Joe O'Bannon is a man of few words and many guns.
For the past 20 years, O'Bannon has been inviting hunters to his 2,800 acre ranch in Martin County to blast the hell out of all manner of exotic animals, making a comfortable living in the process.
O'Bannon flies in caged animals from across the globe - water buffalo from Trinidad, deer and antelope from India and water buck from Africa, to name a few - and charges as much as $5,000 for the chance to make a trophy out of the beasts. He even added a shooting range to the ranch, called J&R Outfitters, earlier this year.
But now, after complaints from neighbors and animal rights activists PETA, authorities discovered the land isn't zoned for hunting, and hunting camp, the largest in the state, may be shut down.
"There's no way anybody had any idea that we were doing anything illegal," a cowboy hat-clad O'Bannon told WPTV.
He argued his business helps conserve the land and bring tourism to rural Florida, and though he already shut down the shooting range, he's hoping a zoning change will allow him to continue to operate the hunts.
"You can have a hunting camp and you can have a shooting range on a 20 acre ranchette, but you can't have it on a 4000 acre ranch, which makes no sense," O'Bannon said.
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Neighbors said either way, it's a noise and safety problem.
"It's just more of a noise pollution issue more than anything," said neighbor Chris Gayden. "I think it was too close to everybody's horses and cattle and livestock and of course your children out here and stuff, even a .22 bullet can go a couple miles and hit somebody."
On its Web site, PETA calls the ranch a "canned-hunting facility" and urges members to help get rid of the "cruel" operation.
The Martin County Commissioners were expected to discuss the issue today.
