Icicles on Isle Royale

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and Great Lakes speaker. She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has written three books about the Great Lakes [A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach *a Heartland Indie Bestseller*, A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk *winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award*, and A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure]. To learn more about her work, or to book her as a speaker, go to http://LakeTrek.com

This year I hiked my third Moosewatch Expedition on Isle Royale. 

All three took place in May. This year was early in the month and there was still snow and even icicles in secluded places on the island.

Here, a rock wall is decorated with delicate, melting icicles.

Islands around an island

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and Great Lakes speaker. She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has written three books about the Great Lakes [A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach *a Heartland Indie Bestseller*, A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk *winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award*, and A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure]. To learn more about her work, or to book her as a speaker, go to http://LakeTrek.com

This year I hiked my third Moosewatch Expedition on Isle Royale. This island is actually an island surrounded by hundreds of tiny islands.

The central island is about 45 miles long and 9 miles at the widest point.

Smaller islands hug the coast of Isle Royale or float a little ways offshore.

Here's a glimpse of a few of the islands in this archipelago:

Pictographs from the Past

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and Great Lakes speaker. She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has written three books about the Great Lakes [A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach *a Heartland Indie Bestseller*, A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk *winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award*, and A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure]. To learn more about her work, or to book her as a speaker, go to http://LakeTrek.com

I drove the northern edge of Lake Superior on my way to catch the ferry to Isle Royale this May. 

Ontario's side of Lake Superior is rocky and wild.

I took some short hikes to explore.

Lake Superior Provincial Park protects almost 600 square miles on the eastern edge of the lake.

Rock wall rises

This park has some art from the Ojibwe people on a rock wall [Agawa Rock] along the lake edge.

Pictographs from the past

Some faded pictographs

Some video from this site (above).

Interpretive sign showing all pictographs

BIG Moose

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and dynamic speaker. 

She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has authored three books about these adventures: 

A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach  [A Heartland Indie Bestseller]

A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk   [Winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award] 

A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure  [Long-listed for the Chautauqua Prize]

 

To learn more about her work, or to engage her as a speaker, go to http://www.laketrek.com/great-lakes-speaker/

My Moosewatch Team found lots of moose bones this May. Our best find, though, was the submerged, antlered skull located by teammate Hal.

The skull is there...do you see it?

The liberated skull

Mark studies skull

Vertebrae from this bull moose

Hal holds the gorgeous antlered skull at Malone Bay

Our victorious team

Jenny gets cheeky with moose skull

All the bones from this find

Working to free the skull

Fungus among-us

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and dynamic speaker. 

She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has authored three books about these adventures: 

A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach  [A Heartland Indie Bestseller]

A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk   [Winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award] 

A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure  [Long-listed for the Chautauqua Prize]

 

To learn more about her work, or to engage her as a speaker, go to http://www.laketrek.com/great-lakes-speaker/

There are many types of fungi growing on Isle Royale, thriving in the leaf litter, attached to live or dead trees. 

Check out the variety:

Pudding cup fungus

Small herd of fungi

Colorful tree fungus

My hand in the shot for scale...it's a big one!

Fungus!

feasting on the fallen

Monster fungus (hand for scale)

Balsam Fir Trees

Loreen Niewenhuis is an author, adventurer, and Great Lakes speaker. She has completed a trilogy of 1,000-mile adventures exploring the Great Lakes and has written three books about the Great Lakes [A 1,000-Mile Walk on the Beach *a Heartland Indie Bestseller*, A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Walk *winner of the Great Lakes Great Reads Award*, and A 1,000-Mile Great Lakes Island Adventure]. To learn more about her work, or to book her as a speaker, go to http://LakeTrek.com

This year I hiked my third Moosewatch Expedition on Isle Royale. 

In addition to gathering moose bones, teams also gathered data from shed antlers, and tallied  sightings of gray jays and snowshoe hares.

Gray jay

Snowshoe hare

Another important assessment in the field was the availability of winter browse for moose.

In the winter, moose eat primarily balsam fir trees.

Tiny, munchable balsam firs populate the island

As the moose population grows on Isle Royale (with only 2 wolves left on the island, there is no predator pressure to stabilize the moose population), there are more moose mouths to feed during the long winters. 

Moose will repeatedly munch these trees. Some tiny trees are actually decades old!

This poor tree has had its top munched off multiple times leading to this crazy growth pattern.

It's rare to see tall balsam fir here, but my team found some trees that had evaded browsing long enough for them to reach over two meters tall! They were luckier than the trees in these photos.