Watchable Wildlife
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Watchable wildlife includes a wide array of state animals, some as common as a familiar bird at a backyard feeder. Others may pass briefly through Arkansas on seasonal migrations. And, some rarely seen species may reward the dedicated viewer after hours of patient waiting and watching.
Besides the animals themselves, watchable wildlife describes an increasingly popular pursuit for many residents. Wildlife viewing is a pastime that can be enjoyed in any season, in any corner of the state, by any age group. Unlike some activities, special equipment is not required. Wildlife watchers need to come equipped only with a sense of appreciation for the state's living resources and the knowledge of where to look for them.
Wildlife viewing has become one of the fastest growing outdoor activities in the nation. We hope you will find this site helpful in enjoying Arkansas’s Watchable Wildlife.
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AGFC Watchable Wildlife Areas
Arkansas is divided into six natural regions or divisions. The divisions are based on physiographic features, which means, in a nutshell, that the regions are defined by distinctive topography, soils, moisture, and plant and animal communities. They also are distinct geographically.
The Ozark Plateau makes up most of northern Arkansas, the Arkansas River Valley divides the Ozarks from the Ouachita Mountains. The Coastal Plain makes up the southwestern corner of Arkansas. Eastern Arkansas is largely the Delta region, but within it is a geological anomaly, a distinct region called Crowley’s Ridge.
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The Ouachitas were formed as gigantic forces crushed the region, folding the bedrock into a series of narrow ridges running east and west, the only east-west range in North America.
The east-west orientation of the formation has had a profound effect on plant communities in the Ouachitas. Because of the angle of the sun, south-facing slopes in the Ouachitas are warmer and drier than north-facing slopes. Shortleaf pines grow on the warmer slopes; oaks and hickories abound on north-facing slopes.
The red-cockaded woodpecker is an example of a species adapted to specialized conditions once common in the Ouachita’s pine forests. The red-cockaded woodpecker makes its home in mature pine savannas and woodlands. Unlike other woodpeckers that dig holes in dead trees, red-cockaded woodpeckers make their cavities in live 70- to 100-year-old pines in which the heartwood has turned soft.
As the mature pine forest in the Ouachitas and other parts of the southern United States was cut for timber, populations of red-cockaded woodpeckers plummeted. Today they are listed as endangered, and there are active programs to restore their populations, primarily by providing new nesting habitat. One example is the Buffalo Road Shortleaf Pine-Bluestem Restoration Area in the Ouachita National Forest.
Camp Robinson SUA Woodlands Auto Tour
Kenny Vernon Bell Slough WMA and Nature Trail
Mississippi Delta
The Mississippi Delta is the product of the flood and flow of rivers. The process began during the ice ages and continued as the Mississippi River and its tributaries rose from their banks again and again.
At the time of the Louisiana Purchase (1803), much of eastern Arkansas was covered by seasonally flooded bottomland hardwood forests or by permanently flooded cypress swamps. The adapted communities of plants supported the vast numbers of waterfowl that came to winter. They also fed and covered migrating neotropical songbirds, and they harbored healthy populations of Florida panthers, American alligators, black bears and many species of wetland wildlife. With flood control, much of this portion of the Delta was drained and converted to agricultural uses, but its primeval vastness can be felt in wildlife refuges such as Big Lake, White River and Wapanocca.
Sheffield Nelson Dagmar WMA
This site is under construction. Please check back for information on other viewing sites.