OUTDOOR CORNER: DUCK CREEK WILL KEEP POOL 3 DRY TO PROTECT TREES

During the 1999-2000 waterfowl season Pool 3 on Duck Creek Conservation Area will not be flooded. This means that no waterfowl hunting will be possible in this pool this fall and winter.

Pool 3 will be kept dry this fall for two reasons.

First, we anticipate replacing several structures on this pool during the summer and early fall. If weather allows, boat lanes and ditches will be dug to enhance drainage and provide easier access for duck hunters.

Second, and most important, the timber in Pool 3 is showing severe decline due to the continuous flooding which has been the management practice on Pool 3 and Pool 2 since Duck Creek was established.

Duck Creek Conservation Area is fast approaching it's 50th birthday. Construction on the levees and other facilities started in 1952. As with anything that grows old, things wear out and need to be replaced. Leaky screw gates and stoplog structures will be replaced this year or early next year. Boat lanes are being dipped to remove sediment and debris. Drainage ditches are being excavated to enhance drainage and improve our ability to manage the habitat.

If you are familiar with Duck Creek, and especially if you are a duck hunter, you are well acquainted with Pool 2 and Pool 3. Both of these pools are referred to as a Green Tree Reservoir (GTR). This fancy term simply means that they are tracts of bottomland hardwood trees which have had levees constructed around their perimeter. A water source such as a well, or in this case a reservoir (Pool 1), ensures that these pools can be flooded each fall to provide migrating waterfowl habitat and hunting opportunities.

GTRs have been developed and used for years in an effort to replace the millions of acres of bottomland forested wetlands that have been lost over the last 100 years or so. In southeast Missouri we have lost about 97% of the original forested wetlands, approximately 2.5 million acres. We now have only about 60,000 acres that remain.

Our bottomland forested wetlands were just part of a vast bottomland hardwood forest in the Mississippi River valley that extended from Cape Girardeau to the delta of that mighty river. These forested acres flooded periodically during the fall, winter and early spring months. They did not flood every year at the same time, or at the same location, or to the same depth, or for the same number of days, weeks or months. Combined, these flooded forest lands provided habitat for millions of migrating waterfowl. In this flooded timber, the mallard was king.

The bottomland hardwood forest on Duck Creek Conservation Area and Mingo National Wildlife Refuge is the single largest block of this habitat left in southeast Missouri. Duck Creek/Mingo is about the only place left in Missouri where a person can hunt waterfowl in flooded timber. Anymore, flooded bottomland timber is a very rare habitat type.

For these reasons it is important that we manage the timber in Pool 2 and Pool 3 wisely and with the greatest care to ensure that this critical habitat is not lost. You may be familiar with what happened to the GTR on Ted Shanks Conservation Area just four or five years ago. For several years managers at Shanks, which is located along the Mississippi River north of Hannibal, had noticed the die back of some trees in their GTR unit.

Pin oaks in particular were suffering limb tip die back and some trees were dying altogether. It was determined that the reason for the die off was that every year the trees were flooded too early in the fall before they had gone dormant. Flooding was to provide hunting opportunities which would be available the first day of the open season.

Also the timber was flooded to the same depth and was left flooded for the same period of time each year. The great Mississippi flood of 1993 was the final blow to that forest. Water flooded the timber throughout that summer until August and all of the timber died.

Over the last few years we have begun to see the same signs of die-off in Pool 3 and to a lesser extent in Pool 2. Since 1954 we have flooded these pools in October and sometimes as early as late September. The pools have been flooded to the same depth each year and the water has been left on through early spring.

Natural flooding in bottomland hardwoods does not occur in this manner. Natural flooding is varied, some years are very wet, some years it is dry and no flooding occurs at all. Natural floods vary as to when they happen, how long they last and how deep the water is. In fact, in a natural flood, water depths vary as the water rises, crests and falls. All of these variations are important for the health of the timber and the waterfowl and other creatures that use it.

The flooding methods used in Pool 2 and Pool 3, over the last 45 years, have not only stressed the mature trees and caused them to decline and some to die, it has also limited regeneration of most tree species, particularly oaks. Without the regeneration of young trees there will be no new trees coming on to replace the older mature trees as they die out.

Given the present condition of the mature older trees in Pool 3 there is a very good chance that in the next several years we could see the loss of nearly all of the black oaks (pin oaks, willow oaks and cherrybark oaks) in that pool.

For those reasons it has been decided to begin to vary the flooding pattern in Pool 2 and Pool 3. This means that some years one or both of these pools may not be flooded until later in the waterfowl season. Some years one may be flooded early. And some years one of the pools may not be flooded at all. By doing this we will more closely mimic the natural flooding systems which we have learned promote healthier trees, encourage regeneration of oaks and provide better waterfowl habitat.

We will start this new flooding system this year. During the 1999-2000 waterfowl season, Pool 3 will not be flooded. For those who love to hunt blinds in pool 3 it seems like a drastic measure to take, but the present condition of the timber in Pool 3 requires that some hard decisions be made now.

We can not guarantee that these decisions will revitalize the timber in Pool 3 or Pool 2, but it should help those trees that are still healthy and will encourage development of the next generation of trees including the black oaks which are the primary food of wintering mallards, other waterfowl and many other species of wildlife.

In recent years both of these pool have been difficult to drain because of sediment that has been deposited in the ditches and the effects of beavers. This has been of increasing concern because, if these pools do not dry, spring through early fall the timber can be stressed and could potentially die.

I appreciate the fact that this news will not be welcome by some hunters, but I ask you to think about the fact that if we neglect to manage these GTRs correctly now, we will kill the timber and eliminate this limited and valuable resource. If we allow that to happen it will be 25 to 35 years before black oaks large enough to produce acorns will once again stand in Pool 3. Your sons, daughters, grandsons and granddaughters deserve to experience the same wonders you have experienced on Duck Creek in the past.

Dave Wissehr is a wildlife management biologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation.