Situated overlooking 3.5 miles of Bayou Deview, Strait Lake Lodge is the premier private waterfowling lodge in Arkansas. Founded in 2013 and beginning on the original 300 acres in northeast Arkansas, the opportunities for hunters have expanded over the years not just in acres but in the quality of habitat provided for waterfowl. The green timber is synonymous with Arkansas and in recent years, agricultural fields including rice and soybeans as well. The diversity in habitat means diversity on your strap including but not limited to gadwall, pintails, and other puddle ducks from the fields with the mallards from the timber.
Owner Max Sharp, with the caretakers and farmers’ efforts, has created a hunters’ paradise paying tribute to the waterfowling history of days gone by while also preserving for the future generations. Part of making the quality hunts as well as conservation efforts possible for the future is that Strait Lake holds 750 acres devoted to refuge or rest areas. This past season they have added 1,200 acres from a neighboring farm which will be used between agricultural fields and new habitat developed this offseason. “Sound management and conservation are important and front of mind in everything we do,” states Mr. Sharp. “This helps create a waterfowling experience and focuses on continuing the family and friend environment.”
Your home base while at Strait Lake is the lodge that is well-appointed to every hunter’s need while there along with in-house Chef John Fearrington for the season keeping members and hunters fed. There is something about the comradery confined within the lodge and duck blind that isn’t able to be found anywhere but there. Holding between 100,000 and 400,000 mallards during the course of the season certainly helps!
“The area is geographically located in the middle of six main tributaries and situated on Bayou Deview. Seeing the development come to fruition with the history of Bayou Deview waterfowl hunting makes it a fowler’s dream.” With the operation and management that has been developed over the years, the team is able to replicate and control the water as if the Bayou has gone over the banks as a draw for the ducks. These six main tributaries, as Max states, translate to, interstates of duck traffic over Strait Lake. Traffic that you’ll be able to see from the new four-story ‘duck tower’ at the lodge.
When you arrive, take a walk to the fire pit behind the lodge. Watch the mallards trade between rest areas and feeds. Soak up your time and surroundings with friends over the Tupelo swamp looking over the Bayou Deview at Strait Lake Lodge.
