Question about about midwest states

[DelDuck]

Ok we are officialy getting over run with city folk here in lower Delaware. They are saying with in the next 5 years or so on on strech of the main road to the beach we are going to have around 4000 new homes. Our hunting properties are dwindling and it has just gotten out of hand. I have been talking with the wife and just kicking around ideas about packing the bags and going somewhere.

What I want from you guys is maybe a brief description of what life is like out your way, and what kinda hunting is avalible. I have really thought about SD, caus I have always heard there is good upland hunting and duck hunting there. But hearing and knowing are two different things. I am looking to buy about 30 - 40 acers depending on price of course. what kinda puplic land there is hunt, what kinda shopping is near around you. What is the job market like?

Any help to make an educated decision will be greatly appreciated.

[Andy L]

Run Away, Run Away.

MO land goes for 20k per acre, there are too many people, havent seen a duck or goose in 30 years, no deer, no turkey, it sucks.....

(think he will buy it?? )

Just kiddin.....

Andy

[BILLY D.]

Originally posted by Andy L
Run Away, Run Away.

MO land goes for 20k per acre, there are too many people, havent seen a duck or goose in 30 years, no deer, no turkey, it sucks.....

(think he will buy it?? )

Just kiddin.....

Andy

i was thinking of that kind of answer myself, but then i thought it's better not to say anything.

[fabsroman]

Hey Del,

If you can't trust your buddies on huntchat, who can you trust?

[Nulle]

Yup no encouragement from this old boy in SD !
Every thing worth a darn is leased or baught by "out of staters" and getting harder every year to get a place to hunt.
There are realators that deal with hunting property in this State and they are being sold so what is high to us may not be to you.
Out of State buyers have driven the land prices though the roof and locals are unable to buy to don't look for a real warm welcome at the local coffee shop.

[DelDuck]

Wow did not expect this.

[M.T. Pockets]

I'd rule out Minnesota. First, the hunting isn't as good as other states to begin with, the population is higher and the choice spots have been leased or purchased by big money out of Minneapolis. Not near as much public land either.

I've known a couple guys from here that moved to Alaska, they tell me it's changed there too with all the air taxis moving people in anywhere.

World is getting smaller.

[gspsonny03]

Del, I have no idea what you make annually, or what you do, but there is lots of jobs in Wyoming. Also lots of land for sale, although it's pretty pricey. Gillette for example is still a boom town and you can expect to pay whatever the market will bare. I will have to say that I really enjoy living here. As far as hunting, if you like big game, 90 miles in any direction will have you hunting big game from antelope, wt deer, mule deer, elk, moose, bear, bh sheep to MT goat. As far as bird hunting of any kind, you really have to stretch the imagination to call this any kind of paradise. Wish you luck.

[justwannano]

They are leasing hunting ground here in Iowa too.
Folks as far away as Georgia are coming here .
Even have 3 private hunting clubs within 40 miles of me.
Its getting harder and harder to get permission to hunt.
Especially hard to find places is coon hunt or any kind of trapping.

Hey Del if you got a couple of million $ laying around you can probably buy a whole farm.

[Nulle]

Sorry Del but the cheap land is gone and with it the hunting.
SD has a good public hunting ground program but the problem is the out of staters also hit that first and then go to their private land = really sucks for us locals but thats the way it is.

[DelDuck]

IF My wife and I decide to do this, and keep in mind it is a big if caus my family has been here in sussex county for about 200 years. and I have been in the local Vol FD for 23+ years so it will be hard to brake these ties. I would be selling all my property here and I have roughly 17 acres between 3 different parcels, and land now around here is going for about $100,000 per acre.
Ppl from Baltimore , annapolis , DC are moving here in droves. that 4000 new home i spoke of is going to be in a 3-4 mile strech of road. Almost all was farm land/wooded/marsh. Our county council is a joke and if you have the money you can build a devolpment. there is no thought or consideration to schools , traffic or jobs. But enough of my area I can see that you guys have it so much worse.

[BILLY D.]

Originally posted by Nulle
Sorry Del but the cheap land is gone and with it the hunting.
SD has a good public hunting ground program but the problem is the out of staters also hit that first and then go to their private land = really sucks for us locals but thats the way it is.

gee curt. i thought i was the only one that noticed that phenom. a few years ago went out to a public hunting area. pulled into the parking area and there was 17 trucks there, including mine. guess what, i was the only north dakotan. got to talking to one of the fellas there and found out they were on their way to hunt a leased property down by dickinson. and these people had already limited out on birds.

two summers ago a bunch (4) from minnesota were fishing devils lake and were caught by fish and game with over 300 crappie they caught. they also caught a nice fine.

for waterfowl now the f&g has set the season back one week for out of staters. at least we in state folks get a small window of opportunity. i wish they would do the same for all seasons.

i'm getting to the point where i don't even care to hunt. next year all i'm going to buy just a fishing permit. at least the gentrified havn't figured a way to screw that up. the waters are public, at least this year anyway. sooner or later they will plot those and have leased fishing areas. if ya ain't rich, your screwed.

didn't mean to mess up the thread, but i just had to rant.

[fabsroman]

You guys are killing me. Yeah, you have it tough, but there are some people that have it a little tougher.

You want to complain about land being expensive, here is what I deal with around here. I hunt a 200 acre farm, which would sell for about $3 million if it went all at once. However, the landowner got smart, hired some attorneys, and is subdividing the farm as we speak and selling 2 acre lots for $200,000. That means that he will get $20,000,000 out of a 200 acre farm. If you guys want to tell me that a 200 acre farm in Idaho, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alabama, Mississipi, Texas, or anywhere else in a rural area costs $20,000,000, I wouldn't believe you unless I saw the closing documents.

Talking about tough, when I started hunting resident geese 9 years ago, almost nobody hunted them around here because all the waterfowlers were on the Eastern Shore (i.e., where Sean Mann) is from. 2 years ago, I was hunting a field where there were 4 different setups of goose decoys and everybody was arguing over property lines. One idiot made us move our decoys 50 or so feet because we were over the property line.

As far as only the rich hunting in the future, I don't think that will even happen. As more and more people are pushed out of hunting, there will be less and less support for hunting and possibly firearms. I donate to the NRA almost every year and I am about to make a donation this year to become a Patron member. If I cannot hunt and/or shoot, you can bet that I won't be making anymore donations. I would love to see hunting limited to the rich and see how much they would be willing to pay to support the NRA and everybody else that supports hunting. Something tells me that we will be losing a sport.

As far as hunting property is concerned, I have been looking in North Carolina and Alabama and have seen some decent farms advertized for sale that range between 200 and 400 acres and none of them cost anywhere close to $1,000,000. I also read the Alabama game code and it is a lot less confusing than Maryland.

As far as people moving to Delaware, I know of 4 of my dad's friends that moved down there and had houses built just this past year. A house that would cost $800,000 here only costs $400,000 there.

All of these opinions are based upon how you perceive things changing in your locale. For instance, my uncle is one of the 4 that moved to Delaware and he is a hunter. Every time he comes back to visit, all he talks about is all the places down there to hunt (i.e., there are a lot of farms). On the flip side, DelDuck thinks that there is absolutely no place to hunt. Granted, my Uncle hasn't tried to obtain permission, but he talks like he is in hunting paradise. The rest of you think that life is rough because you cannot walk out you back door anymore and shoot something. Me, I never had that opportunity unless you can count a pellet gun.

As far as people shooting over the limit, shame on them. I know some of those guys and it pisses me off. What really bugs the hell out of me are the guys that shoot over the limit and then throw everything into a dumpster and then complain the following year that they aren't seeing as many ducks.

I could go on for a while on this subject, but the sad thing is that the bad hunters are ruining it for the good ones.

Edited to add:

What is the definition of cheap? Del just might not be asking the right question, so I'll ask it.

What kind of farm can I get in your state for $500,000? How about $1,000,000? I consider anything around $500,000 to be cheap and anything around $1,000,000 to possibly be affordable.

[Jonesy]

Yeah, it's over populated here in South Dakota...

[Jonesy]

There's no waterfowl here either...