I'm looking for recommendations for hunting lodges in the Stuttgart, Arkansas, area that offer duck hunting. As mentioned in the the thread subject, a full service lodge that offers duck hunting (preferably in flooded timber as an option), guide(s), overnight accommodations, and meals, for a party of 6 men.

I'm basically the leader of the group and put together an annual pheasant hunting trip to South Dakota, which we will do again next November. Our group would like to do another hunt together, and a duck hunt in flooded timber is what we've all agreed that we'd like to do. However, flooded timber is not a make or break deal for the trip. We just want the greatest opportunity to harvest good numbers of ducks. The flooded timber just looks like a really cool experience.

For those of you who are experienced waterfowl hunters, which I'm not, I would like some insight into the timing of hunting the Mississippi Flyway in Arkansas. The Arkansas duck season begins each year in November and ends in January. Would there be a greater likelihood of there being higher duck numbers in January, when more cold fronts have blown south pushing more ducks down? If not, what month of the season would you recommend that we schedule a hunt? We are most interested in shooting mallards, if that has any impact on the timing of the migration and scheduling our hunt.

Thanks in advance for the assistance!

It's all about the water and weather. Hunted Stuttgart in January 2022 and it was one of the slowest (dry) seasons most could recall. Saw a million geese and ducks except when I had a loaded A5 in my hands. For greater chances of success, look farther North to Kansas, Nebraska and Dakotas where the weather is less of a factor.

We booked with Duck Down Guide Service and stayed at Big Jim's Lodge (a.k.a. Cross Heirs Retreat). They hunt 3,000 acres of rice fields, as do most guides in the area. Surprisingly low number of outfitters who offer flooded timber, probably due to significant pressure of public hunting in the Bayou Meto W.M.A. That can make for a crazy if not dangerous excursion. If you think tailgating at Kyle can be combative, try holing up in someone else's "spot." People literally fighting and shooting people in the BM. For an inexperienced duck hunter, rice fields are probably the better option. The lodge/food was excellent, guides were good to excellent and they offer optional afternoon hunts for geese. Dogs are welcome. Would book again.

Thank you for the information!

After my original post, I talked to a couple of outfitters I found on the web and neither offered flooded timber hunts, which surprised me. They didn't elaborate why, but after reading what you posted, I can understand why they don't. The last thing we want is dealing with crazed duck hunters over hunting spots.

This same group of hunters goes to South Dakota to pheasant hunt every year. This past fall, we saw a lot of geese but very few ducks. They had an unusually cold fall/early winter up there this year, and every body of water we saw from southern Nebraska northward was already frozen over, with the exception of the bigger rivers. This was the week before Thanksgiving.

Flooded timber requires land devoted to ducks. Its typically owned by the lodge itself. Most of the guiding outfits are leasing lots of acres of farm land to meet their needs. Look at aerials of the duck areas and almost all of the private land is farm fields.

I have some buddies that go to Slicks. They do a good job of resting their holes and hunting small groups. Still not a guarantee though. And it's not cheap as well as being hard to get in to.

https://www.stuttgarthuntingclub.com/

Before you book with anyone, ask how many people in a blind. The trend to increase profit has gone to bigger and bigger blinds. This way, they can get more shooters in on good hunts by resting a spot for a week and then hunting it with 15 guns once rather than 4-6 people every couple days. Problem is, you'll be hunting with strangers and there's always a couple of idiots in there.

As for dates, id pick the week before Christmas but water and weather can trump the calendar.

My duck hunting partners and I did the Stuttgart pilgrimage a few years ago. Mid December. We hunted a rice field pond one morning and shot a few ducks. Looked about like our El Campo lease. The next morning we hunted timber and the blind was like a tree house about 10 ft above the water. That was fun but not your typical stand next to a tree timber hunt.
The main things I remember are going to Macks and my dog walking up a long ramp to get back in that tree house. Lots of hunters.
Arkansas is not any more a slam dunk than any other duck hunt.

One of the outfitters I'm looking at considers a group of 6 hunters as a "private duck hunt" and doesn't mix that group with others for either hunting or lodging. There are 6 in my group, so that will be nice if we decide to hunt with that particular outfitter. I've seen the same thing on some of the other outfitters' websites.

I met a guy at Mack's Prairie Wings a couple of years ago to pick up a bird dog trailer I had bought from him. This was during the summer so there wasn't much going on in Stuttgart, Arkansas that time of year. While I was there at Mack's, I went inside to look around. I was impressed with the place. It kind of reminded me of what Cabela's used to be like before it got bought out by Bass Pro, except 95% of the place was devoted to waterfowl hunting.

Thanks to everyone for their helpful responses!

My group (6 guys) travels every year for a duck hunt. We've done Stuttgart the last 3 years with Black Duck Waterfowl.

Pros:
he hunts 1 group at a time, you aren't mixed in with multiple other groups.
The property is on the Bayou Meto, like literally out the back door of the lodge. This makes for extremely easy hunting - roll out of bed about 5:30 and in the woods by 6:30.
The owner and his wife are amazing hosts, take good care of you and stay out of your groups way so you can have fun/ screw off.

Cons:
The hunting in the woods can be awesome when the ducks do right, but it isn't a sure thing by any stretch. We've had more success up there shooting flooded corn than the woods. The duck guides are all on private land and if I am not mistaken, they cannot guide on the massive public track on the bayou, so - you are only as successful as this property is in the limited time you are there, which is highly dependent on weather and migration to the areas.

In prior years we hunted Kansas and Oklahoma a lot. We may go back that way next year, still deciding. We end up driving a lot more in that area, but it increases chances of successful hunts if you can call on multiple farms during a trip.

Good luck and I'd be happy to share more of our experience if interested.

The Catfish said:

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My group (6 guys) travels every year for a duck hunt. We've done Stuttgart the last 3 years with Black Duck Waterfowl.

Pros:
he hunts 1 group at a time, you aren't mixed in with multiple other groups.
The property is on the Bayou Meto, like literally out the back door of the lodge. This makes for extremely easy hunting - roll out of bed about 5:30 and in the woods by 6:30.
The owner and his wife are amazing hosts, take good care of you and stay out of your groups way so you can have fun/ screw off.

Cons:
The hunting in the woods can be awesome when the ducks do right, but it isn't a sure thing by any stretch. We've had more success up there shooting flooded corn than the woods. The duck guides are all on private land and if I am not mistaken, they cannot guide on the massive public track on the bayou, so - you are only as successful as this property is in the limited time you are there, which is highly dependent on weather and migration to the areas.

In prior years we hunted Kansas and Oklahoma a lot. We may go back that way next year, still deciding. We end up driving a lot more in that area, but it increases chances of successful hunts if you can call on multiple farms during a trip.

Good luck and I'd be happy to share more of our experience if interested.

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I recall this place. Drive another 1/2 mile and you arrive at Cross Heirs Retreat (where the road dead ends). We tend to go for the more swanky accommodations because really it's the only thing you can control.

I know where you are talking about, but believe that is Black Dog up the road. Black Duck is a little south east of there, near Five Oaks.

I hear you on the lodging - my group isn't real picky on accommodations.. just like to be somewhat private and have good chow.

If willing to go to Kansas, I'd look at Salt Plains Outfitters.

Here's that place we hunted that had the tree house blind.
They had a nice lodge.

https://www.drylakehuntingservice.com/