Late last winter I was asked to prepare a presentation for a group of avid waterfowl enthusiasts in Wisconsin. Since making the presentation last February, I’ve received numerous emails about the presentation and it’s contents. Thus I felt a bit of history might also interest some of the people who read this column. Here’s the text version of that presentation, done in a timeline style format, but first for the introduction.
It all began with Mother Nature establishing a duck’s need to migrate. Untold years after the migration had been established; a series of events took place that changed our wintering grounds. Those events altered the history of waterfowl hunting forever and through the use of a timeline, I hope to provide you with additional information related to Arkansas’ duck hunting heritage and our flyway’s wintering grounds.
Duck hunting has been a way of life for some since the first French Trappers began paddling up area rivers in the 1600s, but for the purpose of this timeline, I’m going to skip a couple of hundred years and start in the Big Lake area of northeastern Arkansas.
1870s were when the railroad first established service through northeast Arkansas. In an era before refrigeration, town butchers and local restaurants had been the market for local game hunters, but the railroad provided a huge boost to market hunters customer base.
1880s were a boom time for Arkansas market hunters. According to historian Lynn Morrow, market hunters “earned a hundred dollars a day shipping 25,000 ducks daily to Kansas City, St. Louis, New York and Memphis”, resulting from the railroad route though the area.
1901 the same railroad that expanded the markets also brought in recreational hunters, establishing some of the earliest waterfowl-related tourism in Arkansas. This became more evident in 1901 when the Big Lake Shooting Club, composed of wealthy Tennessee and Missouri businessmen, made the final land acquisition making up their 26,000-acre shooting club. Having nothing in common with the commercial market hunters, change was in the air again. So much so, at the urging of the Big Lake Shooting Club, the Arkansas General Assembly attempted to control the market hunters by requiring hunters to have written permission before hunting on private property, creating Arkansas’s first known regulation addressing trespassing.
1902 as the battles between market hunters and the Big Lake Shooting Club continued, what I personally believe to be the most significant change in the history of our wintering grounds occurred. Of little significance at the time, the first confirmed acre of rice was planted in the Grand Prairie Region of Arkansas.
1903 The battle between tourism and market hunting continues. The Big Lake Shooting Club, along with the equally influential Wapanocca Outing Club, convinced the Legislature to pass yet another law on behalf of the private clubs. This time they outlawed market hunting in Mississippi County and allowed for the appointment of the state’s first game warden. To add a touch of Arkansas flare to the law, it provided that the petitioning parties (Big Lake and Wapanocca Hunting Clubs) would be responsible for hiring and paying the game warden.
1904 As the clash between tourists and market hunters continued, the first Big Lake clubhouse was burned to the ground. Farther south, great strides had been made toward commercial rice production as the results of the efforts of W.H. Fuller, who according to The Arkansas News had experimented with 70 acres of rice the previous year, establishing 1904 as the first year rice was grown commercially in Arkansas.
1907 Battles between tourists and market hunters ended up with the Federal Court ruling in favor of the tourist and market hunters burned the second clubhouse at the Big Lake Shooting Club, killing a game warden in the process. Meanwhile, the Grand Prairie Region was well on its way to establishing the state’s rice industry. With harvest records dating back to 1905, 1907 was the year rice production first topped 5,000 acres.
1911 Little help had been found in the clash facing tourists and market hunters in northeast Arkansas, but in the Grand Prairie Region rice industry was booming with 72,000 acres planted. (Delta Waterfowl was founded.)
1913 As the market hunters battle continued, public sentiment turned against the Big Lake Shooting Club, and local prosecutors began to support the efforts of the market hunters to prohibit out-of-state hunters from hunting in Mississippi County. Nevertheless, big money won the battle, with their efforts proving crucial in convincing President Woodrow Wilson to designate Big Lake Shooting Club member J.H. Acklen the first federal “Game Commissioner” for the U.S. Biological Survey, set up to implement the Migratory Bird Act of 1913.
1915 was supposed to be the end of market hunting in the Big Lake region, when Big Lake officially became Arkansas’ first National Wildlife Refuge. To the south, Arkansas rice production hit 100,000 acres with an average yield of 46 Bu/A (Bushels per acre.) On March 11, Arkansas Gov. George Washington Hays signed Act 124, establishing the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.
1954 Arkansas rice production is booming as it blasts past the half a million-acre milestone with an astounding 672,000 acres of rice planted. Fears of profit loss followed.
1955 The government established rice allotments. The rice buffet had been well established and the town of Stuttgart, center of rice production in the Grand Prairie Region, is fast building its reputation as the rice and duck capital of the world.
1974 After years of lobbying for the change, the government eliminated the allotment system and rice production heads north. As farm operations throughout northeast Arkansas get involved, 710,000 acres of rice are planted, harvesting an average of 102.4 Bu/A. (I believe this was the start of the chain of events that once again altered our wintering grounds.)
1981 As rice production continues the move north, production topped 1.5 million acres for the first time, with an average harvest of 100.4 Bu/A.
2004 Northeast Arkansas has been established for many years as the new Rice Capital of Arkansas. Five counties (Lawrence, Jackson, Poinsett, Arkansas and Cross) produced 36% of the state’s 1.5 million acres of rice. With an average yield of 171 Bu/A and a record yield of 192 Bu/A, these five counties now produce more rice than the entire state of Arkansas did prior to 1974.
2007 Rice production for Arkansas is expected to remain close to 1.5 million acres and production in the boot heel of Missouri was expected to reach 300,000 acres.
With much of my life having been spent involved with the business end of this industry and having experienced some of these changes, I’m willing to go out on a limb about the future. The management of our waterfowl will never be an easy matter and the future of our sport will require more attention be paid to management than ever before. The USF&W and various state agencies are assigned the troublesome task of regulating the sport, while trying to please those of us who often seem hard to satisfy. Private organizations have their workcut out for them as well and need some of our time and financial support. As we look toward the future of our sport, lets consider new ideas, study them as required, work together and be proud of our heritage as waterfowlers.
Charles “HammerTime” Snapp
www.arkansaswaterfowl.com or snapp1@sbcglobal.net |
