Is it possible to escape hunters, ATVs and noise in a rural area? (Boston: to buy, subdivision)

[Tupaloop]

Hello Mass folks, I desperately need your insight.

My husband and I are looking to relocate to somewhere in New England. We have our sights on western Mass and southern NH (Peterborough area). But we are running into massive obstacles and I'm afraid what we are seeking may not exist.

We have strong aversion to hunting and don't want to see it or hear it. We also don't want to see dead animals strung up from trees in people's yards. We don't vibe with that culture at all and want to get as far away from it as possible, short of moving to Hawaii or California. We want to be able to hike during all seasons without covering ourselves in blaze orange from head to toe to avoid being shot.

Peace and quiet is also extremely important to us. We eventually want to turn our property into a wildlife sanctuary with the intention of donating it to a trust after we're gone.

I've heard the horror stories of people on rural properties being awoken by gunfire, finding gut piles and tree stands on their posted land, or having hunters' arrows go whizzing by their heads.

Can anyone point me to rural towns in western Mass that are not full of hunters and ATV trails? Any towns with state parks with ample hiking trails that prohibit hunting?

Thanks!

[ChadChadderson]

I don’t know if this post is even serious, but if it is I recommend you stay where you are.

You’re not going to find what you’re looking for in a rural area.

[msRB311]

This is an odd post. I've lived in the Boston area my whole life and I've never seen dead animals strewn up in someone's yard. This isn't VT or rural ME.

[massnative71]

Stay in your subdivision (saying this like a friend).

[timberline742]

Originally Posted by Tupaloop

Can anyone point me to rural towns in western Mass that are not full of hunters and ATV trails? Any towns with state parks with ample hiking trails that prohibit hunting?

Thanks!

You're going to need to purchase a very large lot of land to buffer yourself. Very very large.


The state parks without any hunting are few (archery at least is allowed on most, even a lot of the formerly closed to hunting DCR quabbin land allows it now), but they're going to be in eastern mass in towns with discharge prohibitions. And they'll be small.


You may find some places in Sheffield/Great Barrington areas owned by TNC/TTOR that don't allow hunting, but most are coming around to at least allow archery hunting of deer, for good reason.


Honestly, hunting is part of rural life.
But you can hike Sundays without safety orange as hunting is not allowed on Sundays. So.


And snowmobile and ATV trails are common as well and part of rural life.



Hunters are supposed to bury gut piles, or cover them with leaves, but some are better than others.


Unless you're wealthy enough to buy hundreds, if not thousands of acres, you will not find what you're seeking.

Originally Posted by msRB311

This is an odd post. I've lived in the Boston area my whole life and I've never seen dead animals strewn up in someone's yard. This isn't VT or rural ME.

VT and Mass harvest roughly the same amount of deer every year, 15k plus or minus. Mass would surpass it if we had Sunday hunting like VT. Maine has double, but its a much larger land mass. Plenty of hunting in Mass.

[BostonMike7]

I concur. Assuming local discharge distance laws don’t apply, only way to isolate yourself is to buy up all the surrounding land. Otherwise rural life is about what you expect it to be. All the things you don’t want to see are the reason why people tend to love to rural area.

[in_newengland]

Some of the towns just west of Northampton might qualify. Westhampton, Williamsburg, but they're not that rural if you mean you want absolutely no one around. They are countrified though and are not suburbia.

Further out you get the hilltowns. That's pretty isolated and hard to get to but you may get the hunting. Towns like Cummington, Huntington, Chesterfield.

Also, to the north, Conway, Montague, that whole area. They took in a lot of NYers who wanted to live in the country but still wanted access to a very liberal city like Northampton. There are more little towns around there . Beautiful countryside yet the people tend to not be country bumpkins. That area could probably extend up to Brattleboro VT, another very liberal town. Earthy crunchy. I guess you'd have to find a realtor and check out these areas.

[FCMA]

These are tough criteria. Maybe if you find land on the woodsy edges of not quite rural W MA towns like Amherst, Easthampton, Northampton, or South Hadley you can find a rural-feeling area where hunting and ATVs are not an overt part of the social fabric but cross in to the bordering rural towns and that quickly changes. Conservation organizations and the state generally allow at least some hunting on most properties because hungry and overpopulated deer are among the biggest threats to biodiversity when it comes to rare plant conservation and such concerns.

[katzenfreund]

I would recommend Amherst or Northampton outskirts.

[GeoffD]

Originally Posted by msRB311

This is an odd post. I've lived in the Boston area my whole life and I've never seen dead animals strewn up in someone's yard. This isn't VT or rural ME.

I certainly see deer strung up and tagged in my town. The deer population is out of control here and hunting is a good thing. Around here, more deer are taken during archery season than gun season.