said William E. Anderson, a special agent with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service who worked with the commission on the case.

“He’d shoot with a .22 [caliber rifle], with a bow,” Anderson said. “And he was doing all this while his license was already in revocation.”

The 36-year-old man was convicted of 48 game-code violations, resulting in $14,200 in fines and the revocation of his hunting privileges until 2056.

“I think this is just the tip of the iceberg--the ones they were able to catch,” said Randy Geist, who visited the exhibit. “I bet there’s a lot more out there.”

Pennsylvania Game Commission:

www.pgc.state.pa.us