DuckSouth.com

I'm in the middle of pulling down a fairly large roost habitat to allow seed producers to use the ground beneath the surface.

I also have several large areas that I am working to get a good drain and good seed production.

(It's all on marginal land along the sunflower)

If you wanna know just how powerful sunflower flood water is in the whole sceme of things in the delta with the ducks, then you are welcome to come look at this place and learn something about some habitat if that interests you.

I have a control device here that was installed by the COE for a whopping 44,000 dollars, and when you see what $44,000 will get you from them boys, you gonna think twice about letting them spend your money to mess up your river I promise you.

It depends on how I look at it. I can either fight with river to make the land do things it aint supposed to, or I can embrace it, and use the water to make duck habitat.

The secret is control.

If you want to know what it takes to fight the sunflower then you are welcome to come and look and get yourself an idea first hand of just how much damage the COE will do to your duck hunting if they get away with this.

You can Email me and I will be happy to show you what we are talking about here.

I got some real respect for the power of Sunflower flood water last year when it backed out across a milo field and a bean field across the road in one tiny little basin. I had over 6,000 mallards in that hole for over a week.

I didnt shoot them and the canadas came in behind them and then came the pintails.

ALL of them using sunflower flood water.

There had to be 7,000 birds in that one spot for the entire time the water was on it.

Thats in one tiny little corner of the river.

The sunflower out of its banks in winter can feed a million ducks, no problem whatsoever.

As it sits today, it DOES feed that many if they are here. You dredge it, you will ruin this. If you think that isnt going to effect your overall duck hunting in the Delta you really dont know much about how ducks work.
It will turn an oasis into a desert from a ducks point of view.

I can and will be happy to show you the exact place that those birds were, so you can see for yourself what it takes to put food there (with water)

It takes the sunflower.

The last thing on God's Green Earth that any Mississippi duck hunter should support is drying up a feeding ground for a million ducks in the middle of the Delta.

What you should support is what will help the river AND the ducks. Dike it and pipe it, all the way.

If you scrape it out, it will eat deeper into the adjacent fields and fill up again.

You cant win that way. You have to stop the sediment from entering the river.

You do that by stopping the water before it gets to the river so it can deposit its payload.

In the process of holding up the water you feed a million ducks.

Or better

If you are a duck hunter then you should be screaming "DIKE & PIPE".

If you wanna see up close what this is about then I will happy to show you, I really will.

Lacuna,
I just might take you up on that. I been keeping up with your work for a while and I must say, youdo good things for the birds. Maybe some time this summer I can get up that way. I'll e-mail you.

M.B.

P.S. One Question though. When you dike and pipe what about silt build-up behind your dike. How and when do you deal with that? I am not being a smart booty, just wondering.

MB if you wanna see this you should come NOW.

Dont wait until you can see anything for the crops. It's bare dirt, and you can see the whole thing if you want to see it.

The purpose of the dikes is to STOP the silt and to LET IT build up behind it. What that does is take the PITCH out of the land, and it slowly runs off with less and less vigor, carrying less and less soil with it.

What it does is follow natures way. All things to level. If you leave it alone behind the dike it will level itself.

As it goes through this process the duck habitat gets larger and larger, until finally it covers almost the entire blockage while at the same time you can FARM he entire block.

I takes 50 years for that to happen.

We should be there NOW, but the COE messed up in the 40's and we are RIGHT where we WERE THEN, and we have half the water stopped behind the dams to the northeast.

What you do is seperate the river from its drains, let the soil deposit leveling the land around it, while the river cuts deeper all by itself because you arent adding all the sediment to the system.

You come to my place I will show you just how much sediment we are talking about and it will stun you when you realize how much dirt is entering the river. I mean it is absolutely astounding in deminsion.

If you want to support this issue, then you couyld do yourself no bigger favor than to run up here for two hours and let me show you what you are talking about. It will really make you think.

This is a serious problem and its about money.

It isnt about habitat, you gotta understand that. They could care two hoots about winter habitat.

The CORRECT solution helps ALL.

You come on and visit and I will put a razor sharp edge on your perception of this problem and I promise you that it will astound you in deminsion when you see it for what it is.