Bogue Chitto National Wildlife Refuge

Bogue Chitto National Wildlife Refuge, established in 1980, straddles the borders of Louisiana and Mississippi, bisected by the Pearl River. The refuge conserves bottomland hardwood forest habitat, which has significantly diminished in the Mississippi River Delta over the last century. The refuge provides habitat for species of concern such as the Gulf sturgeon, gopher tortoise, ringed sawback turtle, and swallow-tailed kite. Bogue Chitto National Wildlife Refuge is bounded to the northeast by Mississippi’s Old River Wildlife Management Area and by Louisiana’s Pearl River Wildlife Management Area to the southwest. This creates a large area of conserved forested wetlands and adjacent uplands within the Pearl River Basin. The refuge’s bottomland forests of sweetgum-water oak stands are interspersed with bald cypress-tupelo breaks and overcup oak-water hickory stands. The refuge has 860 upland acres of loblolly and slash pine forest, which provides habitat for the threatened gopher tortoise. The refuge is on the ancestral lands of the Acolapissa whose descendants are present in Louisiana and Mississippi today.