Mike Freeze

Mike Freeze operates the largest hybrid striped bass hatchery in the world at the Keo Fish Farm, which spawns more than 100 million hybrid striped bass annually and is one of the top three producers of genetically engineered triploid grass carp in the United States.

Freeze successfully campaigned to create a farmer-led nonprofit trade association advocating for U.S. aquaculture in 1989. He then served as president of the National Aquaculture Association (NAA) during its formative years (1990-92) and again from 2011-16. He still serves on the NAA Board of Directors as a President Emeritus and on key committees driving the association’s work. In 2019, the NAA honored Freeze with its highest recognition — the Joseph P. McCraren Distinguished Lifetime Contributions Award.

Freeze has advocated for fish farmers through written testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives Agriculture Committee and as Arkansas' chapter president for the American Fisheries Society. He has served on the Arkansas Farm Bureau board for more than a decade, including the past six years as its vice president.

Born in Pine Bluff, Freeze earned a bachelor’s degree in fisheries and wildlife management at Arkansas Tech University in 1975, while working through college as a fish researcher at Lake Dardanelle. He completed a master’s degree in biology from Murray State University in 1977.

Freeze worked as a fisheries biologist for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission (AGFC) and was later appointed by Governor Mike Huckabee as a commissioner to the AGFC and became the first former employee to ever serve as chairman of the commission.

In 2004, the Freezes were named the Lonoke County Farm Family of the Year.