By Teri KO4WFP

Spring has arrived in Savannah bringing great POTA weather. There are still parks within a two-hour drive of my home QTH that I have yet to activate.  To check one more off the list, Daisy and I headed to Di-Lane Wildlife Management Area (WMA) this past Wednesday, March 26th.

Di-Lane WMA (US-3744) is located just south of Waynesboro, Georgia. You may recall this town because I mentioned it in a previous article. It is known as the Bird Dog Capital of the World. Why? The town hosts the Georgia Field Trials – a competition that evaluates a bird dog’s ability to find and point flocks of quail. Waynesboro is well suited to the sport given the layout of land and large numbers of quail in the area.

By now you are probably wondering what the heck bird dogs have to do with POTA. The land Di-Lane WMA occupies was formerly owned by Henry Berol, heir to the Eagle Pencil Company in New York. (A side note: he named the plantation for his two daughters Diane and Elaine.) Mr. Berol was an avid bird dog supporter and developed the plantation to host the trials. After Mr. Berol’s death, the land was eventually purchased by the Army Corps of Engineers as wetland mitigation for Lake Richard B. Russell. It is currently managed by the  Georgia Department of Natural Resources with a focus on bobwhite quail.

There are several entrances to the Di-Lane WMA. The one I chose off Herndon Road is flanked by a brick wall and iron bird dogs atop the two pillars which pay homage to the plantation’s past. Just inside the gate is a large barn and check station for hunters.

I drove past this area and found a quiet spot at the edge of Dove Field 1. Despite sunny skies, the temperature was quite comfortable in the mid-seventies.

Everywhere I looked, spring was evident. Flowers were prevalent – bluish and yellow wildflowers, white flowers on wild blackberry vines, and big clusters of flowers on a large bush. Not to be outdone, the sides of the roads were edged with lush, bright-green grass.

There were several trees beside this road of a sufficient height for the end-fed random wire I prefer to use. What I didn’t realize is that instead of a POTA activation, I was actually here to practice throwing my arbor line as it took me ten or so tries to snag a branch at the height I preferred.

I posted on the CW channel of the Discord POTA server the day prior that I would activate this park. I received a request from Cainan N9FZ that I use a frequency to assist regional hams working to hunt all the Georgia parks. Hence it wasn’t a surprise that Cainan was the first to work me when I called CQ on 40 meters. He was followed by five ops before I moved to 20 meters.

Contacts dribbled in on 20 meters over the next 20 minutes. I tried 15 meters next thinking I might snag some DX but it was 17 meters that provided two DX contacts: Jean Baptiste F4ILH and  Dietmar DL3DXX.

Before calling QRT, I moved back to 30 meters to reach more close-to-home hams. That band gave me ten contacts. What I didn’t realize is that band conditions were not great this day. When I began my activation, the K index shifted to 5 indicating a level 1 geomagnetic storm.

All in all, I had 26 contacts on four bands over the span of 1 hour and 10 min. Given the unsettled ionospheric conditions, I considered myself lucky.

It was time to head home but not before a stop in downtown Waynesboro for a photo in front of the famous bird dog mural and some Blue Bell ice cream (flavor: cookies and cream)! By the way, I did share the last bit of the cone with Daisy.

Di-Lane WMA is a park to which I’d like to return when I have more time to spend. It was easy to find, within a hour and a half of my home QTH, and provided good cell service and internet access. I’d also like to visit the pet cemetery on the property. There are headstones for Henry Berol’s pets – horses, dogs, a mule, and a cat.

For those of you wanting more POTA fun, next weekend (April 5th and 6th) is the Georgia Parks on the Air event. Every Georgia state park is scheduled (as of the posting of this article) for an activation over the weekend except Centennial Olympic Park (US-9798). During last year’s event, there were 11,744 reported QSOs and 4,056 individual hunters participated.

While researching for this article, I learned that eleven states in addition to Georgia have a state parks on the air event. This year will be Georgia’s 3rd State Parks on the Air event and promises to be bigger and better than the previous year.

The POTA Babe plans to support the event by activating George L. Smith State Park (US-2179) on Sunday, April 6th. I hope QRPer readers will participate in the fun hunting me as well as other activators over the weekend. For more information on the event, check out the Georgia Parks on the Air event page.

With this successful activation, I now have six parks toward my goal of 30 new parks for 2025. There are more Georgia parks in my near-term sights. Which park will I choose next? Stay tuned…

Equipment Used

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• • Elecraft KX2
  • BaMaTech III paddle
  • Tufteln 9:1 EFRW Antenna
  • Tufteln RG-316 Coax
  • Tufteln Knee Board
  • Helinox Zero High-back Chair
  • Weaver Throw Weight
  • Marlow Excel Throw Line