ALLARDT — A light rain doesn’t affect Bull, an eight-month-old Labrador retriever, as he excitedly jumps aboard a Kawasaki Mule for a ride around a plantation that he is quickly learning by heart.
Bull is one of several dogs kenneled by Sawbriar at the Big South Fork, a wing shooting preserve that, while still in the start-up stages, is quickly gaining recognition and popularity across the region.
Owned and operated by Dr. Fred Moody and Rhonda Wright, Sawbriar is a 400-acre hunting preservation just outside of Historic Rugby. Moody and Wright cater to wing shooters seeking a quality hunt for pheasant or quail without the usual drive to the flat grasslands of the Dakotas or the revered plantations of south Georgia.
As Wright rolls the Mule across the property’s access roads, muddied by the morning rain, it’s hard to tell that this is, in fact, still the Cumberland Plateau, and not one of the afore-mentioned bird hunting havens. The land, which is mostly cleared, stands in winter wheat, bluestem, Indian grass, and broomsedge. It’s a far cry from the green fescue that dominates most cleared land in the region. Surrounded by the rugged terrain of the Big South Fork and the intermingled farm lands stands — if appearance is any indication — a haven for upland game birds.
“We are who we are,” Wright, an Oneida native, says of the hunting preserve. “We can’t be a prime South Dakota flat land where you can see for miles and miles. I don’t want to be something I’m not. I just want to be good at what I’ve got here and at what I can.”
To that point, Sawbriar appears to be, in its early stages at least, a success.
“Fred and Rhonda have done a remarkable job of developing truly outstanding quail habitat from what was primarily cutover brushland,” says Tom Roberts, who teaches habitat management at Tennessee Tech University. He called the Sawbriar a Tennessee landscape that our “grandfathers and great-grandfathers would have recognized.”
But in the beginning, that wasn’t the case. Wright, a 1991 graduate of Oneida High School and former real estate agent for Ayers Auction & Realty, and Moody, a Jamestown native, purchased the property through Moody’s family several years ago. What they purchased was, for lack of a better description, a mess.
“It was rough,” Wright said. “You could barely see the roads. It was like a junk piece of property.”
The land had been clear-cut in the late 1990s, treetops left where they fell. Clean-up alone presented a huge challenge.
“Fred just kept saying, ‘I’ve been over this place. It has potential,’” Wright said. “[But] it was just like walking through a jungle of briars.”
Moody’s father, who owns an Allardt-based transportation company and is a cattle farmer on an adjoining farm, didn’t believe him. Neither did his brother. Or the real estate agent handling the property.
But three years later, the property is cleared, spring-fed ponds have been built, and a majority of the property stands in first-year or second-year growth of native grasses.
“It takes some imagination and planning and work,” Wright said. “The real estate agent came back and rode through the property a few weeks ago and said, ‘I never would’ve believed it would look like that.’”
The process of clearing the property included the use of a Gyrotrack, a mowing machine that can both cut standing trees and stumps and chip tree debris. Following clean-up, the ponds were built and the property was studied to determine the best way to plant it. The three-year process culminated with the planting of fields in the springs of 2006 and 2007.
“The native grasslands and early successional fields they have restored are on par with any WMA in the region and now have the potential to not only support good populations of quail and rabbits, but also numerous small mammals and resident and migrant songbirds,” Roberts said. “It represents a habitat type that historically occurred throughout Tennessee, but today is virtually non-existent.”
GETTING STARTED
Moody and Wright got their start in the wing shooting business by guiding for Royal Tompkins, who operated a shooting preserve on his nearby Honey Creek property until his death in January 2007.
“Royal was truly our mentor,” Wright said. “We guided for him at Honey Creek for several years. That’s where we cut our teeth, which allowed us the experience and the behind-the-scenes of it all.”
Tompkins, who was in his 80s and in declining health, appointed Moody and Wright to carry on the tradition he had started of bird hunting on the northern Cumberland Plateau.
“We were working with him on a lot of this,” Wright said. “It was a five-year project.”
After Tompkins’ death, Moody and Wright kicked their project into high gear, and began offering hunts just nine months later.
“What [working for Tompkins] allowed us to do was to talk to people and get a feel of what they want,” Wright said. “They want somewhere to go. It’s just nice to get away from the office, and cell phone service doesn’t work real good out here . . . even on a day when it’s raining, they can still come and built a fire and sit around the fire.”
The couple studied similar operations at the famed south Georgia plantations to determine what should be implemented at the Sawbriar.
“For us to bring in people from Atlanta, we have to offer something that they don’t have,” Wright said. “And we get a lot of people from Atlanta.”
Despite the late freeze in April that killed many young plants, and the subsequent drought that further hampered agriculture, Wright said that the Sawbriar was fortunate.
“With the terrain and the springs on the property, we were very lucky,” she said. “Every other pond around dried up, but all of ours were spring-fed and they dropped minimally. With the late frost and the drought, we’re tickled with what we have.”
HUNTING BEGINS
By October 1, the Sawbriar was prepared for hunters. Initially, the flow of clients was slow. But that would soon change.
“The weather really hurt us,” Wright said. “We don’t want to get the dogs out in hot weather, so we really didn’t get kicked off until the first of November. It was slow at first, but we didn’t realize how much the weather would help. When the weather finally turned off kinda cool, the phone calls started coming in.”
The month of December booked quickly. With hunting continuing through March, the Sawbriar’s owners are hoping that is a trend that will continue.
The Sawbriar is quickly gaining notoriety. A training session in early November was conducted by Mike Stewart, a renowned dog trainer for Ducks Unlimited. Another event at the preserve attracted several women outdoors writers and company representatives, including representatives from Benelli and Beretta shotguns.
“The thing that most impressed me about Sawbriar during my first visit was the attention to detail,” Knoxville’s Jeff Keith said. “Their focus on bringing back native warm season grasses as habitat is a unique experience compared to most wing shooting preserves in this area.
“Hopefully, one day we will recapture the habitat for viable wild quail hunting in this area. Until then, the Sawbriar provides the closest thing to a wild quail hunt I have found in the area,” he added.
A hunt at the Sawbriar at the Big South Fork begins with a continental breakfast and a fireside chat.
“There’s no rush to get out in the field,” Wright said. “For the most part, it’s not about getting out in the field. It’s about getting away from the office.”
After the morning’s activities, which might include some clay pigeon shooting in addition to the actual hunt, a hot lunch awaits back at the lodge, followed by an afternoon hunt for those who are up to the challenge.
Sawbriar currently operates with four guides, and can accommodate around 12 hunters at a time.
For Moody and Wright, the Sawbriar’s successful start is the realization of a dream, even if it does require some long hours. In addition to their duties at the preserve, both work for the Moody transportation company, while Moody is also a veterinarian at Livingston-based Ragland & Riley, where he pulls two 24-hour shifts each week.
“We’re willing to sacrifice. You have to if you’re going to have anything,” Wright said.
“This was always something that we knew was our goal and our dream.”
[Sawbriar at Big South Fork offers half-day and full-day guided hunts for pheasant and quail. More information is available at their website, www.sawbriarhunting.com.]
