Dagmar Wildlife Management Area

The Dagmar Wildlife Management Area preserves nearly 8,000 acres of bottomland hardwood forests, streams, ponds, lakes and bayous. It's also a great place to go to take pictures. The highlight of the WMA is Hickson Lake, which is easily accessible by a dirt road (that is very well-maintained, except that it will definitely get your car dirty). The entire Dagmar WMA is also extremely easy to reach, located just off I-40 near Brinkley. It's one of my favorite places to visit in the Delta, especially since it isn't that far of a drive from Little Rock.

Last week, Barry Hamilton suggested making a trip there over the weekend. He wanted to get there at sunrise, and I was immediately skeptical. I'm not a very big fan of being awake that early in the morning. But I agreed to meet up with Barry and his friend Lee at 5:30 on Sunday morning.

Now regular readers of this site will be shocked to hear that I managed to accidentally oversleep, so I was a few minutes late in meeting up with them. But we were soon quickly making our way east, just as the distant sky began to lighten with the upcoming sunrise.

We made it to the WMA with plenty of time to spare, and followed the dirt road that runs alongside Robe Bayou. The road ends at Hickson Lake, which is lined on all sides with hundreds upon hundreds of tall trees. This is a view of the lake, taken just before sunrise:


And another view...


The banks of the lake are crowded with both cypress trees and their knees. I was standing along the edge of the lake when I took this shot, and I soon noticed a large snake skin laying among the leaves and mud. It looked like it was left by a fairly big snake, and I sincerely hoped that the snake wasn't around anymore....


And another view of one of the large trees along the lake. This tree certainly looked old, and actually some of the cypress trees around here are believed to be around 1200 years old.




Hickson Lake is a very popular spot for fishing, and there were two boats out in the lake while we were taking pictures. After sunrise, the light on the trees and lake began to get harsh, but I managed to get one last shot of this fishing boat along the shore...