RiverKings and Ducks Unlimited to participate in world record attempt

SOUTHAVEN, Miss. — The Mississippi RiverKings hockey team is just ducky over hosting a nonprofit night to benefit Ducks Unlimited on Saturday, January 31st. The RiverKings crowd will have the opportunity to achieve the honor of performing the largest mass duck call ever and become an official entry in the Guinness Book of World Records. The Rapid City Rush will be the opponents for the RiverKings that evening in the DeSoto Civic Center in Southaven. The night’s events will also include a “how to use a duck call” session with “World Champion of Champions” duck caller Buck Gardner, plus a gun raffle and a wide selection of silent auction items for the outdoor enthusiast. Additionally, Ducks Unlimited members are selling tickets to the game to raise money for the organization’s conservation efforts.

Wes Shive, landscape architect at More Green Landscape Company in East Memphis and Southaven resident, helped start the Ducks Unlimited chapter in Southaven five years ago. “I’m not a big duck hunter, actually,” Shive said. “More important to me is wetland conservation. Wetland conservation doesn’t just save habitat for ducks. It saves habitat for many different species of wildlife. It helps promote and preserve every aspect of the outdoor lifestyle, whether that means canoeing or mountain biking or hiking or bird watching. And the more wetlands we can set aside, the better off we’ll be, in my opinion.” Ducks Unlimited conserves and restores critical habitat needed for waterfowl and other wildlife. Among the most productive ecosystems on the planet, wetlands are invaluable not only to waterfowl and scores of other wildlife species, but to quality of life for humans. “Wetlands do a lot for water filtration,” Shive said. “They are the best source for replenishing the aquifers.” Plants and soils in wetlands play a significant role in purifying water, removing high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus, and in some cases, removing toxic chemicals. Some wetland plants have been found to accumulate heavy metals in their tissues at 100,000 times the concentration in the surrounding water. Nearly 40 percent of North America’s water sources drain through a vast complex of wetlands called the Mississippi Alluvial Valley. Once a 24.7 million acre complex of forested wetlands interspersed with swamps, cypress-tupelo brakes, scrub-shrub wetlands and emergent wetlands, the Mississippi Alluvial Valley landscape has changed dramatically during the last 200 years. Today, only about 20 percent of the original forest remains. These forests have been cleared for agriculture and other purposes, and rivers have been tamed with dams and levees. To date, DU has planted 15 million hardwood seedlings in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley and worked to restore backwater to these forests to mimic historical flooding. Ducks Unlimited’s 9,400 members in Mississippi have worked to conserve over 250,000 acres of waterfowl habitat throughout Mississippi. “What I volunteer for today will always be there, for perpetuity,” Shive said. “The wetlands we purchase will never be developed. That’s a pretty good feeling.” Ducks Unlimited’s conservation programs include restoring grasslands (dense, grassy areas near wetlands); replanting forests that flood regularly due to overflowing riverbanks, such as the bottomland hardwood forests in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley; restoring watersheds (the area surrounding wetlands); working with landowners to improve the agricultural and recreational value of their land, making it more wildlife-friendly; acquiring land and restoring it to improve its value to wildlife; and offering financial incentives to landowners who manage their land for waterfowl and other wetland wildlife, among others. Of course, there is another aspect to Ducks Unlimited, one that Shive said can’t be overlooked. “I like being a member of Ducks Unlimited because we can meet a lot of great people and have a great time doing it,” Shive said. “For instance, where else could you put together a hockey event that raises funds for a great cause, and get in the Guinness Book of World Record doing it? We always have a great time.” Let’s hope the event is all it’s quacked up to be. Contact the author at: Mitch.cooper@prohockeynews.com Media info provided by the Mississippi RiverKings