# Ted Turner buys land in ND?????



## always_outdoors (Dec 17, 2002)

I just heard rumor that Ted Turner just bought some land south of Pick City for $3.5 million dollars. Supposedly this is prime land along the Missouri River with prime turkey and deer land.

Can anyone confirm this rumor??


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## Goose Guy350 (Nov 29, 2004)

I can't confirm the ND rumor but I know he has a ton of land just outside of Bozeman MT that he keeps under lock and key.


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## Roughrider (Apr 12, 2005)

Lord I hope this isn't true. When the "King of absentee landowners" buys land it's gone forever!!


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## always_outdoors (Dec 17, 2002)

Goose Guy:

Ted has a huge spread down in Raton, NM right across from the NRA Whittington Center as well.

This is very bad if he is know looking at ND land. :eyeroll:


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## g/o (Jul 13, 2004)

12


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## buckseye (Dec 8, 2003)

Here comes that big NR money some people think we need to survive...lol....


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## Old Hunter (Mar 8, 2002)

Ted Turner is not in a good financial position at this time. He has lost the majority of his holdings. He is still a millionaire but I would be suprised if he buying land at this time. Could be wrong but my bet is that it is rumor. I hope he goes flat broke the guy is major pain in the ***.


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## gundogguru (Oct 7, 2003)

He owns a whole bunch of land down here in SC too.


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## The Norseman (Jan 8, 2005)

Hello everyone,

Mr. Turner is the number 1 (owns the most acres of land) land owner in America, in the history of the USA.


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## win4win (Sep 8, 2003)

I believe he is still the largest single private land owner is the US and also still owns the largest buffalo herd in the country.

I guess I would rather see him buy the land than some urban developer or guide/outfitting operation.


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## gundogguru (Oct 7, 2003)

win4win said:


> I guess I would rather see him buy the land than some urban developer or guide/outfitting operation.


 Win I'm with you. better owned by him than strip mall.


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## Roughrider (Apr 12, 2005)

Better than an urban developer but worse than a g/o. I am not a fan of g/o but atleast with a g/o you could get on the land or there would be a possiblity of it being sold in the future, but MR. TBS wont ever let that land go, even after he dies. You won't ever get on it, let alone get a glimpse of that land again.


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## zettler (Sep 7, 2002)

win4win said:


> I believe he is still the largest single private land owner is the US and also still owns the largest buffalo herd in the country.


From a NYT (spit!) article in 2002:

"Ted Turner's wealth ebbs, thanks to AOL and bison 
Geraldine Fabrikant The New York Times Tuesday, August 27, 2002

Ted Turner, apparently, is not a happy camper. Or a jolly rancher. That is because it has been a bad year to own stock in AOL Time Warner and livestock in the form of bison. And Turner, the vice chairman of AOL Time Warner, owns a lot of both. His huge stake in AOL Time Warner - he is the company's largest individual shareholder - was worth $7.2 billion when the merger of America Online and Time Warner closed in January 2001. It is now valued at $1.76 billion. 
. 
Then there is the bear market in buffaloes. Turner, who is the largest U.S. landowner, with 1.8 million acres (730,000 hectares) in ranches in Montana and four other states, is also the largest breeder of buffaloes. He owns about 30,000 head, or 10 percent of the total in the United States. 
. 
Two years ago, the going price for buffalo was $2,000 a head, but is now only about $300, according to David Carter, executive director of the National Bison Association. That is a plunge of 85 percent - even more than the 77.9 percent decline in AOL Time Warner shares in the same period."

Now that was in 2002 and things have chaged since then...

"Ted Turner's advice: Eat more bison
CNN founder selling Montana bison meat in 31-restaurant chain
By Rachel Brand of The Scripps Howard News Service, Montana Standard Butte
2/21/05 
A string of Western-theme diners may have transformed a novelty meat into a blue-plate special.

Live bison prices have nearly tripled and the public's hunger for the lean, tangy meat is growing as it shows up on menus and in grocery stores.

Experts credit media mogul Ted Turner and his eponymous restaurant chain, Ted's Montana Grill.

''Ted's was the trendsetter,'' said Dave Carter, executive director of the National Bison Association. ''One of the things we've said for a long time is we needed a good way to get people to take their first bite.

''They're going into Ted's, trying it the first time. It tastes great, and then we are seeing an increase in demand for our other marketers.''

To clarify, it is bison, not buffalo. Dark brown, thick-shouldered bison have short, U-shaped horns. They roamed the North American plains and were nearly hunted to extinction at the turn of the century until ranchers and national parks worked to bring them back.

Turner is the largest landowner in the United States, and he owns 70,000 of the estimated 250,000 North American bison alive today."

It appears, that while I do not know if he has indeed bought land in ND, it wouldn't surprise me - look at the area near Granville and the Bufflao they raise/sell there - they are not Bison.

Once again, Money talks...


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## zettler (Sep 7, 2002)

Maybe even more ominous from a 2002 story, "Ted Turner has South Dakota ranchers concerned. The media mogul/buffalo baron has asked state permission to release rare swift foxes on his 138,000-acre South Dakota ranch.

Turner wants to transplant 180 of the threatened, house cat-sized animals to his central South Dakota ranch over the next several years after trapping them in Wyoming. Area ranchers are worried the release will eventually bring land-use restrictions from the government."

As I know he has had wildlife managers on his properties since he started, could a long-term goal be too control hunting in and around his holdings???

Say, you introduce certain species, like the aforementioned Fox, and along comes the government who now imposes specific restrictions based upon this species "habitat". Then the farmers start loosing cattle livestock due to this protected species, then the wildlife is laid to waste too by this protected predator, free-lance hunters bcome extinct, and the land barons control it all....

WHEW!

Was I on a roll or an episode of the "Lone Gunmen" on FOX??

You all decide!


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## Goose Guy350 (Nov 29, 2004)

Its been awhile since I talked over the Endangered Species Act but I'm pretty sure that the surrounding farmers could enter into a agreement with the U.S Fish and Wildlife service previously to the swift fox being released. The nitty gritty of the agreement is that the farmer won't fragment or degrade the land, or make the habitat for the endangered species any worse than it is at this present time and therefore if it is found he will not have any other land use restrictions imposed upon himself once it is found. I believe a tax break is provided for entering into the contract and in most cases it will make the land worth more because the land cannot be fragmented and with the strong demand for large tracts of land which are becoming rare. The best person to talk to about all this would be someone at the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service but some more info could come from reading the Endangered Species Act.


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## zettler (Sep 7, 2002)

Interesting!


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## always_outdoors (Dec 17, 2002)

3 years ago I was down in NM at the NRA Whittington Center. They took us over to the Philmont Ranch which is a 140,000 acre ranch that was donated to the Boy Scouts. They still have an active ranch there, but the place is designed for the training of camping/survivial skills for the boy scouts. thousands of scout troops go there every year. I believe there is like a 2 yr waiting list for troops to get in there for a camping/hiking trip.

Anyway...Ted Turner's ranch borders this ranch. While we were there our guide told us that Ted is trying to introduce the grizzly bear into his area. There are black bear there already,but typically don't pose a threat to the scouts since they are usually in troops and educated on them. they are quite concerned about grizzly bears and have voiced their concern.

So SD isn't the only place this guy is introducing species or revitalizing species on his ranch.


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## bioman (Mar 1, 2002)

Years ago, I did some work adjacent to the Vermejo Ranch, which at that time, was owned by the Pennsoil trust. Ted bought the ranch and some additional acres in NM, which put the total purchase around 800,000 acres. Ted is definitely into commercial hunting, go to his website and see for yourself.


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## zettler (Sep 7, 2002)

bioman said:


> Years ago, I did some work adjacent to the Vermejo Ranch, which at that time, was owned by the Pennsoil trust. Ted bought the ranch and some additional acres in NM, which put the total purchase around 800,000 acres. Ted is definitely into commercial hunting, go to his website and see for yourself.


Thanks for the lead, here is the link: Turner Outfitting


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## always_outdoors (Dec 17, 2002)

Ted did not buy the Oster property South of Pick City. I guess a former ND resident did. $2000/acre.


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## Habitat Hugger (Jan 19, 2005)

Thank God a former North Dakotan bought that land! Now it will be open for hunting and fishing!


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