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Arkansas state symbols

Arkansas has 36 official state symbols. The oldest is the apple blossom, adopted in 1901; the newest are the mallard, the official state duck, and the Labrador retriever, the official state canine, both from 2025. In between, Arkansas named a state cooking pot, a state steam locomotive and a tomato that is both fruit and vegetable.

36 official designations · every law checked October 23, 2026

A long list with a sense of humor

Arkansas’s symbols are mostly set out in Chapter 4 of Title 1 of the Arkansas Code, and many come with explanations written into the acts themselves. When the state named the pecan in 2009, the act made a point of saying that the nut gets no protected status, so it can still be harvested and eaten. The same clause appears for the state butterfly, the alligator gar and the mallard. The 1987 tomato act explains that the pink tomato is the official fruit because it is botanically a fruit, and the official vegetable because people eat it as one.

Early symbols: blossom, bird and pine

The apple blossom came first, in 1901, after a contest among women’s groups organized by the Arkansas Floral Emblem Society. One campaigner, Love Barton of Searcy, is said to have brought a bushel of polished apples into the Senate chamber to make her case. The mockingbird followed in 1929, pushed by the Arkansas Federation of Women’s Clubs, and the pine in 1939, praised in its resolution as one of the state’s great renewable sources of wealth.

Rocks, gems and the 1967 swap

In 1967 one act named the diamond the state gem, quartz crystal the state mineral and bauxite the state rock, partly so that rock clubs could trade official specimens with clubs in other states. All three tell a piece of Arkansas history. The diamonds come from the volcanic pipe at Crater of Diamonds State Park. Arkansas quartz became a war material in World War II, when it was needed for radio oscillators. And Arkansas supplied about 90 percent of the bauxite mined in the United States for most of the 20th century.

The outdoors

Many recent symbols come from hunting and fishing country. The white-tailed deer became the state mammal in 1993, a reminder of a comeback: by the mid-1930s only a few hundred deer were left in Arkansas, and restocking had rebuilt the herd to roughly a million by 2008. The alligator gar, a fish that can top eight feet and 240 pounds, became the state’s official “primitive fish” in 2019, after the legislature noticed that Arkansas was one of only five states without an official fish. The shotgun, the main tool of duck hunting, became the official state firearm the same year, and the Bowie knife, once known as the “Arkansas toothpick,” the official state knife.

In 2025 the legislature completed the set. It named the mallard, the most numerous duck in Arkansas, as the official state duck, and a few weeks later the Labrador retriever as the official state canine. The sponsor argued that a state with an official duck needed a dog to retrieve it. Arkansas was the first state to choose the Labrador.

Food, music and a locomotive

Arkansas is the country’s leading rice-producing state, and rice became the official state grain in 2007. Milk is the state beverage and the Cynthiana grape the state grape. The fiddle is the state instrument, linked to the old tune “The Arkansas Traveler,” which is also the state historic song. The Dutch oven is the official historic cooking vessel, because it was in use when Arkansas joined the Louisiana Purchase. In 2021 Arkansas even adopted an official steam locomotive: Cotton Belt No. 819, built in Pine Bluff in 1943 and the last steam locomotive built in the state, now kept at the Arkansas Railroad Museum.

The main symbols

The flag, the mockingbird and the apple blossom each have their own page. The state anthem, Eva Ware Barnett’s “Arkansas,” was published in 1916 and is old enough to be in the public domain.

1 1860s 1880s 2 1900s 2 1 1920s 1 1940s 3 1960s 2 7 1980s 4 5 2000s 4 3 2020s
Official symbols adopted per decade. The busiest decade was the 1980s, with seven.

Flag, seal, song, motto and nickname

Animals

Plants and fungi

Earth and sky

Food and drink

Songs, words and language

Culture and history

Questions about Arkansas's symbols

What is the Arkansas state animal?
Arkansas's state mammal is the white-tailed deer, adopted in 1993. The state also has an official duck (the mallard) and an official canine (the Labrador retriever), both from 2025.
Is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable in Arkansas?
Both. A 1987 law made the South Arkansas Vine Ripe Pink Tomato the official state fruit and the official state vegetable, because it is botanically a fruit but eaten as a vegetable.
How many state songs does Arkansas have?
Four: the state anthem, "Arkansas," by Eva Ware Barnett; two state songs, "Arkansas (You Run Deep in Me)" and "Oh, Arkansas"; and the state historic song, "The Arkansas Traveler."
What is the Arkansas state dinosaur?
Arkansaurus fridayi, a small two-legged meat-eater known from foot bones found near Lockesburg in 1972. They are the only dinosaur bones ever found in Arkansas.
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