# Kate Ireland .. RIP .



## maker4life (Feb 17, 2011)

You may not know the name but she was a giant in the quail plantation and restoration world . A major benefactor of Tall Timbers and the Red Hills Conservation Association . 

She passed away Tuesday . The bob white quail lost a very good friend .


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## coveyrise90 (Feb 17, 2011)

I sure hate to hear that. Few people have done as much for quail as she has. I saw her at the Tall Timbers Field Day and everyone there knew Ms. Kate. She owned the 8,000 acre Foshalee Plantatation in Leon County and she was the Chairman of the Board at Tall Timbers. They even named their main demonstration area after her.... the "Kate Ireland Quail and Conservation Area". She was instrumental in the beautifying of HWY 319 (aka Kate Ireland Parkway) between Thomasville and Tallahassee. She donated land so they could widen the highway to 500ft. They then planted wiregrass and longleaf pine in the median and right of way, which are fire maintained by Tall Timbers. She has also been a huge help in acquiring conservation easements for the most quail rich lands in the country. 

Anybody that loves wild bobwhite quail, owes a big thanks to Ms. Kate!

Adam


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## coveyrise90 (Feb 17, 2011)

Just found an article about Ms. Kate in The Tallahassee Democrat.








http://www.tallahassee.com/article/...ionist-philanthropist-Kate-Ireland-dies-at-80

Adam


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## muckalee (Feb 17, 2011)

I never knew Mrs. Kate Ireland but I sure knew who she was.  Maker 4 Life and Covey 90 sure said it well.  She was a "giant" in the quail habitat field.  Hate Mrs. Ireland could not make it through the end of quail season.


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## coveyrise (Feb 17, 2011)

She stood up for wildlife long before it was stylish to do so. Quail have really lost a true friend. She took great care of her dogs also. I hope her nephew takes as good of care of Foshalee as she did. She is one of the reasons Tall Timbers is so world reknown for its wildlife and conservation efforts today. She was the mother of quail conservation.


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## Coach K (Feb 18, 2011)

coveyrise90 said:


> Just found an article about Ms. Kate in The Tallahassee Democrat.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I couldn't get the link to work so here is the article copied & pasted from the Tallahassee Newspaper

Philanthropist Kate Ireland always said what was on her mind and did what she thought needed to be done. Thank goodness.

Because her candor and energy helped preserve thousands of acres of North Florida, improve the beauty of a major highway and inspire hundreds of people — who were left saddened by her death Tuesday afternoon.

Ireland died at her Foshalee Plantation home. She was 80 years old and had been in ill health.

“She had a dogged determination for things she thought were right and proper for the land, for wildlife and for the community,” said Lane Green, executive director of Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy. “I used to describe her as E.F. Hutton: When she spoke people listened and she was always right on point.”

Ireland inherited Foshalee in northern Leon County in 1981, soon moved there permanently and became active in community and conservation efforts.

Most notably, she led the effort to create the Red Hills Conservation Association to protect plantation lands in North Florida and South Georgia from development. She inaugurated the movement in 1990 by putting her 8,000-plus acre Foshalee Plantation into permanent conservation easement. She then persuaded many fellow plantation owners to follow suit.

Today, more than 150,000 acres from Tallahassee to Albany, Ga., are in permanent conservation easements. Though the easements allow hunting, agriculture, timbering and other traditional uses, the property can never be developed.

“This land has been well cared for and tended for almost 100 years,” Ireland said in a 1994 interview. “I want to keep it that way.”

Ireland also spearheaded the beautification of U.S. Hwy. 319 when the highway was widened in the early 1990s. She donated to the state 100 feet on either side of the road where it bordered her plantation, and persuaded two other plantation owners to do the same. That allowed the state to build wide, landscaped medians in the road and create a scenic gateway from Georgia to Tallahassee.

Ireland’s behest specified the medians must be maintained by annual prescribed burning by Tall Timbers, which manages the Red Hills Conservation Association and on whose board she sat — making it the only highway landscaping project in the nation maintained by prescribed burning.

In 1992, the Florida Legislature named the 8.5 miles of U.S. 319 to Tallahassee’s Chiles High School, the Kate Ireland Parkway. In 2008, the Federal Highway Administration gave her an award for developing a “sustainable landscaping initiative using fire.”

“I called her the Queen of Conservation,” Green said. “She talked the talk and walked the walk.”

The never-married Ireland was the youngest of four children of Peg and Robert Ireland, an Ohio coal magnate and World War I pilot. Her family founded the Hanna Mining Co., and wintered at family-owned plantations in Georgia and Florida, including Melrose and Pebble Hill plantations.

Ireland’s older sister is Louise Humphrey, a one-time president of the famed Metropolitan Opera Association in New York City, is the owner of Woodfield Springs Plantation, near Miccosukee.

Ireland spent only one year at Vassar College before dropping out — in favor of a career of philanthropy, investing and volunteering.

In the 1950s, she followed her sister into service with the Frontier Nursing Service, which provided social and health services to indigent residents of rural Kentucky. She worked actively in Kentucky until 1975, when she became the organization’s national chairwoman and chief money raiser.

Ireland later became a limited partner in a noted New York investment bank and was a co-founder of a Thomasville, Ga., investment firm. She spent a six-year term on the board of a Federal Reserve Bank in Ohio. She served as chair of Archbold Medical Center in Thomasville and was one of the Tallahassee Democrat’s 1995 Volunteers of the Year.

“She was an astute businesswoman. She had her own set of ideas and ideals and was very successful,” said Tallahassee attorney Duby Ausley, whose family has been friends with Ireland’s family all his life. “A lot of people who come from inherited wealth don’t live productive lives. But Katie did.”

Ireland was an avid outdoors woman. She raised Tennessee Walking horses and hunted quail, dove, ducks and turkeys with seemingly endless stamina. She shared her passion with an array of hunters, including Gov. Lawton Chiles who hunted ducks on her plantation the weekend before he died in 1998. On her last hunt in September, Ireland bagged nine quail in 11 shots.

“She was a good shot all her life,” Ausley said.

Ireland was beloved for her personality, which was equal parts determination, candor and good humor. The road to her home was named Tenacity Lane; her auto tags were emblazoned “Preserve” and her land holdings were held in the “Perserverance Trust.”

“Kate gave of herself 100 percent to any project she was involved in,” said longtime friend Mart Hill. “She was fun to be with, she was always pleasant — and she always told it like it is.”

Ireland is survived by her sister, her longtime companion Anne Cundel and nine nieces and nephews.

A memorial service will be held at All Saints Episcopal Church in Thomasville on Friday March 4 at 4 p.m.
Next Page


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## Lane Morrell (Feb 18, 2011)

Her place is one of the most beautiful places I've ever had the pleasure to step foot on.  My wifes uncle managed Foshalle for almost 20 years.  Joey, have you ever been down there with us when Jody was home?


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## rocket (Feb 18, 2011)

maker4life said:


> You may not know the name but she was a giant in the quail plantation and restoration world . A major benefactor of Tall Timbers and the Red Hills Conservation Association .
> 
> She passed away Tuesday . The bob white quail lost a very good friend .



Amen Brother.


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## Maduro on Point (Feb 21, 2011)

No question Ms. Kate will be missed.. God Bless


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## huntindawg (Feb 21, 2011)

During my time at Tall Timbers, I had the pleasure to meet Ms. Kate several times of the years. I'll echo everything that's been said already.  Quail conservation has lost a true ambassador.


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## Wingmaster870 (Mar 4, 2011)

working in Cairo this past week and road down to 319 after i finished up one day.  Beautiful area...especially this time of year with everything ablaze!

I really liked the longleaf, wiregrass, live oaks, etc in the median...especially the bioswales with the planted cypress.  Those areas will be really nice one day!  

Ms. Kate sounds like a heck of a woman!


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## huntindawg (Mar 4, 2011)

Wingmaster870 said:


> bioswales



bioswales?????

where'd you learn that boy, in ecology class?


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## Wingmaster870 (Mar 4, 2011)

you like that sucker???  made that up on my own, but i reckon they are just plain old, shallow detention ponds.

maybe you paid a little more 'ttention in some of those ecology classes and you wouldnt be stuck in a cubicle over in South Carolina!


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## huntindawg (Mar 4, 2011)

Hahaha...

1) I'm in NC

and 2) I ain't in a cubicle.


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