Bottomland Forests of the Louisiana Mississippi River Delta

The Bottomland Forests of the Louisiana Mississippi River Delta project lies in one of North America’s most biologically rich wetland ecosystems. This project spans 28 sites across Louisiana and Mississippi and provides habitat for migratory birds, black bears, amphibians, fish, and hundreds of native plant species. These hardwood forests play a critical role in improving water quality, reducing flood impacts, and sustaining wildlife corridors.

Each site within this project is enrolled in a sustainable forestry certification program, ensuring management practices that will sustain healthy forests and structural diversity at the site level while encouraging watershed and healthy wildlife habitat at the project level. 

Conservation Highlights:

• Confirmed old-growth bald cypress stand — Intact old-growth bald cypress on private, unprotected bottomland is extremely rare anywhere in the South. The vast majority of old-growth Mississippi Alluvial Valley (MAV) cypress was commercially logged between approximately 1880 and 1940.

• Black bear conservation — Land directly adjacent to the Tensas River National Wildlife Area (NWA) provides habitat connectivity value for Louisiana black bear, waterfowl, and the breadth of MAV wildlife. This land supports a robust, documented Louisiana black bear population, placing it within the most important private land matrix in the bear recover landscape. Additionally, the documented Louisiana black bear presence on two properties in Louisiana and Mississippi span the full breadth of the subspecies’ MAV recovery landscape.