It's amazing - I was simply asking and trying to understand and all I can receive is a rude response. We have lived here for TWO years and this was happening last year, except that the planes were working in the afternoon and there were no gunshots day and night. I guess my biggest worry really should be living in a neighborhood with someone like you Perhaps you can work on explaning how things work on your farms to the rest of us like a gentlemen.

Maybe it is time to move on because the planes and crow guns are not going anywhere soon.

I live at Stony Run Apartmens and have the same issue. It woke up my entire family family this past Saturday, at 6:30am.
I am not sure of what it is or where it is coming from, but there should be some regulation on noise, especially in the morning.

Well, I was told to move if didn't like it...."you decide". I have decided - that I will no longer buy flowers and produce at Gill's Farms. I fully appreciate that they are trying to care for their crops, However, I do not appreciate being told to move if I don't like it. I pay for my home and pay taxes, and I am entitled to at least ask what is happening and voice that I am having an issue. It is apparent that others are having an issue with this, and they should not be told to move, either. We love our home and neighbors, but I will not patronize a business where the farmers are rude, especially to those who buy from them!

This is exactly the type of quality-of-life issues that Kingston needs to address if it ever wants to clean its image up and attract more tourism and business into the area. Not to mention the residents who have to endure this kind of constant noise! Who wants to hear that kind of racket all the time? I certainly wouldn't!!

I've lived on Hurley Mtn Rd for 20 years, with the plane flying directly over our house to the point where I could probably hit it with a baseball, we have cornfields literally in our backyard and right down the road from us. It's just something you have to live with and get used to if you wanna live in this general area. They spray at different times all the time. Just yesterday they did it around 5-6pm.

Mr. Gill, might you at least position the cannons deeper in the fields, and point them away from houses? Also recycle them slower? This would go a long way toward defusing what's becoming a growing resentment in Hurley.

FWIW, some of us Hurley residents aren't in the Gill family and harbor no "growing resentment", except against newcomers who decide they want to change the way things have been done since long before they got here.

Long before either of us "got here", they sprayed DDT, burned old tires, and paved the roads using PCB laden oil. Just because it was done "for a long time" doesn't make it right or safe! The Gills have long been involved in Hurley civics, and I would think they'd want to remedy the problems being brought out in this forum.

There's nothing "unsafe" about early-morning fly-bys and such, so please let's not use hyperbole and try to pretend this is anywhere close to the level of DDT usage, tired-burning, or carcinogens on the roads.

Derek - You completely missed the point that Hurleyite was making - perhaps that was on purpose. At any rate, no one wants to hurt another person's business. It is clear that there are numerous people having a problem with what is happening, and not all of them "just got here". Spraying at 8am on a Sunday may be better received than before 6am. Gunshots going off continuously has got to be difficult for those that live close to them. And, those gunshots do go off in the middle of the night, not just during the day. For the record, when we bought our home, there was no disclosure that these things were happening. Perhaps we would have made a different decision, I don't know. The fact is, there have been many new and young families that have moved into the area well after us. This should be a good thing for Hurley and for your business. However, it won't be a good thing unless you try to work with the people that live here and show some understanding and compromise, as these people will leave, and no one will want to live here. There will be no one here to buy from your farm.

It's not "my business", so please don't mistake that just because I'm defending their practice, that I'm somehow part of the business.

I'm just saying:
- Those things have been going on for a long long time
- Not everyone is as bothered by it as newcomers seem to be
- It's not the responsibility of the neighborhood to disclose everything to the new-home buyer, it's the buyer's responsibility to know the neighborhood they're buying into
- You say "no one will want to live here", but that's not the case. Maybe uptight city-folk who want to control every aspect of their surroundings and not have anything happen that annoys or offends them will decide they don't want to live here, but I think there's a lot of people who'd be completely OK with that outcome.

Recommended Reading: Country Matters: The Pleasures and Tribulations of Moving from a Big City to an Old Country Farmhouse (ISBN 978-0060197728)

Derek - Thank You for the link, but don't mistake me for someone from the Big City, and I definitely didn't buy an Old Country Farm House!. I've lived in Ulster County my whole life. I would be curious to know how many other people have asked that this get fixed, are also not from the city? I would be more apt to think that people from the city wouldn't mind the noise as much as those of us who grew up in the country, such as myself.

At any rate, Thank You for taking the time to respond.

Once again we have a "this is the way it's always been argument". This is 2013, maybe it's not the best way for things to operate in Hurley any longer. I tremendously respect family owned farmers and support them making a living here and throughout the country. But the rest of the community should not be subject to negative,n outdated farming practices because Mr. Gill holds political power in a small town.It's time for change in Hurley.

There's nothing "negative" about those farming practices, other than some uptight folks don't like them.

If you don't like what they've been doing on their property since long before you got here, feel free to buy their property and then do what you want on it.