March 18, 2012. From Brenda Twiford.
The Virginian-Pilot September 27, 1998 by Jeffrey S. Hampton
SIGHTS SET ON HISTORY PHILANTHROPIST JOSEPH P. KNAPP WAS LEADING FORCE
BEHIND PRESERVING WILDFOWL, HUNTING.
For 77 years the Currituck Game Commission has in some way managed
waterfowl hunting in the Currituck Sound, writing a little history,
preserving a natural resource and making some enemies.
In 1921, the newly formed commission wrote laws, required licenses and
hired wardens to take on weathered hunters used to shooting ducks when,
where and as often as they wanted. It was one of the earliest attempts
in the state to regulate hunting.
"Nobody had the kind of program Currituck had," said Sid Baynes, chief
of the North Carolina Division of Conservation Education. "They (the
commission) are really probably the main reason there's still waterfowl
up there."
Some of the old hunters resisted the rules and accused the commission
of playing favorites and making profits off license fees. The yellowed
pages of an old ledger describe some of the battles.
A Poplar Branch man named J.E. Guard with a long family tradition of
duck hunting on the Currituck Sound built his blind close to a goose
box that belonged to the Currituck Shooting Club, according to game
board minutes of 1931.
When he refused to move it, the board revoked his license. He continued
to hunt his blind even after a game warden confronted him.
"All I am going to do is go gunning and do not bother me," Guard said,
according to an account by chief game warden T.G. Griggs recorded in
the board minutes.
Several months later, Guard was given his license back and allowed a
blind in another place that was agreeable to him and the board. Years
later the minutes show that a John E. Guard Jr. was made a game warden.
The game commission records show an early idea by philanthropist Joseph
P. Knapp to preserve wildfowl and increase hunting.
Knapp wrote a letter in 1930 outlining his plans to start a game farm
on Mackay Island. He wrote his letter in the old ledgers of the game
board. He hoped in time to be able to raise and release 5,000 mallards
and black ducks each year. He asked the commission to hire three game
wardens to protect the ducks from being shot out of season.
"But this plan of mine it is hoped will be of still greater value to
Currituck, "Knapp wrote. "It is intended to demonstrate that there is
money to be made in running game bird farms in Currituck."
The records don't show Knapp's idea became a profitable game farm, but
in 1934 he founded More Game Birds in America, the predecessor to Ducks
Unlimited. Mackay Island became a National Wildlife Refuge.
In some cases the commission critics were right, according to longtime
hunters with ties to that era.
"I think they're doing a good job now," said John Barnes, a lifelong
hunter from Knotts Island. "There have been times over the years where
they've had problems." Barnes' father was a federal game warden and
hunter in the Currituck Sound in the 1930s.
The board still faces hostility over decisions affecting a prized
blind. Last year, a family sued the board after losing a blind that had
been in the family for decades.
The blind was in the name of the father who died during the year. By
law, a blind not renewed by its owner falls into a pool. The new owner
is drawn from a hat holding the names of whoever applied for the blind.
Members of the family applied for the blind but their names were not
drawn. The board holds the annual drawing for unclaimed blinds in
August.
"It's kind of like a judge," said Billy Rose, chairman of the Currituck
County Game Commission. "Generally he makes one person happy and
another mad."
In the early part of this century, the Currituck Sound attracted
millions of ducks and geese along the Atlantic Flyway. Wealthy northern
businessmen who migrated with them nearly always bagged ducks. Locals,
who had lived off the sound's bounty for generations, guided for them
and managed their posh hunting clubs.
At the same time, market gunners shot hundreds of ducks each day and
shipped them to northern restaurants. The money was good.
Certain areas on the sound were sweet spots for shooting ducks and they
quickly became crowded. Sometimes one blind was well within shotgun
range of another, and it wasn't unusual to be pelted with shot. With
very little law enforcement, poachers were shooting ducks by the
hundreds at night and killing them out of season.
The game commission's regulations chaffed some of the locals, but they
began to control the unsupervised slaughter of Currituck's ducks,
officials say. The board hired five game wardens for $100 a month to
try and enforce the laws.
The five-member game commission today oversees licensing of 810 blinds
and management of wildfowl rest areas on the Currituck Sound, Rose
said. Blinds must be at least 500 yards apart. The Currituck Sound has
no space left for another one. The board had 193 applicants for 11
unclaimed blinds.