The struggle to save 

 our maritime for ests 



BY NANCY DAVIS 



A rope swing drifted some 25 feet be- 

 neath a gnarled live oak branch. 



Shay Clanton took a running jump and 

 threw her legs around the swing's seat. She 

 sailed through the trees several times, then 

 dropped off. 



The clearing would make a beautiful site 

 for a house. But Clanton felt more at home 

 with the rope swing. For the artist, develop- 

 ment would only mar the landscape she 

 loved to paint. 



Clanton and about 250 environmentalists, 

 all members of Friends of Hatteras Island, 

 had just won a victory of sorts. After two 

 years of debate and negotiation, the woods 

 were to be protected by a special Dare 

 County ordinance. 



Development would still take place. But at 

 least it would be controlled. 



Buxton Woods, the state's largest remain- 

 ing maritime forest, covers about 3,000 acres 

 of the widest portion of Hatteras Island. 

 About 1,000 acres are part of the Cape Hat- 

 teras National Seashore. Most of the remain- 

 ing 2,000 acres are privately owned. 



Except for a few houses, the woods have 

 remained undeveloped . . . until now. 



As beachfront land becomes scarce and 

 prices soar, people are looking to the woods. 

 And for some longtime property owners, 

 the promise of hefty profits is luring them to 

 sell their land or develop it themselves. 



It's a scenario repeated up and down the 

 Carolina coast. At one time, most of the 

 Outer Banks were forested with the live oak, 

 laurel oak and loblolly pine characteristic of 

 maritime forests. 



But time has taken its toll. Many of the 

 forests have been chopped by the devel- 

 oper's ax. 



Buxton Woods is just one of the state's 

 maritime forests that's been under scrutiny 



SHAY CLANTON IN BUXTON WOODS 



lately. And the debate over that forest has 

 called attention to others from Duck Woods 

 to Bald Head Island. 



"Maritime forests are already an endan- 

 gered habitat," says David Owens, director 

 of the N.C. Division of Coastal Management. 



"Most of what we had is gone, and most 

 of what we have left is going," he says. 



And it's the going that has Clanton and 

 her group worried. 



"We don't oppose development in here," 

 she says of Buxton Woods. "It's just such a 

 fragile place that we're afraid large-scale 

 development would destroy it. 



"Everyone realizes that development is 

 inevitable, but we hope it's planned enough 

 that it won't destroy the environment," . 

 Clanton says. 



The controversy over Buxton Woods be- 

 gan in 1986 when a landowner announced 

 plans for a golf course and housing 

 development. Individual homes had been 

 built in the forest before, but never a large 

 development. 



The Friends of Hatteras Island formed in 

 opposition to the proposed development 



