White river National wildlife refuge

Area specifications

This area is known as the White river National wildlife refuge and covers multiple counties in the state of Arkansas. Ranging from Clarendon Arkansas following the white river almost to the Mississippi River the National wildlife refuge covers approximately 160,000 acres of hard wood bottomlands (Sharp, 2012).

Area Climate

The landforms in this area vary containing flat fields, hard wood bottomlands, and rivers/ aquatic regions. The climate in the three points I chose have similar climates but vary in organisms and water availability throughout the year depending on rainfall and dam generation upriver. Although a large majority of the refuge is bottomlands there is still a wide variety of plants and animals that live in this area. The refuge experiences hot and humid summers, mild winters, and abundant rainfall (Sharp, 2012).

Area Soil

This area contains predominantly Sharkey clay (a vertisol) with the majority of the location being hard wood forest that are flooded the variation between the three points consist of farm fields, hard wood forest, and the white river (Soil Survey). With the soil consisting of mostly clay, water is held in the soil which makes for great land for growing rice close to the area (Scott, 1998). In the river there are more fine sediments, and the woods contain a mixture of both due to composition of leaves and erosion during floods.

Sources

(Scott, 1998)

https://agcomm.uark.edu/agnews/publications/187.pdf

Sharp, D. (2012). White River National Wildlife Refuge Comprehensive Conservation Plan. Retrieved 2021, from https://www.fws.gov/southeast/planning/PDFdocuments/White%20River%20Final%20CCP/WebVersionWhiteRiverFinalCCP.pdf

Web soil SURVEY. (n.d.). Retrieved March 03, 2021, from https://websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/WebSoilSurvey.aspx

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