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Thread: Development vs. Hunting

  1. #1
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    Hunting falls prey to development

    AS GROWTH OVERTAKES FORESTS, HUNTERS HAVE FEWER OPTIONS

    By David Klepper

    The Sun News


    John Bellamy remembers days before water parks and frontage roads, when you could hunt deer at Broadway at the Beach. Before growth pushed all the good hunting grounds west of the waterway.

    "I hunt whenever I can," said Bellamy, 59, of Myrtle Beach. Bellamy said he has hunted locally since he was 13. "But now I go down to Andrews."

    As growth continues to transform Brunswick, Horry and Georgetown counties, subdivisions, roads and shopping centers have sprung up where forests and fields used to be. That means hunters have to travel farther to find their prey.

    "You used to see more deer along the roads, and now you see big shopping centers," said Wade Long, who hunts dove and deer by bow and rifle near his home on S.C. 111.

    "We used to hunt off of [S.C.] 90. Now, there are homes there."

    Where subdivisions rub up against wilderness, the hunting tradition clashes with the new suburban identity.

    Cathy Honeycutt sometimes sees hunters in her back yard in the Pelican Bay neighborhood near Carolina Bays Parkway in northern Horry County. Sometimes, lost hunting dogs will wander around the neighborhood. It's no wonder: She regularly sees deer, turkey and even black bears. She saw a bobcat not too long ago. Two weeks ago, she found shotgun shells on the road.

    "It's all private land, and it's not supposed to be hunted on," she said. "But the hunters will walk right through. Once this guy with a shotgun was out there, and I yelled at him, and he just looked at me and said, 'This is public property.' I said, 'No it's not.'"

    Statewide, the hunter is a species in decline. The number of deer hunting permits has decreased 13 percent since 1992, according to a 2001 S.C. Department of Natural Resources study, the latest numbers available.

    Dove hunting, the second-most popular permit, has fallen 43 percent, and the dove harvest 40 percent, since 1990. Harvests for other animals have gone down, too, most dramatically for the black bear: 95 percent. Only turkey hunting permits are increasing.

    "Times have changed," said Danny Stone, president of the Five Rivers Council, a hunting advocacy group in Georgetown. "It's a lot worse in Horry County, where you have so much development."

    Between 1990 and 2000, Horry County's population increased by 36.5 percent, and the annual number of building permits issued for home construction doubled.

    Government land-use maps indicate nearly two-thirds of Horry County is farmland or forest. About 50,000 acres are considered "vacant" land, though county projections show that number will be reduced to 5,000 acres in 2020. Still, only about a fifth of developable land has been used, according to the county's comprehensive plan.

    Conservationists and hunters now find themselves championing the same cause: protection and conservation, according to conservationist Scott Yaich of Ducks Unlimited, a group that includes environmentalists and waterfowl hunters in its ranks.

    "There's a lot of overlap," he said. "Our mission is habitat conservation, and we focus our activities on preserving wetlands and grasslands. But our activities certainly benefit hunters, and it's designed that way. Many of our members are sportsmen who want to conserve, and they do hunt. They're one and the same."

    There are no numbers to prove it, but several local hunters say they think the number of Horry County hunters is holding steady, or even increasing, as hunters from outside the area move in.

    That puts more pressure on shrinking wilderness. More and more, hunters have to pay private property owners for the right to hunt on their undeveloped land.

    Or, they turn to public preserves that allow hunting.

    Public dove hunting is allowed at the Schultz Tract near Stephens Crossroads, and dozens of hunters show up on weekends. Farther south, the 9,000-acre Lewis Ocean Bays Heritage Preserve has the state's largest concentration of black bears outside of the mountains.

    As the march of development draws near, the preserve's habitat - and its animals - will be increasingly surrounded. Already, several housing developments lie adjacent to the preserve.

    "[Development] happens gradually and incrementally, so you don't notice it so much," said Bob Perry of S.C. DNR. "But it's happening all around us, and it's something that hunters recognize."

    http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld...ne/9764021.htm

  2. #2
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    This is a double edged sword for me. I love the outdoors, hunting, fishing, and such.....but I finance development for a living. I have a house in North Myrtle Beach, and have lived there for 25 years, and yes....my old hunting grounds have depleted as well. Especially off of Hwy 90. This is why we should all support DU and other conservation programs that implement land purchase protection programs.
    Quote Originally Posted by dfasano View Post
    Don't speak for all of us.....stupid son a of a bitch (Dabo Swinney) needs to be spending his free time learning to coach instead of coming up with gay ass sayings.

  3. #3
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    DU's land purchace protection programs are impacting thousands of acres of land state wide that would have otherwise been lost to development.Thank god we have a national organization with "local" representitives that can help lobby a cause and find funds from other enviromental groups not just out of pocket from DU.If our great-grandchildren are hunting it will be because of these visionary groups putting their wallet where their mouth is and keeping development at bay.
    Trying to be the person my dog thinks I am.

  4. #4
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    How about a habitat tax on every structure that is built??
    RIP Kelsey "Bigdawg" Cromer
    12-26-98 12-1-13

    If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever.

    Missing you my great friend.


  5. #5
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    Or better yet, how about a serious tax CREDIT for every acre that is preserved?

  6. #6
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    I like the way you think JAB.
    Trying to be the person my dog thinks I am.

  7. #7
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    Tax credits and perpetual easements are the way to go.

    Good post, Seacraft.

  8. #8
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    I like the idea of a tax credit, why do you think a credit is better than say a habitat destruction tax?
    RIP Kelsey "Bigdawg" Cromer
    12-26-98 12-1-13

    If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever.

    Missing you my great friend.


  9. #9
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    One is a voluntary philanthropic act with some remuneration while the other is a socialist attempt to penalize those that are supplying the services an expanding population needs. heh heh

  10. #10
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    HA!HA!HA! What a perspective!
    RIP Kelsey "Bigdawg" Cromer
    12-26-98 12-1-13

    If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever.

    Missing you my great friend.


  11. #11
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    It is simply the unvarnished truth...

  12. #12
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    B&C has cleaned it up so, people are actually going to want to go to Myrtle Beach again. It's only getting started boys. Thank goodness we've got the Santee Delta and the ACE is all I can say.
    Bowhunting for doves....hadn't thought of that yet.
    "hunting should be a challenge and a passion not a way of making a living or a road to fame"

    Rubberhead

  13. #13
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    While you guys sit here and yammer about tax credits and impact fees, MeadWestvaco is sitting in secret meetings with major developers, spinning off huge tracts without a thought of offering anything other than token bones to recreational purchasers, conservation groups, or our pitifly inadequate conservation fund. In just the past year, timber company land sales to developers have resulted in 30,000 new homes slated for the Charleston area alone.

    I seriously doubt that our children will be hunting and fishing when they're our age.

  14. #14
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    I agree GMAC. While they may be able to hunt, it will be drastically different. The opportunities we had have drastically declined. Finding good affordable hunting opportunities has become harder and harder for most. I fear hunters of the future will say screw it because of the headaches and cost associated with hunting. Somedays I wonder why I endure all the bullshit. The fun seems to be slowly fading away.
    RIP Kelsey "Bigdawg" Cromer
    12-26-98 12-1-13

    If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever.

    Missing you my great friend.


  15. #15
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    Westvaco is selling off a lot of huge sections of land. I think I saw were over 30,000 more acres are now up for sale but only to developers.

    My company is based on development, residential and commercial. If there was no growth I would not be in business. But even I hate to see what is happening to lots of the old places here in the lowcountry I hunted on at one time or another. More towns and cities are starting to put restrictions in place to slow down the growth but it will not stop growth.

    In another 10 years this will be another debate of the haves and have nots. If you want to have you better start investing now. I'm trying now, wish I would have started 10 years ago.
    Life ain't easy and dry bread ain't greasy.

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  17. #17
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    So GMARX and LeninluvR, what would you have us do? Sieze the assets of private owners?

  18. #18
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    For the greater good, of course. It's all for the childen...

  19. #19
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    Would not a tax credit rely on voluntarily preserving acreage? An impact tax would affect those whom contribute to the problem. Yes, I don't like the idea of another tax,however, show me something else that would "require" restitution for damage.
    RIP Kelsey "Bigdawg" Cromer
    12-26-98 12-1-13

    If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever.

    Missing you my great friend.


  20. #20
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    The development of civilization and industry in general has always shown itself so active in the destruction of forests that everything that has been done for their conservation and production is completely insignificant in comparison.
    Karl Marx

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