James Hublick of Harrison was recently honored as winner of the Oklahoma state duck stamp competition during the 2006 Nature Works Art Show in Tulsa.
Hublick's rendition of a pair of widgeons in flight was judged best of 28 entries submitted by notable waterfowl artists from around the country, but it wasn't the first time he has been recognized for his wildlife art.
A self-taught artist with a lifelong interest in fishing and hunting, Hublick was named winning artist for the Michigan trout stamp and South Carolina duck stamp competitions and honored as Ducks Unlimited Artist of the Year. His work has also appeared in the Arkansas Wildlife Calendar.
The 74-year-old artist grew up duck hunting and trout fishing in north Michigan and Wisconsin, where his developing artistic talent led to a 30-year career in the art department at General Motors Corp. headquarters in Detroit. Upon retiring, Hublick moved to Florida, where he lived in the Fort Myers area for 15 years.
A mid-1990s visit with a daughter living in Harrison led to another major life change.
"I was brought up on trout fishing, so I liked what I saw in the White River and the Norfork [North Fork of the White] River," Hublick said Saturday.
He also liked the beauty of the Ozarks, the region's four-season climate and its abundant small towns.
Hublick has lived in Harrison since 1996 and makes frequent trout-fishing trips to the White River and its North Fork when he is not pursuing his passion for wildlife art.
CENTER SHOWCASES BIG WOODS
The degree of local interest in the ivory-billed woodpecker and its rediscovery in the Big Woods of eastern Arkansas were exemplified by the auction of a guided canoe trip into ivory-bill country during the recent Call of the Wild banquet in Bentonville, a fundraiser for the Ozark Natural Science Center.
The canoe trip into the Bayou DeView area where the woodpecker was spotted drew spirited bidding to more than $2,000.
As noted in a recent article in this section, it is possible for people to make self-guided trips to see areas of oldgrowth cypress and tupelo forests in the Cache River Wildlife Refuge near Brinkley. This is especially true of the Dagmar Wildlife Management Area, located within refuge boundaries a few miles from Brinkley. Visitors to the management area can take a driving tour along bayous or set out on marked walking trails and canoeing paths.
However, when local members of the Ozark Society recently toured the Big Woods, they found a visit to the recently completed visitor center of the White River National Wildlife Refuge to be a good place to get an overview of ivorybill country.
"It was definitely a worthwhile part of the trip," Terry Fredrick of Fayetteville reported after the visit.
Located near St. Charles, about an hour's drive south of Brinkley, the center features a 28-foot-tall replica of a giant cypress as a symbol of the swamp. The interior of the hollow tree houses two bear families and is surrounded with mounts of birds and animals common to the swamp. The base of the tree is surrounded by an underwater diorama showcasing aquatic life of the refuge.
Additional exhibits and two short films further educate visitors to the bottomland hardwood forest ecosystem.
More information is available online at www.fws.gov/whiteriver.
MOREL MUSHROOM SEASON NEAR
Mitch Glenn of Garfield spent nearly as much time talking about morel mushrooms as he did crappie April 6 while fishing the White River arm of Beaver Lake.
"Spring in the Ozarks doesn't get any better than catching crappie and finding morels," he said.
Like many people who have developed a taste for the wild mushrooms, Glenn avidly anticipates the annual appearance of the delicacies each spring. He knows four or five places to find them and has already been out looking.
"All we need for the morels to show up is a little rain and a warm day or two," he said.
He would get his wish for rain before the day was done.
A review of columns written over the past few years revealed that morel picking has been good by the third week of April. At least that has been when the secretive morel hunters have admitted finding them.
Details of those locations, however, are generally vague.
Some people say to look where you see colonies of May apples, while others say to search in the vicinity of sycamores.
In general, shaded areas along rivers, creeks and spring-fed hollows are most favored.
Robert Ginsburg of Fayetteville has such a spot on his property in the Madison County Wildlife Management Area. It's a narrow hollow where several springs emerge between a bluff on one side and a low hillside on the other.
The morels have shown up on the hillside, poking up among ferns and May apples, as well as around a few sycamores close to the springs.
I've been calling Ginsburg, but he's not revealing much - yet.