Tensas River National Wildlife Refuge

In 1932, Mason Spencer, a state representative from Tallulah, armed with a gun and a hunting permit, shot a male ivory-billed woodpecker on Singer Sewing Company land. He killed the bird to prove to the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries that the creature existed in Madison Parish — a matter that had been in dispute. The Tensas basin was the last documented home of the ivory-billed woodpecker. By 1938, the Audubon Society persuaded Senator Allen J. Ellender to work for a proposed Tensas Swamp National Park to preserve sixty thousand acres of Singer Company land. Ellender's bill died in committee. Congress established the refuge in 1980. The refuge occupies 71,000 acres of bottomland hardwood forest in the upper basin of the Tensas River, west of Tallulah in Madison, Tensas, and Franklin parishes. It holds one of the last concentrations of the Louisiana black bear. In 1907, Theodore Roosevelt hunted black bear just north of the refuge boundary. The famous "teddy bear" was introduced as a result of an incident during the hunt. Concentrations of ducks, geese, raptors, wading birds, and shorebirds are present. Several rookeries are in the reserve. Oxbow lakes and cypress swamps are in the refuge. A scenic auto tour route and walking trails run through the refuge. A visitor center has exhibits on delta ecology.