Where Can You Legally Ride a Side-by-Side in Mississippi?

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Where Can You Legally Ride a Side-by-Side in Mississippi?

Four places, and only four. Private land with the landowner's permission, private off-road and mud parks, the designated OHV trail systems in the De Soto National Forest, and wildlife management areas under narrow game-retrieval rules. Public roads are not on the list, because Mississippi Code Section 63-31-3 states that nothing in it authorizes operating an off-road vehicle on a public road or highway.

What surprises most buyers is not the shortness of the list. It is that the two federal trail systems, the ones that look like the obvious answer for public riding in the Pine Belt, will turn away the machine they just bought.

Where	Legal status	Width limit	Cost	What it takes
Private land	Legal with permission	None	Free	The landowner's permission
Private mud and off-road parks	Legal, park rules govern	Set by the park	Day or season pass	Park waiver, sometimes insurance
Bethel OHV Trails	Legal, designated use	50 inches	$10 per user per day	Driver's license, spark arrestor, 96 dBA
Rattlesnake Bay OHV Trail	Legal, designated use	50 inches	Fee at the trailhead	Same federal trail rules
Wildlife management areas	Game retrieval only	Per WMA	WMA permit	Deer or hog retrieval, no loaded weapon
Public roads	Not authorized statewide	Not applicable	Not applicable	No state pathway exists

Why Does Machine Width Decide Where You Can Ride?

Because both De Soto OHV trail systems were established for vehicles no greater than 50 inches wide, and that number excludes most of what a Gulf South buyer actually owns. The Forest Service sets the limit for trail construction and safety reasons, not for machine capability, so a more capable machine does not earn an exception. A 62-inch side-by-side is not permitted on a 50-inch trail no matter how well it would handle it.

Run the numbers against common machines and the gate is obvious.

Machine	Overall width	Fits a 50-inch trail?
Polaris Ranger XP 1000	62.5 inches	No
Polaris Ranger SP 570	56 inches	No
Can-Am Defender, full-size trims	Over 60 inches	No
Polaris RZR 570	50 inches	Yes
CFMoto ZForce 500 Trail	50 inches	Yes
Honda Pioneer 500	50 inches	Yes

This is the single most useful thing to know before buying if public trail riding is part of the plan. A full-size utility machine is the right answer for mud, hunting land, and property work, and it is the wrong answer for De Soto. Buyers who want both usually end up with a full-size machine plus access to private ground, not a full-size machine and a trail pass. The tradeoff between machine classes is worked through in the guide to utility versus sport versus recreation side-by-sides.

What Do De Soto's OHV Trails Actually Require?

Both systems sit in the De Soto Ranger District and run on the same federal rule set, with a fee and an equipment standard that catch people out.

Bethel OHV Trails is a 43-mile system in Harrison County. The trail use fee is $10 per user per day and the ticket stub must be on each person, not left in the truck. Operators must have a valid driver's license. Anyone under 16 must have a safety certificate and a helmet. Machines must have spark arrestors and an exhaust system that sounds to 96 dBA at 20 inches. There is a seven-day stay limit. As of late August 2026 the trail is temporarily closed due to flooding, which is normal for the Pine Belt and the reason the conditions line matters.

Rattlesnake Bay OHV Trail is a 31.6-mile system, also capped at 50 inches, and is a fee area with the fee station at the trailhead. It is open year-round unless weather forces a closure.

Call 601-528-6180 for current conditions on either. Gulf South rain closes these trails regularly and a closure is not posted anywhere you will think to look before loading the trailer.

The 96 dBA rule deserves a note of its own, because a machine with an aftermarket exhaust can fail it and most owners have never measured. If a rig has been opened up, that is worth checking before paying a day fee for the whole group. Sound is also the thing that gets a machine turned away on hunting land, which is covered in the guide to the quietest side-by-sides for hunting.

Can You Ride on a Wildlife Management Area?

Only to retrieve harvested game, and the rule is narrower than most hunters assume. Under Mississippi's WMA regulations, off-road vehicles and ATVs are allowed on a WMA for the retrieval of harvested deer or hogs, not for general transportation to and from a stand. No loaded weapon may be in possession while operating the machine, and no ATV or ORV is allowed on any public road within a WMA that is open to licensed motorized vehicles.

On WMAs managed on U.S. Forest Service land, off-road vehicles may use designated roads and trails, and the document that governs which ones is the Motor Vehicle Use Map the Forest Service publishes annually. The MVUM, not the trail's appearance on the ground, decides whether a route is open.

Hunters with a qualifying disability may be granted access to open portions of a WMA by ATV or UTV, with documentation establishing eligibility. The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks handles those determinations, and the Jackson office is at 601-432-2199.

What About Private Mud Parks?

Private parks are where most Gulf South side-by-side riding actually happens, and they are the only category with no width limit and no state rule to read. The park sets the terms: a day or season pass, a signed waiver, sometimes proof of insurance, and its own rules on alcohol, minors, and machine sound.

They are also the honest answer to the width problem. A 62-inch machine that cannot touch a federal trail is completely at home in a mud park, and the terrain those parks are built around is what full-size utility machines are built for. Which machine suits that ground is covered in which side-by-side Mississippi mud parks reward.

Because parks are private businesses, hours and access change without much notice. Call before driving, especially after heavy rain, when a park may be closed or may be at its best depending on how it is built.

Is Private Land Really the Main Answer?

For most owners in this region, yes, and that is not a consolation prize. Private land with the owner's permission is the clearest legal ground in Mississippi: no width limit, no fee, no permit, no MVUM to check. Hunting leases, family property, and timber company ground under a lease agreement account for the majority of side-by-side hours in the Pine Belt.

The two cautions are worth stating plainly. Permission should be actual permission, ideally from the person who owns the ground rather than someone who also hunts it. And a lease that allows hunting does not automatically allow riding, since those are separate uses and some leases address them separately. Read the lease before assuming.

What Trips People Up?

Four things, in roughly the order they cost people a wasted day.

The first is buying width-blind. A buyer picks a full-size machine for mud and hunting, which is usually correct, and then discovers months later that the nearest public trail system will not admit it. Nothing is wrong with the machine; the plan just needs private ground or a park.

The second is the trail fee structure. It is $10 per user per day at Bethel, not per machine, so a four-person outing is $40 before fuel.

The third is assuming a WMA is open riding. It is not. Game retrieval is a specific, narrow allowance, and riding a WMA for recreation is not permitted.

The fourth is not calling ahead. Both federal trails close for weather, and Bethel is closed for flooding as this is written. One phone call to 601-528-6180 prevents a two-hour tow for nothing.

FAQ: Riding a Side-by-Side in Mississippi

Can I ride from my house to the trailhead on back roads? No. Public roads are not authorized for off-road vehicles statewide, and the local ordinances that permit small vehicles on city streets are golf cart and low-speed vehicle programs a side-by-side does not qualify for, which is covered in the survey of which Mississippi cities allow side-by-sides on local roads.

Is there any way to ride a 62-inch machine on De Soto trails? No. The 50-inch limit is the trail's design standard and there is no permit or exception process for a wider machine.

Do I need a title or registration to ride at a park or on federal trails? Titling and access are separate questions. Mississippi now requires titling on many machines, but a title is an ownership record, not an access credential. The details are in the guide to titling a side-by-side in Mississippi.

What does a spark arrestor actually do? It stops hot carbon particles from leaving the exhaust and igniting dry ground cover. It is required on federal trails and is a genuine fire-season concern in pine timber, not a formality.

Are there state parks in Mississippi with OHV trails? The designated public OHV riding in this region is on federal ground in the De Soto National Forest. Confirm current offerings with the managing agency before planning around anything else.

Can I take a passenger on a WMA game-retrieval trip? The regulations govern the use, not the seat count, but the loaded-weapon prohibition applies to anyone on the machine. Read the current WMA regulations for the specific area, since individual WMAs carry their own rules on top of the basic ones.

Bottom Line

Mississippi gives a side-by-side owner less public ground than the machine's capability suggests, and width is the reason. If public trail riding matters, the machine has to be 50 inches and the shopping list is short. If mud, hunting land, and property work matter, a full-size machine is right and the riding happens on private ground and at parks, which is where most of it happens in this region anyway. Decide which of those two the machine is for before buying, not after. For the road-use question specifically, start with the guide to whether side-by-sides are street legal in Mississippi.

Verified against U.S. Forest Service Bethel OHV Trails and Rattlesnake Bay OHV Trail information for the De Soto Ranger District, Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks WMA regulations, and Mississippi Code Section 63-31-3 on 31 August 2026. Trail status, fees, and WMA regulations change annually; call 601-528-6180 for trail conditions and confirm current WMA rules before hunting.

Sources

• U.S. Forest Service, Bethel OHV Trails - the 50-inch width limit, the $10 per user per day fee, license and helmet rules, the 96 dBA spark arrestor standard, and current closure status.
• U.S. Forest Service, Rattlesnake Bay ATV Trail - trail length, the 50-inch limit, and the trailhead fee station.
• Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks, WMA regulations - the game-retrieval allowance, the loaded-weapon prohibition, and public road restrictions on WMAs.
• Mississippi Code Section 63-31-3 - the provision that nothing in the section authorizes operating an off-road vehicle on a public road or highway.
• Polaris RANGER SP 570 specifications - manufacturer dimensions used for the width comparison.
• Hattiesburg Cycles - the Gulf South dealer this publication recommends; scale, tenure, and lineup figures are the dealership's own stated numbers.