Reelfoot National Wildlife Refuge - Blue Hole, TN - National Wildlife Refuges on Waymarking.com

During the winter of 1811-12, a series of some 1,874 recorded tremors within the New Madrid fault dramatically altered the landscape over some 30-50,000 square miles and left Reelfoot Lake in its wake. This shaky beginning was followed by a series of conflicting issues, with competing interests involving timber, market hunters, and local hunting interest which eventually resulted in bloodshed when local vigilantes known as the night riders hung a lawyer representing the logging interest near what is still the community of Walnut Log. This prompted the State of Tennessee in 1908 to condemn and designate those lands on and around Reelfoot Lake for use by all the residents of Tennessee. Yet still the controversy continued in the early 1930's with failed attempts to drain Reelfoot Lake to benefit farming interests. The controversy over the water levels and water management were eventually quieted with the leasing of some 8000 acres on the northern end of the Lake to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1941 to be managed as a National Wildlife Refuge. In addition to the management of those lands transferred, the USFWS also took all responsibility for the manipulation and management of water levels within Reelfoot Lake.


Reelfoot National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1941 to manage the northern third of Reelfoot Lake as a refuge for migratory birds. Additional lands acquired in Southwestern Kentucky expanded the refuge to its current 10,428 acres. The proximity of Reelfoot Lake and the refuge to the Mississippi river has always made the area a major stopover and wintering ground for migratory waterfowl and bald eagles.

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