26

outdoors

sports

with Lou Rodia

Higbee Beach Better, Stays Under Pressure

We have been around and on Higbee Beach for a lot of years Way oack in the i940‘s, when we first discoveredThe area, it had little use expect for a few locals and an occassional visitor As the years progressed..andas more and ' more development closed off other areas, the pressures mount#! as people were pushed out of one place and looked for others. Time and progress took their toll all over the state and more and more people are try ing to do the things

they have always done or the things they have come to enjoy in less and less space. Sooner or later, there has to be collision of sorts, since it is a known law of physics that two solid objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Something has to

give.

Higbee Beach is at that crossroads now and it has been for many yehrs. Perhaps time has blotted out some of the unpleasant memoriefiTVridr to the acquisition |by the State of

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New Jersey under the Endangered Species Act which made Federal funds available in 1973! Highbee was doomed for destruction It had become a haven for the hippie culture which was using it for beer parties, dope parties and all sorts of high-jinks. It was literally a dumping ground for everything from abondoned autos to bed springs to everyday trash. THE BEAUTIFUL holly trees were being cut for decorative purposes around the Yuletide holidays / Some trees were cut for firewood. Others were cut to make room for some of the illegal activities listed above, and others to clear sites for the most unpleasant kinds of camping we have ever encountered — junk, halftents and half tar paper, nq sanitation and no drinking water or bathing facilities. Illegal iilknting was prevalent." Dune buggies were ripping up the foliage. There was little if any control because the remoteness of the area made it almost impossible for the Lower Township police to act to curb the rowdies. Jiigbee Beach had hardly anywhere to go but down, and eventually it would have fallen to the bulldozer and development. In the early 1960 s there was an effort to acquire the area by the state and Local opposition curbed that effort. At the urging of many groups, including preservationists, sportsmen’s groups, hunters, fishermen, bird watchers, hikers, and interested in-

Eckel’s Goes To Playoffs

E MAY i- Eckel s J and Wrecking Crew off in the wild-card tch to decide who would advance to the first round playoffs of the Men s Recreational Volleyball' League Eckel’s waltzed through game one as Dave Barikian zapped some impressive spikes and led his team to an easy 15-6 victory. Game two was much more competitive as the Wrecking Crew battled back from an early deficit to take a narrow 10-9 lead and Gary Franco made some spectacular diving saves. With the score knotted at 13-13. Eckel's took the lead behind the expertly controlled bumps of Chuck Howard arid went on to win the game 15-13

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dividuals who just liked the area, the land was acquired and put into the hands of the Division of Fish, Game and Wildlife to manage. Since the state acquisition, things have been constantly improving. There are few, if any dune buggies tearing up the vegetation. Instead, with rigid control and a permit system which is now required, a few (34 in fact) beach buggies are permitted to use a limited access road to the beach and they are permitted to use the beach for fishing between the low tide and high tide marks. FOR THE UNINITIATE, the difference between a beach buggy and dune buggy is tremendous. The beach buggy is usually a Jour-wheel drive vehicle outfitted with roadcapability equipment, is licensed by the state and is used on the beach for transporting fishermen and their equipment along the beach so they can reach inaccessible areas. Incidentally. beach buggies (also four-wheel drive units) are used by bird watchers on occasion. Dune buggies, on the other hand, may be licensed for road use and again, they may not. Many are cut-down cars with huge tires and they are designed for riding up and down the dunes. Their purpose is to be used merely for riding over the dunes'and for the thrill of zipping around the beach and on woods roads for the sheer fun of it. Forget that they tear hell out of ; things, but that's what they do. The state surveyed 1729 Higbee Beach users from May 31,' 1983, to Feb. 11, 1983. Counts of cars entering the area and an estimate of the approximate number of people per car provides an estimate of 90,000 persons utilizing Higbee in that time frame.

Casale’s in Clone Win < * CAPE MAY - Casale’s Matt McGaffaey went on a scoring binge in Peewee Basketball as he scored all but five of the team’s points,* when Casale’s narrowly defeated Kiwanis, 32-31. McGaffney led all scores with 27 points Pat Swyer backed up McGaffney with five point" Kiwanis was led in scorii* by Scott. Holden’s 19 poinsT followed by Mike Cbelius with 10 points. Hillhouse Greenery continued its dominance of the league as it pasted Model Cleaners 35-24. Hillhouse jumped off to a 17-2 halftime lead and coasted to victory behind Kevin Freeman’s 14 points. Freeman was backed up by Tom Reid and Tom Johns™, who scored 8 and 5 points, respectively. Gary FrazW paced Model with 9 points STANDING

Again, since no one counted every last person going into the beach area the figures are net absolute, but they indicate some of the pressures being put on the area Beach activity accounted for 43 per cent of the use Jetty fishermen numbered 16 per cent. Other uses included: bird watchers. 15 per cent; hunters, 12 per cent; surf fishermen, 5 per cent; nature walkers. 2 per cent; fresh water fishermen. 1 per cent;, boaters, .5 per cent, and horseback riding. 7 per cent. THE FIGURES can be only as accurate as any other survey, and that depends on how representatives the sampling is. It does point out however, that accurate or not, there is a multiple use pressure being put on the area by a broad based group of' people. With all of this use, Higbee Beach has not been as clean is it is now for many years. Illegal activity has all but ceased. Tree cuttiqg has stopped, and those dope and beer parties are all but a thing of the past. With the original objective of preserving and enhancing the area to aid endangered species, the Division of Fish, Game and Wildlife is also trying to get the most use from the area and keep it compatible with the original objectives. Hunting is still beirig permitted as are all of the other activities lifted above. The two which have had some people upset are the hunting and the beach use by the four-wheel drive vehicles which allows limited numbers of people to fish otherwise unused areas. Some people cannot handle hunting as a sport, as a game management tool or

as a way of harvesting game for table consumption. Others object to the use of the out of the doors for anything except of* nonconsumptive activities. That means to eliminate hunting,, vegetation destruction of any kind or removal of trees or any wildlife. The ultimate protectionist would have nothing at ajl done to nature except to let it be born and to die without an interference by man. IT HAS ALWAYS been a puzzle to me that the antihunters are so absolute in their attitude that they cannot and will not compromise. Is it better to preserve a Higbee Reach and have it accomplish the announced goals, or is it better to keep dividing the groups which have a vested interest in protecting the area? Someone'has to convince the anti-hunters that they did not invent the environmental movement and that hunters and fishermen are also concerned about the atomosphere, the water and the soil. Instead of locking step and fighting for the bigger goals, the end result is that the two groups keep fighting each other. We have often wondered what has been lost to the bulldozer because the protectionists, and antihunters and the antitrappers and the hunters and fishermen and trappers were fighting each other What an awesome force the antis and the pros would make if they did in fact lock step with each other be affecting a compromise position which both groups would and could live with. too often, I think we get so busy winning the battles that we end up losing the wars.

Knraoi'

> Cape May County • ALMANAC

MARCH

MOOS PHASES/POSITIONS TTu Moon « o/fnct on ihr Tide U grratrst when clotrtt to Earth (in pang—) and whan in dirrct alignment with Sun * earth (full * n»» moon phateii On and about their daUt. low pretture eyetemt and/or *tron* winds l depending upon direction) may result in flooding, and extremely

CORRECTION TIMES Compute approximate time< of high A low water /or your area by adding or subtracting the following number of minute* for each tide phase in

the Tide Table

LOW HIGH

Great Egg Harbor Inlet

Minus U plus 10

Ocean City (Mb Si Bridge)

New Mom » plus J5 p^zz

“ Co™olnl«iLri*,i

Full MOOS |J DIUS 21 nhaa-? Last Quarter. »j v P“* 7 Apogee Sea meCty Perigee 'Ludlatn Thoro Bridge)

pius 66 plus 43

TIDE TABLE i-i_ p.,,, n . Computed for Cape May City mif «, ““ ^

beachfront, for other areas, see 2 _ minus 21

Correction Timas Townsend Inlet

Ph*2l phas4

DATE HIGH LOW Seven Mile Beach ; £ °

J Sat 8 13*32 ISS-ZZl

4 Sun 8 4M;aS 2:36*52 Hereford Inlet (Angleaea) 5 Mon 9:24-9:37 3 10-3 24 P* 1 ® 19 0 6 Tue 9:56-10:12 3:40-3:50 Wildwood Beach 7 Wed 10:33-10:49 4;I4-4:17 Minus2 minus 17 « Thu 11:15-11:31 4 4M 49 Weal Wildwood

i Eu wgS iSJiS

11 Sun 1:36-2:08 8:064 06 P* 1 ® 43 12 Mon 2:364:25 9:144:30 Cape May Harbor 13 Tue 3:514:37 10:16-10:23 Ph» 1 minus 4 14 Wed 5:066:37 ll:i2-ir.a Rv « Fathom Bank 15 Thu 5:564:28 -12:34 piusll pju,, 6 Fn 6:46-7:16 12:30-12:55 Cape May Point

7 Sat 7:364:03 1:14-1:44 ptas46

18 Sun 1:234:50 2:06-2 30 ^ „ P* 1 ®* U Mon 9:114:31 2:5«;i4 u McCne Shoal 30 Tue 9:50-10:30 3:414:57 P* 1 ®* pta»32 11 Wed 10:50-11:18 4:3M:43 Delaware Bay “ 5:23-5:34 Bayshore Channel

| 2 “iliSS

S £ SiEiS S:£;S

27 Tue 4:104:47 10:30-10:38 ph ®’? P*»71 » Wed 5:084:37 11:85-11:38 Do ®“ Creek Entrance » Thu 5:634:17 11:49- Pto98 pfasM * ™ ‘ JM M U-n-U Jl Brandywine Shoal Light « Sat 7:13-7:M 12:54-1:10 ptat77 ^5,