A Hunter’s Oasis
In The Mountains

It’s about that time to break out the camouflage and don the
bright orange safety garb. Hunting season is right around the
corner and two local men have just added a little more excitement to that recreational highlight. Mark Scruggs has brought to life a long-time dream of his with the help and experience of hunting enthusiast Don Jones. Since March, the two have been toiling over the details of the new Covey Hollar Hunting Preserve, the first place of its kind in the High Country.
Last week, Scruggs and Jones were busy putting the final touches on the large bird coup that will house the pheasants, chuckar and quail that will soon inhabit the preserve. The birds will be purchased through the Shady Knoll Game Farm, in Asheville, throughout the coming months.

Jones already owns a preserve outside of Fayetteville and wanted to open a facility here to accommodate the numerous hunters that come to stay at his inn in Valle Crucis, The Mountainside Lodge. Scruggs is an avid hunter who enjoys sharing his interest in the sport with his children and wanted a place where they could pursue that interest together. The two connected and began the search for the most imperative part of any preserve – the land.

In order to open a preserve, the state mandates that the proprietor open on no less than 100 acres and no more than 1,000. Fortuitously, one of the largest land-owners in the area happens to be a big proponent of hunting and lent 650 acres of his private estate, free of charge, to the idea of the preserve. Sterling Carroll, of Carroll Leather Goods owns a breathtaking plot of land off of the Parkway, 6 miles east of Boone, where Scruggs and Jones will guide all of the hunts.

There will be 10 memberships sold through the preserve for $700 a piece, which guarantee members 100 of any combination of chukar, quail or pheasant throughout the entire hunting season. The preserve will also offer full-day and half-day packages to non-members. All of the hunts will start out with breakfast at the Blue Ridge Diner off of Old Highway 421 and then Scruggs and Jones accompany groups of up to three people on hunts tailored to the group’s needs. The men provide the dogs for the hunt and a small snack while the hunters will need to provide their state hunting license, guns and shells.

Preserve hunting creates an added benefit for dedicated hunters in that the season on a preserve extends two months beyond that of hunting in the wild. Covey Hollar also offers one of the most spectacular settings for hunting as the preserve is surrounded in lush forest that will turn to beautiful foliage in the fall and offer resplendent mountain vistas in the winter as the leaves begin to fall. Hunters will also get a fairly good workout as the four primary fields are on some steep grades through mountainous terrain.

While Covey Hollar is primarily geared toward guided hunts, Scruggs and Jones have also started a Quails Unlimited in tandem with the preserve. “Not only is Covey Hollar a hunting preserve,” Scruggs explains, “but we’re also into the conservation of quail as well. We do a seed program where we give the farmers in the area seed – millet and milo – and then we help them plant a buffer sown around their fields to help the quail habitat come back up to the mountains.”

Jones also contends that any hunting preserve inevitably replenishes the bird stock in the area as well. “When you go out to hunt you never harvest all the birds,” he says. “There’s always some left. There’s a fair possibility that some of them will survive and restock, at least in the area that you’re hunting in anyway. But the mortality rate is pretty tough on them though, what with bobcats and coyotes and foxes.”

Scruggs and Jones hope to have Covey Hollar up and running on October 1 but are already available for booking hunts. “Wing shooting had just gone by the wayside in this area,” says Scruggs, “and we want to bring it back.”
For more information about the preserve you can visit their website at www.coveyhollar.com.