Note: Land owned by the Bayou Meto Water Management District is for project operation and is NOT publicly accessible for recreation.

The Bayou Meto Water Management Project

Irrigated, row-crop farming of soybeans, rice, cotton, corn, and sorghum is the primary driver of the economy in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain of East Arkansas. For these crops to thrive, reliable irrigation water and good drainage are absolutely essential.

About 85% of the water used for irrigation in Arkansas comes from the ground. While our state has abundant surface water, groundwater has historically been the preferred source because not all farmland has direct access to rivers, and moving surface water long distances can be expensive.

However, this has taken a toll. As far back as 1920, rice farmers in Arkansas County noticed that the shallow alluvial aquifer was declining year after year. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) began studying this groundwater depletion back then and continues an extensive monitoring program today.

Project History & Infrastructure

The Bayou Meto Water Management Project was originally conceived in the 1930s to accomplish two main goals: improve drainage in sluggish Delta streams to reduce flood damage, and put a fraction of the Arkansas River’s water to work irrigating nearby farms.

Congress authorized the project in 1950 but did not fund its construction. As groundwater issues grew more severe, interest was reinvigorated, and the project was reauthorized in 1996.

Decades of planning and design led to the construction of two major hubs:

• The Marion Berry Pump Station in Scott, Arkansas.

• The Little Bayou Meto Pump Station in Reydell, Arkansas (located 49 straight-line miles away).

Both stations were completed by 2015. Work continues on the massive network of canals and pipelines needed to distribute water to approximately 268,000 acres of farmland.

Protecting Wildlife and Waterways

The project is designed to benefit both agriculture and East Arkansas's world-class wildlife ecosystems:

• Preserving Bottomland Hardwoods: Restoring the Little Bayou Meto channel will remove excess water from the lower project area. This includes the 33,000-acre Bayou Meto Wildlife Management Area—the premier winter mallard habitat in the country. Preventing water from standing on high-quality bottomland hardwood trees during the summer protects the forest and preserves this vital habitat for thousands of winter duck hunters. When the Arkansas River is too high to allow gravity flow, the Little Bayou Meto Pump Station will assist by pushing the water over the levee into the river. 

• Creating Summer Aquatic Habitat: To distribute the river water, 105 miles of new canals are being built, alongside 116 miles of existing bayous and ditches. The project will place up to 56 weirs in these bayous and ditches to create pools for irrigation pumping. Because these waterways naturally go dry in the summer, keeping water in them year-round will dramatically enhance aquatic life, increasing estimated habitat units by up to 90%.

• Waterfowl Flooding: Beyond agricultural use, water from the project will be used to flood over 30,000 acres specifically for winter duck habitat.

• Greener Canals: Some canals will be planted with native grasses recommended by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission to improve local wildlife habitat.

Improving Water Quality

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimates that introducing moving Arkansas River water into the bayou systems will actively improve overall water quality. Maintaining a higher water table will also benefit local wetlands and streams that are currently losing water as the underground aquifer drops.

We are also tackling nonpoint source pollution (agricultural runoff) through several initiatives.

Looking Ahead

As the project inches closer to water delivery, local farmers are already adopting better on-farm water management practices to ensure sustainable agriculture for generations to come.

With assistance from the State of Arkansas and our federal partners, the project aims to begin delivering water as soon as 2028. A tremendous amount of canal, pump, pipleline, and weir construction is underway to meet our goals.