A beautiful River in Western North Carolina needs your help. The Little Tennessee River is a class I-II River that flows North from Georgia into Western North Carolina. It is one of the most biologically diverse rivers anywhere and has been all but devistated by dams that form famous reservoirs like Fontana, Calderwood, Tellico, and the list goes on. Upstream of the large dams though the river snakes along through low hills and over wide shoals covered with rare endemic mussels. Just before the river slides into the silence of Fontana Reservoir, it passes through a 4600 acre tract of land that has been the source of one of the hottest regional environmental debates in decades.
The Needmore Tract was originally taken or bought depending on your opinion by a power company that intended to build a dam and flood the reach. The dam was never built, and the land remained virtually untouched for much of 1900s. What exists today on the needmore Tract is a remnant of an ecosystem that graced our ancestors eyes across the southeast but today is a priceless rarity. It is places like Needmore that will be the Noah’s Arc of future river restoration efforts in the entire Little Tennessee Watershed. Thus, it was a desperate situation when Duke Energy transferred the needmore tract to its infamous devepment subsidiary, Crescent Resources.
What followed was a massive, multiple front effort by environmental interests to save the land from development. American Whitewater was working with a coalition of stakeholders to encourage the conservation of the land through regional dam relicensings, when to our relief, negotiations between the Nature Conservancy, US fish and Wildlife, and other stakeholders were successful in arranging the purchase and protection of the Needmore Tract. Now, critical fundraising efforts are underway to actually make this awesome conservation purchase a reality. Nantahala Outdoor Center is making it fun and easy to help with the cause. Please check out NOC’s Fundraising Website to see how you can help support this critical conservation effort!