Time to lock up leases for hunting season

Many hunting properties open up this month

The days for sitting in an elevated perch overlooking a green garden of tasty treats or a highly-traveled bottleneck will soon be a normal afternoon delight for outdoorsmen in the Carolinas. Deer season is just a few months away — even less for S.C. lowcountry hunters. And time is running short for adequate preparation to make that opening week one for the books.

For those hunters relying on leased or borrowed lands, having a place to go every year is not guaranteed. Often, hunters lose the right to hunt a parcel for one reason or another. Then, they scramble to find something in the last few hours before the season arrives. June is a good time to start looking to replace a lost lease or to find a few more acres to complement your current hunting package.

Having the same chunk of dirt to hunt every year is a real prize. And many hunters get the opportunity to hunt the same properties year after year. When hunters invest years on a property, they learn to pattern deer and can invest time and energy into on-site habitat management. While some trophy bucks show up by good fortune, hunters who consistently tag big bucks have a long history with the property. But hunters aren’t always lucky enough to keep a property under their control unless they are the registered owner.

With the end of turkey season in May, the annual hunting-lease cycle is also complete. In June, hunters and landowners are securing leases for the next season. It’s the perfect time to secure an available parcel.

Don’t waste time finding your next hunting lease

Traditionally, most large, established hunting clubs with 2,500 acres or more under their control lease land owned by the forest industry or a similar large, land-holding corporation. There are few private, non-industrial landowners that own extremely large parcels of land. And these large clubs will rarely lose their foothold on these properties. Even if one becomes available, the cash investment to pay for a 10,000-acre lease might be a little too big to swallow for a single hunter or a single year.

However, many of these large, forest landowners have a wide variety of parcels scattered over the Carolinas from 50- to 10,000-acre tracts. Frequently, opportunities for some of the smaller tracts, those less than 250 acres, become available, and this is the time for prospective hunters to snag one.

Most large, forest-industry landowners advertise hunting opportunities on their company websites. Additionally, many with an interest in leasing their land for hunting will advertise with large, land-management companies that use their websites to display these availabilities. From 50-acre tracts to large parcels, there will be hunting properties to view and book in June. But don’t wait too long; the best sites won’t last long.

In the Carolinas, plenty of websites advertise for both private and corporate landowners. These websites normally carry plenty of opportunities for new hunting leases: www.resourcemgt.com, www.cdlmhunting.com, and www.weyerhaeuserhuntinglands.com/leases. In North Carolina, the N.C. Department of Agriculture has its own website for landowners and hunters to connect; it can be accessed at www.ncagr.gov/hunt/. Many large, forestry consulting firms manage large groups of properties that are often available.

Happy hunting!