This park is the perfect playground any time of year,
offering visitors swimming, boating, fishing, birdwatching, hiking, camping,
biking, picnicking, snowmobiling, cross-country skiing and year-around
naturalist-led activities. Hikers can explore the beauty of a tamarack bog
carpeted with showy lady's slippers, pitcher plants, dragon's mouth, grass pink,
and insect-eating sundews. Most flowers are blooming in the bog during late
spring and early summer.Quick stats:
1,688 acres
135,902 annual visits
Naturalist:
Naturalist programs are available year-round in the park.
Wildlife
The diversity of vegetation in the park supports many wildlife species.
Birdwatching is a favorite activity with hobbyists spotting red-eyed and
warbling vireos, rose-breasted grosbeaks, and many other forest songsters.
Loons, eagles, herons, even osprey can be seen on the lake. Hikers often come
across deer, porcupine, squirrels, and chipmunks and even spot the occasional
black bear. In the evening, visitors are treated to the sounds of gray treefrogs,
spring peepers, and chorus of wood frogs. The sound of the barred owl, the
flute-like song of the veery, and the hammering of a pileated woodpecker all add
to the wilderness experience.
History
For hundreds of years, the ancestors to the Dakota Indians fished and hunted
around Lake Bemidj. Later, the westward-moving Anishinabe reached the area
around 1750. Early trader records identify Lake Bemidji as "Lac Traverse" which
is French for diagonal. The Anishinabe knew the lake as "Bemiji-gau-maug"
meaning cutting sideways through or diagonally. This was a reference to the path
of the Mississippi River through the lake. In the late 1800s, European
immigrants were drawn to this region to harvest the prime white and Norway pine.
During the peak of logging around the turn of the century, the lumber mills on
the south shore of Lake Bemidji were the center of logging in the nation. The
foundation of one mill is still visible near Nymore Beach. Logging artifacts are
occasionally found in the lake by divers. Fortunately, a few areas within the
park boundaries were still in a virgin state when the land was purchased by the
government, thus preserving a remnant of towering forests so common in years
past. In 1923, the Minnesota Legislature established Lake Bemidji as a state
park. The park serves more than 125,000 visitors each year
Geology
The park landscape is the result of the last stage of glaciation in
Minnesota. Sand, gravel, and rock material carried by the glacier as it moved
south was eventually deposited as the ice receded 10,000 years ago. The park's
rolling topography was created by uneven deposits of this glacial till.
Meltwater from the glacier also played a role in creating the present shape of
the land. Many of the swamps and bogs in the park were formed when chunks of ice
separated form the receding glacier and left depressions which later filled with
water. Lake Bemidji itself is the result of ice left behind by the retreating
glacier.
Landscape
Located in a pine-moraine region of Minnesota, the park contains a mixture of
plant communities from the mixed red and white pine uplands to jack pine
barrens. The park also contains fine examples of conifer bog that includes some
of Minnesota's most unusual plants and animals. A quarter mile long boardwalk
leads into one of these areas so that visitors can observe pitcher plants,
insect eating sundews, orchids, and other plants.
|
