 |
| Naturalist John Muir played in the area preserved by Wisconsin's John Muir County Park. |
 |
| John Muir County Park Segment map. Click for larger version. |
The John Muir Park Segment makes up a 1.4-mile loop in the the Ice Age National Scenic Trail’s eastern bifurcation. As circling Ennis Lake, it rambles through a number of ecosystems shaped by the glacier that covered this region a mere 12,000 years ago.
Muir immigrated from Scotland to Wisconsin’s Marquette County when he was 11, and there he developed his love for the region’s fens and oak savannas. His efforts directly led to the creation of Yosemite and Sequoia national parks in California and inspired millions of others to work toward preservation of other natural wonders throughout the United States and across the world.
To reach the park, from Adams-Friendship take Wis. Hwy. 13 south. Go left/east on Wis. Hwy. 82. Once in Montello, turn right/south on Wis. Hwy. 22 then right/southwest onto County Hwy. F (also known as Fox River Road). After driving a few miles, an entry road to the park is on the left/east side. Park in the first lot on the left/north side of the park entrance road. From the parking lot, head north onto the Ice Age Trail.
Wisconsin fen
The first stretch offers an excellent view of the prairie landscape created when a massive glacier leveled and covered this region during the last ice age. Ennis Lake also is a remnant of that time. When the Green Bay Lobe retreated, it left behind a massive pile of gravel and sand insulating an ice block buried beneath it; as the ice depressed the ground and melted, the sediment floated to the lake bottom.
As rounding Ennis Lake’s north side, the trail passes a wet-mesic prairie on its right/south side. The soil of a mesic prairie generally is more moist than that of a traditional flat grasslands. This mesic prairie is a remnant of the landscape that existed before settlers plowed under the surrounding region into fields.
When the trail curves to the lake’s east side, a fen appears alongside the waterbody. Fens, which often occur on glacial terrain, feature saturated soils fed by mineralized groundwater. Such conditions allow plants, not usually seen elsewhere, to grow. At the county park, that includes unique sedges and Kalm’s lobelia.
Muir's childhood stream
On the lake’s east side, the trail crosses a small stream via the Muir View Bridge. The Muir family homestead was located upstream, to the northeast, past the sedge meadow. Biographers believe this stream is the one Muir wrote about in his “Stories of My Boyhood and Youth.” Time he spent on this stream sparked his desire to preserve land simply so its beauty could be enjoyed.
A sedge meadow rather than a fen surrounds the lake’s southeast side. Tussock and hummock sedges grow here, as do red-osier dogwood, a favorite food of white-tailed deer. The soil in a sedge meadows is peaty and mucky, almost always saturated but usually not covered by water.
While the sedge meadow hugs the lake, to the trail’s left stands an oak barrens, common in central Wisconsin. Along the side south of the lake is a hill; the trail follows an ancient shoreline when the lake was higher.
The oak thickens into a woodlands on the lake’s southwest side then curls away from it and around another fen. It then heads across a playing field before reaching to park entrance road and the parking lot.
