JET—Tuesday was no joke freezing cold and windy like being on the tundra in the furthest part of the northern hemisphere. But it wasn’t the Arctic or Alaskan terrain, but rather the salt flats of Northwest Oklahoma just west of Jet.
For on April Fool’s Day, the gate was unlocked at the west entrance of the Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge so the selenite crystal digging season could commence at sunrise.
Those seeking to mine the jewels of Alfalfa County first thing in the morning on that day were greeted with mid-40 temps and southeast wind gusts of 20 miles per hour making it quite chilly on the open salt flats.
But that didn’t deter AlfalfaCountyBuzz.com founder Korina Dove Pattinson and rockhound Jordon Ott of Stevens Point, Wis., from braving the cold on opening day of crystal digging.
Pattinson, born and raised in the nearby town of Cherokee, remembered coming to the salt flats as a child and decided to build a website dedicated to the tourism in her hometown and surrounding county. She was eagerly awaiting April 1 to dig for selenite crystals and demonstrate in a video uploaded to her website for potential visitors to see.
Ott, along with her husband, Pat, were on spring vacation from their home in central Wisconsin. As a rock collector, she frequents the shores of Lake Superior, so it was a thrill to discover there was a free crystal dig site on their way to New Mexico and Arizona.
“For two years I’ve been wanting to do this,” Ott said. They left Wisconsin the day before during an ice storm and booked one of the Salt Plains State Park cabins so they could be among the first to choose a spot on the pristine dig area that doubles as a whooping crane habitat during the winter.
Both women made the first tracks on the salt flats for the 2025 season.
History of the salt flats
For newcomers to this part of the country, the Great Salt Plains is located inside Alfalfa County on the northern edge of Oklahoma between Jet, Cherokee, and Byron with the tiny township of Nescatunga nestled on the shore of Great Salt Plains Lake.
President Herbert Hoover designated 32,197 acres on the flood plain of the Salt Fork of the Arkansas River as a national wildlife refuge on March 26, 1930, to protect more than 300 species of birds and 30 species of mammals.
Prior to that, bison freely roamed the region and the people of the Osage Nation controlled the Great Salt Plains during the 18th century, using it as hunting grounds and trading the surplus of salt with other tribes, according to historian Louis F. Burns.
In an 1803 letter to Congress, per a September 2020 article by National Geographic, President Thomas Jefferson attempted to justify the Louisiana Purchase by promising it contained “a salt mountain … 180 miles long and 45 in width.” Political opposition mocked him; President Jefferson unfortunately had confused the salt flats with a mountain, meaning it took another decade before the government actually located what he had touted.
Explorer and Indian Agent George Champlin Sibley examined the Osage hunting grounds in 1811, led by Osage guide Sans Orielle, and reported back to Fort Osage in Missouri about the benefits of the salt flats of what he called the Great Saline.
Upon the signing of the Treaty of New Echota in 1835, the Cherokee Nation now owned the Cherokee Outlet, thus the Great Saline. However, the stipulation within the treaty was anyone from other tribes could access the salt.
By 1881, according to the Oklahoma Historical Society, the Cherokee Nation received permission to lease the Great Saline to private investors, but the venture failed and homesteaders came near and far to gather salt on their buckboards.
Then came the Cherokee Strip Land Run of 1893 which included Alfalfa County (which was still part of Woods County then), allowing pioneers to settle in northern Oklahoma Territory, including the Great Saline area.
Following President Hoover’s executive order in 1930, the idea of building a dam for flood control purposes was included in a 1931 study made for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Congress eventually authorized construction and excavation for the spillway began in September 1938.
The dam wasn’t completed until July 1941 and impounded the Great Salt Plains Lake, which covers 9,300 acres with 41 miles of shoreline. It is a relatively shallow reservoir, only averaging about four feet deep, and 1/4 as salty as the ocean.
In the meantime, World War II happened and the U.S. Army Air Corps used the salt flats as a bombing and gunnery range from 1942 to 1946. Bombers arrived from surrounding states for target practice while soldiers on the ground learned to sniff out potential chemical agents. A non-fatal amount of each chemical was packaged in a vial, which were distributed in Chemical Agent Identification Sets (CAIS), and buried throughout the salt flats.
At least a couple hundred of those CAIS vials remained hidden for six decades until 2007 when a Boy Scout out crystal digging came across one containing mustard gas. The dig site was closed and crystal digging suspended for two years while the Army Corps of Engineers inspected the salt flats and removed any remnants to ensure visitor safety.
Long after the war was over, Salt Plains State Park came into being when Oklahoma leased 820 acres of the wildlife refuge for use as a state park on the east side of the spillway. Guest cabins and initial hiking trails were established in 1960 as part of the state park.
Also, in operation since 1929 just north of the Great Salt Plains is the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation’s Byron State Fish Hatchery. The fish, such as walleye, bass, and channel catfish, raised in the hatchery are dispersed throughout the refuge and the lake.
Within the Great Salt Plains are rich landscapes including the salt flats, mixed-grass prairie, wetlands filled with flowers and plants, forested riparian (land passage between marsh and prairie) areas, rolling sand hills, and open water.
Bald eagles are known to roost in the area along with numerous waterfowl including pheasant, bobwhite quail, mourning dove, and sandhill cranes. Migrating shorebirds like snowy plovers, falcons, pelicans, and least terns often stop there before continuing on their journey.
Today, Ralston Island, which rises from the center of the Great Salt Plains Lake, is the largest heron rookery in Oklahoma, with more than 30,000 birds dropping in each year.
Digging for treasure
Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge and its adjacent Salt Plains State Park offer walking, hiking (see the March-April issue of ETown for details), horseback, and driving tours as well as camping, hunting, fishing, and of course, crystal digging.
For more than 50 years, the main attraction at the Great Salt Plains has been the selenite crystals. Families both locally and from across the nation arrive armed with buckets, shovels, and jugs of water in hand prepared to find buried treasure in the form of hourglass crystals along the 11,000 acres of salt flats.
By the 1970s, the Salt Plains National Wildlife Refuge began selecting specific dig sites each season marked with bright orange signs that read Dig Area. This allowed sections of the salt flats to be rotated every year thus giving utilized sections a chance to rest and recoup, per se, before being reopened in future years for crystal digging. And wildlife uses the holes for feeding and breeding, so visitors don’t have to fill them back in after their excursion.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) officials also implemented rules such as weight limits and a ban on the selling of crystals in any form including artwork. Photographs on the salt flats are allowed for private use; check with the USFWS office for commercial photography permits.
The salt flats were created by the repeated flooding of the shallow sea that once covered Oklahoma. When the ocean receded for good, it left behind a thick crust of salt. Saline groundwater still flows beneath the salt flats, replenishing the surface during annual floods.
When this salty groundwater comes into contact with the mineral gypsum in the soil, it forms crystals. Gypsum can transform into crystals of many shapes; the presence of very fine sand and clay particles during the formation process means these crystals often take on the shape of an hourglass.
The crystals diggers seek can usually be found only a few feet below the surface, so it doesn’t take much to discover them.
USFWS recommends bringing a shovel to dig with, protection from the sun (sunglasses, hat, sunscreen, and even a pop-up tent for shade plus a folding chair to rest in), and enough water to drink, rinse the crystals, and clean up after. The salt brine on shoes can track everywhere, so it’s advisable to bring plastic bags or towels to cover the vehicle floorboards and/or seats. The salt brine can also damage a vehicle’s undercarriage, so visitors are advised to pop into a car wash not long after.
Hardcore hunters, like Ott did Tuesday, bring garden spades, repurposed dish soap bottles filled with water, and buckets.
Most of the crystals found are small single blades, but some are twins or clusters. The biggest finds have been seven inches long or weighed up to 38 pounds.
The ground finally yielded its jewels for Ott who spent 30 minutes and two holes later mining for the first crystal of the season. The miniscule cluster was enough to rejoice about as Ott held up her prize to the cloudy sky to inspect in the blistery cold.
When the couple from Wisconsin booked their trip to the Great Salt Plains last week, Ott said the forecast was supposed to be sunny and in the 80s. Nevertheless, she was excited to be on the salt flats despite the frigid temps, something she and her husband said they were used to since they spend their winters up north.
“Glad to get here and dig!” Ott said.
Pattinson filmed the crystal digging event as it unfolded; she opted not to dig herself this time since Ott was a willing participant. She later posted the footage on the Alfalfa County Buzz Facebook page.
Crystal digging is permitted daily from sunrise to sunset through Oct. 15, and is literally the only free hourglass selenite crystal digging activity in the world, Pattinson said. There is an observation deck at the west gate that available year-round. For more information or directions, go online to fws.gov/refuge/salt-plains or call the refuge office at (580) 626-4794.
For rules and regulations regarding hunting and fishing in the state of Oklahoma, go online to wildlifedepartment.com.
To uncover more about the Great Salt Plains and Alfalfa County, go online to alfalfacountybuzz.com/post/guide-to-salt-plains-national-wildlife-refuge-crystal-digging-birdwatching-fishing-hunting.