Wildlife Refuge

Bird watching nature walk at Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge.
 

In 1929, the Land Acquisitions Division of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Biological Survey, approached the New Holland Corporation concerning buying the lake and allowing it to refill for a wildlife refuge. Five years later, on October 10, 1934, New Holland Corporation sold its 49,925 acre lake property to the U. S. Government for $311,943. By executive order dated December 18, 1934, President Franklin D. Roosevelt designated the property to be the Lake Mattamuskeet Migratory Bird Refuge. The federal government had created nearby Swan Quarter Refuge two years earlier, in 1932. 

The Refuge began immediately to convert the lake property from a farming operation to a sanctuary for migratory waterfowl and other forms of wildlife. They planted vegetation in and around the lake to feed the birds and wildlife, and installed flood gates in the man-made canals from the lake to the Pamlico Sound to prevent uncontrolled salt-water intrusion during periods of extreme high tides. During the drainage years, Hyde residents drove across the drained lakebed to get to distant points in the county. In the 1940s, the State of North Carolina built a causeway across the lake from south to north. This eliminated the necessity of driving around the huge lake to get from one side of the county to the other.
 
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