When is a subdivision not a subdivision? When it stays stable as a farm, of course.

That unlikely case of retro-development is happening outside the small town of Bishop in rural south Oconee County, where the pressure to sell large land tracts for building only has increased in recent years.

A local developer has scrapped plans for a 70-home, high-end subdivision there on a historic piece of property along Price Mill Road. Now, the property is expected to return to agricultural use, easing local fears about what would happen to a few 19th century buildings there.

For nearly three years, developer Bob Cain has had in hand an approved subdivision plan for the 307-acre tract, known as Shady Grove Plantation.

Cain fully intended to build there but never did "for a number of business reasons," he said. Since then, he's tried a number of different plans that never materialized.

This year, he finally sold the entire tract for millions of dollars, but the buyers aren't interested in bulldozing the place - they want it preserved.

The most visible structure on the property is a 120-year-old plantation-style house, with a columned porch fronted by pecan trees. There are even older buildings surrounding it.

The house was home to the prominent Branch family, which bought the land, the former Whitlow plantation, in 1888, according to historical accounts.

The Branches reportedly were horse enthusiasts who had property on the other side of Price Mill Road, and for decades after they bought the plantation, they used a 1-mile oval track there for harness racing.

Bill and Lisa Douglas, the Oconee County couple who bought the land this year, say they're committed to keeping the historic buildings intact.

The buildings are in various stages of disrepair, so the couple is partnering with preservationists in the county interested in restoring them, Lisa Douglas said.

Though they don't have any immediate plans for the property, they're taking time to learn about the history that's there, she said.

Their ultimate goal, at least for now, is to live there.

"Our long-term plan is to live on that land, and use it in the ways it was created to be used for. We may throw a couple of cows out there," Douglas said. "The idea is to be good stewards of that land, preserve as much of the history of the land as possible and be good neighbors."

The property originally was rezoned in 2005 for 72 lots of 3 to 5 acres. Cain says he planned to name the community "Shady Grove Plantation" and build large estate lots where residents could keep horses if they wanted.

Because of the rural location, Bishop residents at the time were concerned a developer might ruin the rural nature of the property, said Nedra Johnson, a town councilwoman who lives down Price Mill Road from the old Branch home.

"It's not a place where you should have anything smaller than 4- or 5-acre lots," Johnson said. "The house is kind of a concern. It is a historic building, and the outbuildings are (historic) too."

One year after his plan was approved, though, Cain was back before Oconee County commissioners with a request to nullify the rezone and return the land to agricultural use.

He had a buyer that was interested in the plantation house and couldn't sell that with the subdivision zoning, he said. But the deal fell through.

Then last year, Cain began a process to rezone the property for bigger lots - a business model he thought would work better. But, he later withdrew that request, too.

Commissioners on Tuesday are expected to vote on Cain's second request to rezone the property back for agricultural use. The petition cleared the county's planning commission with no trouble earlier this month.

According to the Oconee County Planning Department, it's the first time in the county that a property with a fully developed and fully approved subdivision plan has been rezoned back for use as a farm.