Tallahala WMA camp site 4

public land records

Likely — The record is good enough to put a pin on, but thin in places. Treat the details as a starting point, not gospel.

Camp site mapped by MDWFP inside Tallahala WMA, which lies on U.S. Forest Service land. Camping here is governed by the U.S. Forest Service, not MDWFP: 40 Miss Admin Code Pt 2 Ch 1 Rule 1.2 M ('Camping is allowed subject to U.S. Forest Service regulations') and Rule 1.5 A, which records the 10 Apr 2002 MOU giving the Forest Service authority over WMAs inside National Forest land. Forest Service dispersed-camping rules for the National Forests in Mississippi (fs.usda.gov/r08/mississippi/recreation/camping-cabins, read 2026-08-13): 'You may camp in a dispersed area for up to 30 days. After 30 days, you must move at least 5 road miles for camping in another dispersed area.' Camp 'at least 100 feet from any stream or other water source'; use existing fire rings; no wood permit needed; bury human waste in a cathole 200 ft from water or pack it out. Dispersed camping means 'no services (such as trash removal) and little or no facilities'. No fee. Coordinate is MDWFP's own GIS: public ArcGIS service https://arcgis.mdwfp.com/arcgis/rest/services/Website/WMA_New/MapServer layer 0 ('WMA POINT FEATURES'), queried 2026-08-13 for TYPE IN ('CAMPING','CAMP SITE','CAMP SITES'). It is the agency's mapped camp-site point, NOT a field visit and NOT a geocode. MDWFP does not publish per-site facilities, so table/fire-ring/toilet presence is UNKNOWN. No water source is claimed. A WMA User Permit (Rule 1.6 B, $15 resident / $30 non-resident annual) is required on USFS-owned WMAs only of people hunting, fishing or trapping -- not of campers. MDWFP Rule 1.1 bans alcoholic beverages on WMAs. Hunting seasons run here -- check mdwfp.com/wma and the Forest Service Motor Vehicle Use Map before you go, and wear hunter orange in season. Nearest town: Lake ~7.6 mi -- STRAIGHT-LINE distance to the nearest OpenStreetMap place=city/town/village, NOT a driving distance; in the Delta and the Pascagoula bottoms the road in can be far longer. MDWFP does not name its individual camp points, so the number in this row's name is ours, assigned in MDWFP OBJECTID order, not a sign on the ground. Ingest 2026-08-13. --- NIGHT SHIFT REVIEW 2026-08-18 (reviewer=nightshift-verified) --- Coordinate re-checked against the live agency source this fire: MDWFP ArcGIS https://arcgis.mdwfp.com/arcgis/rest/services/Website/WMA_New/MapServer layer 0 ('WMA POINT FEATURES'), re-queried 2026-08-18 for TYPE IN ('CAMPING','CAMP SITE','CAMP SITES'). 182 camp points came back and this row's lat/lon still matches its agency point EXACTLY (0 m): OBJECTID 59, TYPE 'CAMP SITE', WMA label 'TALLAHALA WMA'. All 92 pending MDWFP rows in this state matched exactly, so the coordinate provenance recorded above holds. CONTAINMENT re-checked this fire against layer 2 ('WMA PROPERTY BOUNDARY') with a point-in-polygon query: the point falls inside 'TALLAHALA WMA'. Rule 1.2 re-read 2026-08-18 (40 Miss. Code R. 2-1.2 [Effective 6/30/2025], 'NON-STATE OWNED, NON-COE WMA REGULATIONS'): paragraph A still lists Tallahala among the covered areas, and paragraph M still reads verbatim "CAMPING: Camping is allowed subject to U.S. Forest Service regulations or the regulations below:" -- the 'below' exceptions are only Wolf River, John Starr and Little Biloxi, so Tallahala remains under Forest Service camping rules exactly as recorded above. Rule 1.5 A re-read the same day and still reads verbatim "The current Memorandum of Understanding dated April 10, 2002, between the U.S. Forest Service and the MDWFP establishes the Forest Service as having authority to regulate access on wildlife management areas within National Forest Lands." Forest Service dispersed-camping rules re-read 2026-08-18 at https://www.fs.usda.gov/r08/mississippi/recreation/camping-cabins -- "The National Forests in Mississippi welcomes dispersed camping in all forests", "You may camp in a dispersed area for up to 30 days. After 30 days, you must move at least 5 road miles for camping in another dispersed area", "Please place your campsite at least 100 feet from any stream or other water source" and "No amenities are provided, such as water, restrooms or trash cans" are all still present, unchanged. TWO CORRECTIONS to the older text above, both from that Forest Service page as read this fire: (1) the page ALSO says "Campers may not return to the same campsite within the calendar year" -- a real limit the note above omits; (2) the note above says to bury human waste in a cathole '200 ft from water'. The agency page actually says "dig a hole six (6) inches deep at least 100 feet away from any water source" and "take your toilet paper with you". 100 feet / 6 inches is the agency figure; the 200 ft was our error, not theirs. The page also asks campers to "keep your campsite within 150 feet from a roadway". No potable water is available here and none is claimed; the agency tells campers to "Carry water or a water filtration device with you". WMA User Permit re-verified 2026-08-18 at 40 Miss. Code R. 2-1.6 [Effective 6/30/2025]: Resident Annual $15.00, Non-Resident Annual $30.00; required of ALL users on WMA property not owned by the U.S. Forest Service, and on USFS-owned WMA property only of those hunting, fishing or trapping; persons exempt from a licence under Miss. Code Ann. 49-7-5 / 49-7-9 are exempt. Unchanged from what is recorded above. DUPLICATE CHECK: every pending Mississippi row was compared BY COORDINATE (haversine, never by name) against all published and 'later' Mississippi camps. This row has no published camp within 1500 m and no other pending row within 120 m. Checked specifically for the trap that caught Upper Sardis in this same batch: this point is not within 1500 m of any National Forests in Mississippi developed FEE campground we already hold (Marathon Lake, Shockaloe Trail BC1/BC2, Chewalla Lake, Puskus Lake, Big Biloxi, Cypress Creek Landing, Clear Springs, Choctaw Lake, Davis Lake, Turkey Fork, Long Leaf Horse Camp, Delta Hunt Camps), so this is dispersed ground and free rather than a fee site. VERDICT: HOLDS UP. Free dispersed camping on National Forest land inside Tallahala WMA. Campers need no permit (the WMA User Permit binds only hunters, anglers and trappers on USFS-owned WMAs). Facilities UNKNOWN, no water available and none claimed.

US Forest Service Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW_MVUM_01, layer 1), Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026. Straight-line distance from the pin to the nearest mapped segment within 1 mi; surface type, maintenance level and open dates are the agency's own values for that segment, expanded from its codes and otherwise unedited. Nothing here says which road reaches the site.

US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station locator, snapshot 2026-09-16. Straight-line miles to the nearest public, open, unrestricted station; restricted and planned units are shown but never counted.

On the agency's books. The land manager inventoried this site, so its existence is not in question — current conditions are. Nobody from here has camped it recently.