Longtime Atlanta developer Tom Cousins is selling his prized Nonami Plantation near Albany, Georgia, to legendary media mogul and environmentalist Ted Turner.

The Nonami Plantation, which is about 8,800 acres, is considered one of the best quail-hunting spots in Georgia.

“Tom and Ted have been very good friends for many years,” said Phillip Evans, a spokesman for Turner Enterprises Inc. “It’s my understanding there was a mutual agreement between the two that if Tom ever decided to sell the property, Ted would have the first option.”

Evans said the purchase of the plantation was still “in process.” But the deal is supposed to close in the near future.

“As with all of Turner’s land, Nonami will be managed in an environmentally and ecologically friendly manner,” Evans said of Turner’s plans for the property. Most of the land already is protected under a conservation easement.

This will be the largest purchase of property for Turner in the state where he grew up and built his media empire.

Turner is the largest individual owner of land in the United States, owning more than 2 million acres.

He purchased most of his property to preserve and conserve the land as well as to provide places where buffalo could roam. Those landholdings are located in Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, and North Carolina, as well as in South America. Turner owns some land in North Georgia, but nothing as large as the Nonami Plantation.

Cousins did not want to comment on the sale of the Nonami Plantation because it is a personal transaction between friends, according to Billy Wren, CEO of Nonami Enterprises Inc.

Turner’s purchase of the Nonami Plantation is not the first time that he has done business with Tom Cousins.

More than 35 years ago, Turner approached Cousins for a loan so he could build a television empire by leveraging a small local station into a national cable channel through satellite technology. That became the pioneering SuperStation.

In an effort to get relatively inexpensive programming for his SuperStation, Turner then purchased the Atlanta Hawks from Cousins in 1977. (Turner also had acquired the Atlanta Braves for the same reason.)

Their business dealings didn’t stop there.

Five years after starting CNN, the first 24-hour cable news channel, Turner purchased the Omni International office, hotel, and retail complex from Cousins. Turner moved CNN to the Omni, which had been developed by Cousins a decade earlier, and rebranded it as CNN Center.

During their decades-long business associations, they developed a strong personal friendship. Turner has spent time each year with Cousins at the Nonami Plantation, and Cousins has been a regular guest at Turner’s ranch in Bozeman, Montana.

In fact, when Turner was married to Jane Fonda, Cousins named two of his bird-hunting dogs Ted and Jane in their honor.

The property originally was part of the 14,000-acre Blue Springs Plantation.

According to people familiar with the purchase, Cousins had a hard time coming up with a name for his new quail plantation. Finally, his wife, Ann, said that if he didn’t come up with a name by a certain time, she would call it the great “No Name” plantation, and hence, Nonami was born.

When asked why Turner wanted to buy Nonami, Evans said: “It’s a beautiful piece of land, and it’s been long admired by Ted and others.”