Discover Jonesboro & the Upper Delta

Date: 2026-09-01 08:59:09 | Story: Stephanie Maxwell Newton | Photography: Mandy Jayne |

See the future of the Arkansas Delta through the eyes of a fifth generation Birdeye resident

Chickens in a grassy yard with a wooden structure and fence.

Chickens roam free at Birdeye Farms.

Martin Smith is a son of the Delta. Growing up surrounded by family and farmland in Birdeye, an unincorporated community in Cross County, he experienced a bit of culture shock when he moved away for college, a path that ultimately led to a landscape architecture degree. After he and his wife, Kara, started to build their lives in Texas, she had a job opportunity in Little Rock—and Martin found himself back in The Natural State. Here, he began pondering an old property back home in Birdeye. “My great-grandfather’s 1903 house was 5 miles from where I grew up. It was in disrepair, and our family was told it needed to be torn down,” he says. Having recently traveled to Scotland where he cycled among centuries-old relics, something about the history of the home started to tug at Martin, and he felt compelled to save it. “We were following this path that society had set up for us, and we just kind of put all that aside and said, Let’s do this,” he says of their decision to uproot their life and move to Birdeye. A year after relocating, Martin and his partner, Tanner Weeks, opened their firm, Ecological Design Group, with Martin officing out of the Delta. The firm also has branches in Little Rock and Rogers.

Today, what Martin and Kara have built in Birdeye is more than a renovated home. It’s a community, an opportunity, and, hopefully, an infrastructure that will continue to revitalize the Delta. Read on for more about Martin’s work connecting communities across the region.

Q: You have deep roots in the Arkansas Delta. What are your family ties to the area?

A: When the area was settled in the late 1800s, my great-great-grandfather, Thomas Benton Smith, took advantage of the Swamp Land Act, in which the federal government was looking for people to timber and drain the wetlands and create agricultural areas that would feed the U.S. He accumulated 10,000 acres of land doing that, and his son founded a store called W.M. Smith and Sons and a cotton gin. We live in the house that Thomas Smith built. Birdeye had probably 300-500 people at the time, mostly farm workers. During the mechanization of agriculture, the population dwindled and everybody left. That’s the whole story of the Delta.

Q: Ecological Design Group has had a part in some really special projects all over the state—Heifer International Headquarters in Little Rock, Osage Park in Bentonville, and the ONE Jonesboro Master Plan, to name a few. But you also stay busy with your nonprofit organization. Tell us about StudioDrift and its mission.

A: About 10 years ago, I was asked to try to come up with a way to save the bridge going across the White River at Clarendon. Our pitch was to turn it into a float-in, bike-in operation. At that point in time, it would have been the second longest bicycle/pedestrian bridge in the world, which would have been very marketable. It had a real experience factor and offered a cultural arrival to a place. … We lost the bridge, but through that process I saw something larger—a revisioning of the Arkansas Delta through our natural resources. We have the Big Woods, the White River, the Cache River, Crowley’s Ridge—we have all of these incredible places that are really only identified and used for hunting and fishing some seasons of the year. But we saw the potential for more wildlife viewing, ecotourism, and outdoor recreation, and that became the premise of StudioDrift.

Q: What are some of the organization’s largest projects?

A: Crowley’s Ridge Gravel Trail has been one of our defining projects. Moving back here from Austin, Texas, and being a cyclist, I didn’t feel safe cycling on the streets, so I started exploring the gravel roads around the area. There were wildlife trails, Civil War trails, and county roads, and they all intertwine and connect—but there wasn’t one contiguous route connecting them. So we’ve used existing infrastructure to connect 250 miles of gravel roads all the way from Piggott to Helena.

We have the same concept with paddle trails connecting Newport, Augusta, Des Arc, DeValls Bluff, and Clarendon. The White River is never going to be used to move grain again, so what are the outdoor recreation and ecotourism possibilities that can connect all those port cities back together? One thing we do is identify the assets that are here and simply activate them.

Q: What excites you about the future of Birdeye and the Delta?

A: A huge project for us right now is the Cache River Water Trail, which we’re working on with Woodruff County. And our oldest son, Whit, is coming back to Birdeye next year after college and expanding his regenerative agriculture farm here. We haven’t held our kids hostage and told them they have to stay in the Delta, but we raised them in this, and Kara and I have always looked at it like, If none of our kids want to come back here and be a part of this, what are we doing? If everybody just wants to leave, there’s not anything to come back to and be proud of. You have to take ownership in something, and you have to know that this is generational change we’re talking about. I might not even be alive when you can look around and say, Wow, something’s really changed here. But you put in the legwork and just push toward that, and it’s worthwhile.

Martin and Kara Smith at Birdeye Farms with their three dogs, Francis, Vito, and Millie.

Read on for more of our favorite ways to discover the Upper Delta.

Paragould

Big O’s Ribs in Harrisburg

SHOP
Founded in 1997, Jonesboro’s Gearhead Outfitters (gearheadoutfitters.com) has outdoor clothing, hiking boots, camping gear, and everything you could possibly need to enjoy your next adventure. For little ones seeking a new favorite toy, head to The Toy Store (jonesborotoystore.com) to browse train sets, dolls, games, puzzles—and maybe take a spin on a merry-go-round outside the storefront. In Newport, owner Jamie Darling curates a unique selection of gifts, décor, women’s fashion, and accessories at her boutique Darling’s Fine Things (darlingsfinethings.com).

DINE
It’s just not a visit to the Delta without tamales. Visit The Tamale Factory (thetamalefactory.net) in Augusta (open on Friday and Saturday evenings only) for a taste of this regional delicacy. In Paragould, CHOW at One Eighteen (chow118.com) delights diners with inspired menus featuring seasonal ingredients. Plan your next date night to try one of their elevated entrées, or make it a lunch stop with fresh options like the Korean BBQ Salmon Bowl, Cuban Wrap, or a range of tasty salads.