BAYOU METO, Ark. — On the final day of duck season within the coronary heart of Arkansas’ finest duck nation, longtime hunter Todd Taylor mentioned the searching simply wasn’t pretty much as good as earlier years.

Sitting in his boat within the George H. Dunklin Jr. Bayou Meto Wildlife Administration Space, 33,000 acres of public wetlands preserved by the Arkansas Sport and Fish Fee within the Mississippi River delta, Taylor complained that there have been too many hunters and never sufficient geese. On the final day of the season, he and his group bagged only one — far lower than earlier years.

Taylor has been duck searching in Arkansas for 35 years, touring from Orangeburg, South Carolina, to hunt within the well-known Arkansas timber, a flooded woodland identified worldwide as a vacation spot for the game. Bayou Meto sits about 20 miles southwest of Stuttgart, which payments itself because the duck-hunting capital of the world. Each winter, hunters from throughout the state and the nation flood into the wetlands and rice fields within the delta, traditionally contributing to a $1 million-a-day financial affect through the season.

Wetlands, particularly bottomland hardwood forests of towering oaks and cypress timber, are integral habitat for geese flying south for winter.

Duck searching is a vital cultural and financial fixture within the state, and it’s additionally an essential mechanism for wetlands conservation in Arkansas, the place there are not any state legal guidelines particularly for wetland safety. However waterfowl populations are beneath rising threats from local weather change and habitat destruction, resulting in fewer geese, and in the end fewer hunters, and fewer {dollars} to guard the geese and the wetlands they name house.

On high of an already grim image, habitats up and down the Mississippi River basin are going through higher threats than ever as a result of 2023 Sackett v. EPA Supreme Court docket choice that may take away federal protections for a lot of wetlands. And now Arkansas conservationists should discover their footing in a authorized surroundings unfavorable to their work of preserving the wetlands that geese and their hunters love.

Arkansas nonprofits, landowners, and authorities companies have lengthy shaped an alliance to protect the essential wetlands ecosystems left within the delta, glued collectively by the longstanding custom of duck searching. However in a brand new, post-Sackett period of lesser wetlands protections, that coalition appears to be in an uphill battle. And duck hunters like Taylor stands out as the solely drive with the ability to save lots of wetlands within the state. 

The issue

Whereas waterfowl numbers rose modestly final yr, in response to the newest report from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, they’ve declined over the previous decade. The report additionally famous that habitat situations “usually declined” over the surveyed space, a lot of the northern U.S. and Canada, since 2023. Local weather change can also be wreaking havoc on breeding grounds all over the place, driving a lot of the habitat and breeding floor loss additional up the river.

Coupled with the habitat decline, the variety of duck hunters upriver continues to crater in locations like Minnesota. However the variety of Arkansas duck hunters has remained regular. Greater than 100,000 duck stamps, or searching licenses, had been bought from the Arkansas Sport and Fish Fee in 2024.

Whereas the variety of duck hunters has remained secure, the duck populations haven’t. And starting in 2022, out-of-state duck hunters like Taylor began outnumbering native hunters. Based on George Dunklin Jr., a longtime hunter and operator of one among Arkansas’ most outstanding personal duck searching operations, 5 Oaks Duck Lodge, there are numerous causes for concern.

Dunklin has turned his 6,000 acres of prime delta land into a non-public, nonprofit duck searching membership that he and his staff lovingly name “the buffet” for waterfowl. 5 Oaks preserves varied varieties of wetland habitat in rural Humphrey, south of Little Rock, and is actively rising extra forest to supply constant, high quality habitat for migratory birds. It features a analysis heart and collaborates with the College of Arkansas. Dunklin can also be a former commissioner of Arkansas Sport and Fish.

Why does duck searching matter a lot for conservation? Based on Dunklin and his workers director of analysis, Ryan Askren, the federal authorities allocates habitat conservation funding based mostly on firearm and ammunition gross sales by way of the Pittman-Robertson Act. The Arkansas Sport and Fish’s conservation efforts additionally obtain main funding from duck stamps, which contributed roughly $27 million to the fee’s finances in fiscal yr 2024. 

A variety of that got here from out-of-state hunters, but when they hold having a poor expertise, like Taylor, Dunklin worries that fewer hunters will come to Arkansas and spend their cash on duck stamps, firearms, and ammunition to fund the state’s conservation efforts. 

Jennifer Sheehan, chief of the environmental coordination division of the Arkansas Sport and Fish Fee, is immersed in state water coverage. She mentioned out-of-state hunters usually buy gear in Arkansas, which kicks again to the fee’s finances by way of the federal Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Conservation Act. That represented round 10 to fifteen % of the fee’s finances yearly.

Wetland habitats are declining, too. 

Throughout the swamps of Bayou Meto on the final day of duck searching season, Sheehan identified dozens of fallen crimson oak timber that died after being over-flooded for years by Sport and Fish and outcompeted by white oaks and cypress timber. Acorns from the crimson oak timber are essential vitamin for waterfowl populations.

Wetlands are additionally essential habitat for waterfowl, in response to Geese Limitless biologist Jake Spears, who works immediately with landowners and farmers to preserve habitat on their land. The group performs a big half in conservation efforts in Arkansas.

“Lots of people seek advice from rice fields as ‘surrogate wetlands,’ and with out rice fields as we speak, we wouldn’t have a variety of geese,” Spears mentioned. “Again within the day, this entire delta was mainly one big bottomland hardwood forest wetland. Most of it received cleared, and a variety of these rice fields act as considerably functioning wetland.”

Earlier than Europeans settled the Arkansas delta, it was coated in bottomland hardwood wetlands. However over 70% of these wetlands had been cleared for agriculture after the 1780s, and hundreds of thousands of acres are used for commodity rice and soybean manufacturing. Stuttgart, Arkansas, additionally calls itself the “rice capital of the world.”. 

“Rice is mainly a potato chip for a duck. They will go in and eat it and get some vitamin out of it, however not a ton,” mentioned Spears. “However you’ll be able to’t survive off simply potato chips alone.” 

Spears mentioned geese have developed to eat acorns, that are a big element of their diets. Forests, not like rice fields, additionally present shelter for geese and higher types of meals, Spears mentioned.

Conservationists grapple with Sackett, options face steep hurdles

George Dunklin Jr. sees habitat destruction and funding declines all through the Mississippi River Basin as posing a severe problem that Arkansas conservationists can solely attempt to mitigate. The Sackett v. EPA Supreme Court docket choice restricted the variety of wetlands throughout the nation which can be protected by the Clear Water Act, which can result in higher habitat destruction in northern areas of the Mississippi flyway the place geese breed earlier than they fly south to Arkansas. 

Dunklin didn’t suppose the affect of Sackett would have an effect on Arkansas wetlands a lot, largely as a result of many of the state’s wetlands have already been cleared. Askren created a map exhibiting the decline of wetlands throughout the state because the 1780s.

Adam Gold, a researcher on the Environmental Protection Fund, printed an evaluation in September 2024 suggesting that between 17 and 90 million acres of wetlands nationwide might be in danger relying on how the Supreme Court docket ruling is interpreted. Gold additionally created an internet software utilizing knowledge from the Environmental Safety Company, exhibiting that federal authorities allowed shut to twenty% extra requests to develop wetlands with out permits because the Sackett choice was handed down.

And in Arkansas, the numbers weren’t a lot completely different. Gold discovered that since Sackett, the Military Corps in Arkansas decided that solely 19.4% of claims to fill wetlands had been beneath their regulatory authority.

Dunklin mentioned the “swampbuster” provision within the Farm Invoice, which makes a farmer ineligible for federal Division of Agriculture advantages in the event that they convert wetlands into farmland, would proceed deterring wetland destruction. However Sheehan frightened that non-public landowners might nonetheless be allowed to fill wetlands, which might enhance flood threat in close by public areas. And the Nationwide Agricultural Legislation Middle launched a report in March 2025 exhibiting that Arkansas has no additional wetland protections enshrined in state regulation.

Different optimistic indicators are rising regardless of Sackett. With farm incomes declining within the delta, many farmers are turning to duck habitat conservation as a brand new income stream. 

Ben Noble, government vice chairman for Riceland Meals, mentioned farm tourism has additionally tremendously expanded, and Pure Assets Conservation Service applications have elevated conservation efforts on personal lands. Arkansas Sport and Fish began a Non-public Lands Habitat Division to encourage extra farmers to preserve habitat. Spears mentioned he works with 70 to 80 Arkansas landowners a yr on conservation plans, and plenty of different organizations do related work. 

Nonetheless, each Noble and Dunklin mentioned that conservation simply wasn’t as worthwhile as farming. Dunklin couldn’t make a non-public duck membership very worthwhile, so he switched to nonprofit standing in 2020 so he can concentrate on conservation and get grants to assist the work.

In the end, a public coverage resolution is required, mentioned Dunklin, and duck hunters stands out as the solely curiosity group with sufficient political energy to step up and demand extra conservation sources. 

“The duck stamp is now $50, however after I first began popping out right here it was $10 or $15,” Taylor mentioned. “But when the cash is used proper, I feel it’s truthful. I don’t thoughts paying that in any respect as a result of I take advantage of these sources out right here.”

This story is a part of the sequence Down the Drain from the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an impartial reporting collaborative based mostly on the College of Missouri in partnership with Report for America, with main funding from the Walton Household Basis.

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