Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Good Bye Elk herd.

So Here I am at 6:30 AM this morning at my reload bench in the attached shed to the garage
handloading some rounds to test in one of my 223s, with powders that are available on shelves, that are for pistol and shot gun use, but I've been testing them in the 223 for varmint use.

As I am doing so, out the window am watching about 25 elk graze away, on what use to be a golf course, but the owner died years ago, so its been closed for 7 to 8 years....there are 5 or 6 good sized bulls in this small sub herd. When the full herd is all together, there are about 60 plus elk now in it...

HOWEVER....

Recently the neighborhood got notes in the mail about a town hall meeting last Monday night. There is a 35 acre field with a pond that is up the road, that is what is left of a farm. Grandma and Grandpa passed within the last year or so, and it was willed to their kids who live up in Potlandia. Well they want to sell it to a California developer, to sell into 5 acres lots...its already been done.

Then a couple hundred yards from my front door, there is a home, that had 40 acres attached to it, that dates back to the 1940s, when 40 acres wasn't a big piece of property. There is a total of 80 acres back there with a couple streams going thru there and is heavily wooded. That is where the elk herd calls home.

The couple that owned that home have passed with no one to will it to, except to a trust fund, for the Catholic Church.
Well some real estate people ( California transplants ) have bought that and the house has been turned into a New Catholic Church. A priest evidently comes down here for a Sunday Mass at 4 PM, and then hears confession on Monday morning at 8 AM and goes back to where he came from. But the 40 acres the home owns, is being sold off in 5 acre lots, for the benefit or the new St Stephens Catholic "Church".

This 40 acres is part of the 80 acres where the elk call home....of course the land is all being advertised down in California, not locally.. by a CA based Real Estate Company, with an "office" here in town... basically in someone's garage, that has been finished off...by another CA Transplant locally.

The Monday night "Neighborhood Meeting" was immediately cancelled when more people showed that they were expecting.
( yeah I was there ). County used the excuse of some obscure "Oregon State Law" because a video recorder needed to be repaired, so the meeting could be recorded. So they set the new meeting for July 24 so that, they could come up with a new game plan, to push this new development thru, to avoid public resistance from the people who live in the neighborhood.

Since the entire neighborhood is also on wells on each property, the local water table is a big concern. County, wants to develop the land for more tax revenue for the democRATs who run the county. So they are telling all existing residents that they need to consider buying holding tanks for their property....

The county doesn't seem to have a bit of concern about the local elk in the neighborhood, and what their future is.

They are always screaming about the environment and saving wildlife, until that involves them losing an opportunity at more tax money rolling in, to spend as they see fit...( on themselves)....

I sure wish we still lived in the days, where tar and feathering a politician was common and hanging them upside down from a lamp post or phone pole for a couple of days...

So this morning I was enjoying it all, watching that elk herd, while at the reload bench.... those days are going to be gone in the next 24 months....

and Californians wonder why the locals never seem to like them, when they move in and want to take over everything to make it just like California, but with lower costs and without all the population....

but Oregon democRATS will prostitute anything and everything in our state, to get all that California money in their pockets.

Truly is, THEM Vs US.

Sounds like there is money to be made!

Who’s gonna let a few elk stand in their way…..

elk don't bring in much money, on a dependable basis. land/property taxes do. easy to understand why hunting suffers. besides, as time progresses, less and less people like or participate in hunting. sad but true.

That’s a damned shame. Enjoy the elk while they are there. I hate kommifornia and the morons that transplant. Of course Oregon has been going down the crapper for a while now.

Elk are neat....somewhere else.


When they are eating your begonias....they are vermin.

Fingers crossed some LOLbertarians show up in the thread...

You're a smart guy Seafire, but blanket statements like that are just dumb.
Most all of my closest friends have left California in the last 20 years.
ALL of them are right wing conservatives that hunt, trap and fully support the second ammendment.
They are fiscal and social conservatives.....not "California Conservatives" another term often thrown around... most of them thought that even Ronald Reagan was too liberal.
They moved to be with like minded people and to escape the strangling regulation, restrictions and taxation of California.
If anything, they would like to see things get even more conservative in the states that they moved to.
Contrary to popular belief, not all Californians are the same.

Sounds like a call to Sierra is in order.

You should have bought the land.

big business > elk

Maybe you need to put1 of those bulls on your wall and in your freezer so you will allways have them. On the other hand a few California realtors decorating some of your street lights might discourage the vermin from invading.

You could buy up lots and refuse to build, no?

How large are your and your neighbors parcels?

Wheres Buzz ? Lol

Is the dispute with private landowners or the zoning board?

Yes. One's only option is to stay aware and buy the property.

It sounds like the county is telling you that further development will infringe on your existing water rights.

Are your water rights not senior. Would that not be the avenue to pursue?

Capitalizm at its finest John.

You bought and live in a desirable area.

Over time, other folks have discovered its desirability.

Having grown up in a part of SoCal in the 60's that was pretty "rural" for a suburb, as in ground squirrels and road runners coming down from the hill onto our retaining wall, an open ditch/creek separating the N and S bound sides of our street with crawdads, frogs, bats in the tunnels where the road crossed over, herons, even fish in it, I watched it happen there. Now, I can't live there, and haven't been able to since the 90's. Used to be able to go a couple miles from the house to shoot, or to the east even further on BLM or FS land to plink. Now, no recreational shooting unless it's at a range.

30 years ago, had you decided to, you might have started a "slow growth" movement in your county, but I'd be willing to bet the push back from the Chamber of Commerce, the real estate interests, and even private folks with businesses and land would have fought you tooth and nail.

It sucks, it truly does, but it's the nature of our growth dependent economic model.

Wife and I are concerned as the nearest neighbors put up a for sale sign a couple of weeks back. We like our neighbors, have been to their house for dinner and vice versa. We help each other when needed and leave each other the hell alone most of the rest of the time. To lots to the west of them, last year someone bought the 3 acre parcel that had an established well and septic. They haven't built yet, have stayed in a camp trailer and shed until they do, but he got a job up in Tulelake with housing so they're up there for awhile. He and I both want the lot between theirs and the neighbor that's selling.

We've been here only 6 years and our 'hood is changing already. Not sure about the wife, but I'm pretty concerned as property values have risen dramatically since we moved here. By most standards, especially CA ones, property is still cheap here. The climate kinda sucks, there aren't many jobs, but land and houses are still very affordable. I think our previously declining population has started an uptick since the Corona scheidt happened. Folks are moving to this area for the affordability, certainly not for our whopping +/- 90 day growing season, or the -20*F winters, or the 2 to 3 hr drive to any kind of medical specialist/surgeon. I guess the old saying "You can't stop progress" holds true, although certain of us don't see much progress when the neighborhood changes.

How many Republicans on your county Board? How many on the Chamber of Commerce? How many on the local RE business group? I'm just takin' an educated guess, but I'd bet most any of the R business "leaders" there think this development stuff will be good for the local economy, and therefor good for their portfolios. And they can move to a nicer area when their bets pay off.

Sad to think that moving to an area not as nice is one of the few alternatives to seeing your great area change the way it is. My wife and I are both ocean folks and really miss the coast. We both realized years ago, even in places like Humboldt, Del Norte or the S Coast counties of OR are out of our price range and have gotten too expensive for our income levels. So we're kinda stuck in BF California, with our nice (for now) home and property with not too many neighbors to piss us off. At our age, if things get worse we have no clue what we're going to do.

Good luck, and if you can afford it buy some of the lots surrounding your place. Or maybe move to an area with a declining population? The Rust Belt perhaps.

Can't beat them? then join them. Relative of mine lives 5 blocks from the beach, in a 50's house on a big lot. Her 'hood is changing so much now she and her husband are thinking of tearing the house down and putting in the allowed 10 units of dwellings on their lot, 2 of which will be reserved for "lower income" folks. They bought many years ago, had a 15 yr mortgage so they own it outright now, and they're thinking they'll piss off the neighbors who wanted the changes they're now seeing along with financing their move to wherever they end up choosing to go.

A herd of 60 elk is calling an 80 acre parcel home?

If they aren't harassed, elk will live almost in town sometimes. Take a look at some of mountain resort towns in elk country. Some have resident elk wandering all over.