doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com OT - Escape From New York !

After dreaming for 25 years, being relatively frugal for a decade, and property hunting for more than a year, we finally got a patch outside the city.

We were supposed to close right after the Vintagers but the seller had medical issues and the schedule pushed, but now we have our smallholding, about 2.5 hours north-northwest of the city.

During the final inspection this week, while I was looking in fields and woods for dumped debris in the usual places - in little valleys and at the downhill end of farm paths - I flushed four grouse from underfoot. A pair flushed from one of those old stone walls running through the woods. After the flushes, if I'd found a pile of dioxin drums in the creek I'd still have closed.

Some of the folks here were more influential than they know. I had to learn on my own that 8 acres isn't diddley if you only have 100 yards of road frontage. Our thinking on what's a good minimum size was assisted by some of the OT threads here. You all are the folks that I talk to about guns and hunting, so I figure I can BS and crow about land a bit too (I'll try not to crowd Lowell's schtick).

Surer than $#it, none of my city friends understand - they look at me with deep concern when acreage is discussed. They want to know about shopping, skiing, and isn't it scary at night without streetlights.

This summer, looking south to the Catskills

Bird Cover photos from this week's pre-close inspection



Double flush stone wall

Sounds like a good name for a movie!

Check your PM's

But where are your "NO HUNTING - NO TRESPASSING" signs?

So what weekends are open for visits?

Congratulations on your preserve!

Yeti,

Fantastic, congrats on your purchase! Absolutely beautiful.

Your city friends will never understand, but the rest of us do. I hope to follow your lead down the road.

Ken

Land today is a much greater investment than double guns, "No Hunting, and No Trespassing" signs are a must to protect what is yours.

Sure looks beautiful to me! I'm happy for you. Does it have pasture poodles?

That's pretty countryside. You sure that's not Virginia?

Congratulations Yeti and BZ!!!
I do know what you mean - city-born and raised (Toronto) and now enjoying a life-long reaction to "the city" at the end of a country road watching the whitetails, turkeys, Huns and coyotes.
Smart move. I hope you and yours enjoy it as much as "we" have.

Jim,
I don't know about pasture poodles. When we closed on this place, the list of what I don't know got a whole lot bigger. I will definitely keep you guys amused as the place delivers the lessons I know are coming.

Thanks to all of you for the good thoughts.

Congratulations on a great piece of land! I hope you don't "have to" post your land. I know NY is a different place. I have a place about your size in northern most part of NH and I would be ashamed to post my land. A very good friend bought 44 acres in Rangley ME and the day he closed we went around and tore off every posted sign. It was a very good feeling. The neighbors love him and watch is property when he is not there. I hope you have a place where you can do that. Enjoy.

Oh yeah... don't shoot every grouse, leave some for breed stock. I have a few grouse on my land and they are for training the puppy.

Oh yeah, you are in a very good population of deer. If you need help controlling them... I am your man.

Same mountains from Maine to Georgia.

Yeti, what's the nearest town? I know alot of that country fairly well and I'm curious. What will you do for a large bridge when you're there? I wonder. Might have to do without. Anyway, mazeltov.

You should have escaped from New York state and the north east!!! In all seriousness I know it's difficult. I would like to get out of New Jersey before they start kicking in doors. With a stuborn wife and an elderly mother making it difficult. I don't have to go that far,Pennsylvania will do. But the house at the entrance of my gun club is for sale so maybe I'll be here for awhile. I own 13 acres on a nice trout river in Maine and I wouldn't dare post it. It is a tradition in Maine not to post. The state actually has a law making it nearly impossible to sue a land owner if some one got hurt on your land pursuing a sporting activity. This keeps millions of acres of timberland open for hunting and I greatly appreciate that. It's my escape from New Jersey and all the crap associated with living here. A vist there calms the heart and the soul.

Escaped from the PSRNJ 10 years ago Tanky, and my only regret is that I waited so long.Very few posted signs here in NH only the flatlanders that buy the land and run back to MA or points south at first sign of cold and snow post here and we drive right by them when they run off the road in the ditch !
Looks like real nice land Yeti,used to hunt the Catskills, years ago with my father inlaw,lots of deer and grouse(partridge up here).
Enjoy it and forget the posted signs you will get along much better with the locals and see and hunt more game.

"Double Flush" sounds like a perfect name for it. As I'll readily admit, I don't know diddley about grouse, but I do know that if you got a double flush on an 8 acre plot it does not need to be 'improved'. Think that statement over carefully before you go changing things. The colors you folks get to routinely enjoy this time of year are sure pretty, we don't get near that much contrast. I used to keep a 'Ski Lubbock' poster about from Southwest Airlines, but something happened to it after Montgomery Wards quit sending their catalogs out ;-) Be sure and ask your city fellas & gals to keep their old phone books for you, now that you you have a country place;-) Be very glad they don't 'get it'. We of the fortunate sort require a secret laughing place, suggest you keep it that way. Its very pretty, enjoy! Hope it brings you much satisfaction.

edit: I may have misread on the acreage, but please understand that I ain't asking; its not polite to go there, ever. I just read the ref is all and used that.

Hi Yeti,

Congrats on the new chunk of dirt. I think NY State is one of the more beautiful and affordable areas and you can hunt on Sundays. I think our piece is south and west of you. We are in Delaware county but on the border and that is a big county. You will have to join us up at our place one day. Do you have a structure on the prop is it the one in the pic?

Jeff G.
Ps opening day of deer tomorrow

I have friends that come from upper state NY. They are all fine, stand up people, to a person. They are outnumbered by the city folks when its time to vote. FWIW, same condition exists, at present, in Uruguay. The photos you provided are just great and speak all of the country you are in. Old stone walls were an easy way to clear fields and mark boundries in most places. Further south, but perhaps not, Iris rhyzomes were used as bench marks. For Geo. Washington era surveyors it was the norm and the Iris were known as 'flags'. Here, the blue & white iris retain that name, tho most have no idea why. Check in the spring to see if any are on you, there may be a few and if so they will delineate the original plats. Nothing to do w/grouse, rather a diversionary thot you might file away for post season activity.

Lovely property, but I would take Virgina over NYS anyday!

tw,
You Texans are such gentlemen.
I will look for the irises, and maybe plant a few.

Wish you and yours the best Yeti,

Looks to be a wonderful place.

Hope all works out as per plans!

Looks like a very nice place to look forward to spending lots of time at.

Lots of time.....

Best,
Mark

Yeti:
Congratulations on your new "Escape"......I have always loved those stone walls. If I were to "Improve" one thing it would be looking into rebuilding that wall. Good long term project, but probably not as easy as it seems. From what little I know of the east they are a vanishing lot.

For what it is worth don't shoot the grouse on your property, they are great for working you're dog, and as you discovered a joy to flush.

Chicago Mike

Sorta reminds me of the countryside where I grew up in NY State. I imagine that is a bit east of where you're located as the farm we lived on was right on the CT/MA line in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains about 10 minutes from Sandanona.

Chi, If there are walls on the existing property borders, I might consider holding a mint julep while a platoon of Spitzer's Specials rebuild the things.

Picking up and carrying heavy stones is....Hey!... is what my kids will do as teenagers for punishment I may have the entire place redone.

But the old walls running though the woods are artifacts to me. The forests of the east coast are all second growth, and I've come across farm remmnants in the Appalacians from VT to TN. The deeper in the woods they are, the more affecting they become. A set of weathered walls, a squarish pile indicating the foundation, and an aged fruit tree or two is a special find.

I can't see shooting more than a grouse or two per year on the place.

Steve Lawson,
That's the area that we looked in for about 6 months, but the prices were too too much. I'm 20-30 years too late for that part of the state.

Yeti, My father was offered a 140 +/- Acre working dairy farm with barns, sheds, Milk house, 23 room house (divided into three apartments and a secound three bedroom house in 1957 or 1958 for $38,000......... From the mountains in the east crossing a dirt road (At that time) to the river in the valley to the west......... Gorgeous. At that time he couldn't come up with the 20% cash down needed to purchase. He often lamented that............... as do I.

Congrats Yeti, what a fantastic place. I love that first picture. Enjoy it!

Great! You are going to love it. I purchased 30 acres west of you about 5 years ago, hay field & meadows with a great pond and a creek in the back. I have a nice range way out back and put up a house right in the middle of the hay field which overlooks the meadow. It on Rt 23 in a little town called Davenport Center. Beautiful views wide open and I do have a little bit of wooded aera. Lot of Birds, Deer, Trout & bass.

Yeti. Couldn't happen to a nicer Guy! Please post O/T like this anytime. Someday maybe I will. I'd like to have a good chunk in the NorthEast part of my state.

Congradulations Yeti: As one who was born and raised in the Berkshires I can still appreciate the land and scenery back there. It's TOO bad about the politics though. BTW: Is that a deer standing in the middle of the 3rd picture?
Jim

Yeti,
Owning your own piece of ground away from urbania is good for the soul! Hope it turns into the paradise you dream it to be.

Yeti -
Best of good fortune to you on your land. I moved from northwest NJ 27 years ago to upstate NY (about 30 min. drive from Jeff G.'s and only 20 min. from Sarge) because I wanted land and privacy and quiet to pursue my sawmill business and raise and work the Percheron draft horses I was breeding. It was pretty close to homesteading. Anyway, we have lived pretty close to the bone for most of these years, but what I have (207 acres on the old hill dairy farm we purchased with a friend) is more, much more, in every respect, than most ever get to know. If there is a downside, it's that there are too many deer and not enough grouse and woodcock, though so far this season (interrupted as always by the damn deer season) I've recorded 161 grouse flushes for approximately 60 hours of hunting time. Life is good. Again, all the best in your pursuit.
Will

Yeti, thanks for bringing to everyone attention how beautiful the 'other' and the vast majority of the State of New York is!!!!! Good hunting and thanks for the pics!!!!
All the best