Ground Zero: North Carolina's Record Bucks

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Check out this video to learn how to manage your small track of land to bag your trophy buck.

 

“Hunt North carolina Farm Land”

 

The top way of bagging a trophy buck is by hunting private property. Private farms offer excellent nutrition, resulting in super-sized antler growth. Hunting pressure is also lighter than it is on public lands.

However, competition for private hunting land is high, so leases are expensive. Finding a lease can be as difficult as finding a good spot to hunt on public land on opening day of the firearms season. However, about five years ago, as part of an initiative to bring hunters and farmers together to benefit both, the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services launched “Hunt N.C. Farmland,” with its own tab hunters and landowners can use on the agency’s website. The genesis of the program was helping farmers who needed help in controlling deer numbers — and accommodating hunters wanting to find private property to hunt.

Hunters looking for leases, as well as landowners looking for hunters to lease their land, begin by keying Hunt N.C. Farmland into their search engine, visiting ncagr.gov/hunt or visiting the Commission’s Website, ncwildlife.org, which has a Hunt N.C. Farmland tab that links to the N.C. Department of Agriculture site.

Hunters can search for land to lease by county, species, allowable weapons and other parameters. Landowners can list amenities, such as whether the property has a cabin or clubhouse, whether the landowner needs help maintaining fields, the size and condition of the property and types of cover available.

The hunter must go through a log in process and complete an electronic form. That initiates the contact between the hunter and landowner. A recent search for the three counties found only one farm listed in Caswell County. The farm had 172 acres and the lease price was $3,000 per year for a maximum of four hunters. While that lease is likely no longer available, hunters should keep checking the website because new leases come up relatively often.

The best time to visit Hunt N.C. Farm Land is around the first of the year. Property taxes are due, and landowners often view hunting leases as a means of paying their taxes. Another good time is the mid-summer period, when hunting clubs find out whether members may be leaving, and they need to replace them or end their lease agreements with landowners.

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