Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Compromise reached on beach driving
Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor's Outdoors column and notebook appears regularly in The Roanoke Times.
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With the busy surf-fishing season approaching, many die-hard Outer Banks anglers have nervously been awaiting a judge's ruling on beach vehicle access to some of the most popular fishing areas at the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
It appears those areas will remain open to off-road vehicles to at least some degree and for the foreseeable future now that both sides in the battle over access have agreed on a compromise plan.
The details of the plan are due to be released Wednesday.
Beach driving appeared seriously threatened after the Defenders of Wildlife and the National Audubon Society filed for an injunction last winter to stop driving at six key areas on the beach, which is managed by the National Park Service.
The environmental groups said the closures were necessary to protect fragile wildlife species until the NPS could develop an approved plan for off-road vehicles -- something that could take several years.
Critics of the move to close the beaches claimed that the closures were unnecessarily harsh and would cripple the economy of the area, which is heavily dependent on tourism from anglers and others who drive on the beaches.
The case went before federal judge Terrence Boyle in Raleigh, N.C., on April 4, at which time he gave the two sides a week to reach a settlement.
On Friday, attorneys for the sides filed a joint motion to continue the case until Wednesday. The delay was needed to give a third party in the case -- a defendant-intervenor group comprised of the Dare and Hyde county boards of commissions and the board of the Cape Hatteras Access Preservation Alliance -- time to vote on the settlement.
Attorneys for the defendant-intervenors said the groups would recommend approval of the plan.
While the case was pending, beach-driving proponents initiated aggressive protest campaigns and held a number of public vigils. One protest involved spelling out "Please Help Us" with vehicles at Cape Point, the area's surf-fishing epicenter and one of the areas that would have been closed had the injunction been approved.
While beach driving rights appear to have been maintained, the compromise plan almost certainly will feature some latitude for temporary and seasonal restrictions, such as those intended to protect specific breeding bird pairs.
Solid numbers on gobbler opener
The weather for Virginia's spring gobbler season wasn't ideal, with damp conditions followed by wind on the heels of the a front that swept across the state Saturday.
Even so, turkey hunters managed a solid day, according to figures from the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries phone and Internet checking systems.
Hunters called in 862 gobblers and checked 53 more via the Internet, a new option this year. That's 16 percent over the tally from last year's opening day, when the electronic check number was 791.
Granted, the numbers aren't completely scientific because hunters have the option of taking their birds in person to an authorized check station.
The percentage of hunters using the electronic checking option is increasing slightly each year, but increased participation alone likely didn't account for that kind of jump. Hunting success had to be better.
Saturday sure seemed to be a day for doubles as a number of hunters I know scored in pairs.
One of them was Bob Ellis, assistant director of the DGIF's Wildlife Division and an avid turkey hunter.
Ellis doubled with his son, Chad, after the elder Ellis called in a pair of gobblers. Chad shot first and Bob was able to drop the second bird a second later.
A couple of doubles I heard about had larger time gaps.
Veteran turkey chaser Carson Quarles of Roanoke, former chairman of the DGIF's board of directors, roosted some birds at his family's property in Botetourt on Friday evening. He slipped back into the area a few hours later to quietly set up a blind and set out decoys.
The plan worked perfectly and his wife, Norma, dropped a 22 12-pound gobbler just a few minutes into the season.
After retrieving the bird, Quarles started calling to another gobbler. He didn't have a gun, but borrowed his wife's. Fifteen minutes later he had his tom on the ground to complete the couples' first-ever double.
Quite a bit more time elapsed between kills for Jim Forbes and buddy Royce Day.
Hunting on national forest land in Botetourt, Day dropped his tom at about 7 a.m. The two were getting ready to end their morning about three hours later when they heard a gobbler that Forbes was able to call in.
Call-in numbers weren't available for Monday. But even with the chilly weather that may have kept some gobblers from sounding off too much -- and kept other hunters at home in warm beds -- it's a sure thing the hunting was better than on last season's second day.
On that day, high winds made for brutal conditions and only 152 turkeys were called in.
