Do you miss the smells and sounds of Wisconsin’s north woods? Long for the call of the hermit thrush, the smell of rich conifer swamps? Why not channel that inspiration and desire into poetry? Join Mary Linton and Todd Davis for four days of rustic living, hiking, wetland discovery and poetry writing in a Florence County section of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in northern Wisconsin (details below). The days will involve investigations of the flora and fauna of wetlands and their surrounding uplands, fine examples of nature poetry, writing exercises and poetry sharing.
About the Trip Location
Base Camp
We will make our base camp at the Lost Lake campground and Lost Lake Cabins in a Florence County section of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in northern Wisconsin near Long Lake. Lost Lake campground is a 5-6 hour drive from the Madison area and is located approximately 20 miles west of Florence via State Highway 70 and Forest Roads 2450 and 2156 (see page 90, section A4 of the Wisconsin Atlas & Gazetteer). This small, scenic lake is rimmed by shoreline wetlands and a natural stand of virgin hemlock and white pine. The campground is quiet with large, private sites separated by trees and shrubs. The campground includes vault toilets and drinking water and each camp site has a tent pad, picnic table and fire-ring. Lost Lake Cabins are on the same lake and rented by the U.S. Forest Service. Each rustic cabin has 2 sets of bunk beds, a locker and a table. They include access to a bath house with toilets and hot showers.
Read more about Lost Lake online at: www.exploringthenorth.com/nicoletmi/lostlake/lost.html.
Read more about Lost Lake cabins and find out how to reserve a cabin at:
www.florencewisconsin.com/Accomodations/cottages_cabins.htm.
Day Trips
Each day we will venture from our base camp out to a wetland site to explore both wetland ecology and poetry. The area offers a diversity of wetland types including marshes, shrub-carrs, conifer swamps and bogs. One day we will take a hike to view shrub-carr wetlands along the nearby Pine River, which has a National Wild and Scenic River designation. Grandma Wetlands State Natural Area (SNA) is another site we will visit. Grandma Wetlands SNA contains a pristine soft water bog lake surrounded by an open mat that supports an unusual and diverse community of wetland plants. Ringing the lake is a wide, open mat of sphagnum moss, sedges, rushes, and low shrubs. The bog is surrounded by a conifer swamp of tamarack and black spruce and northern white cedar is also present at the site.
Read more about Grandma Lake Wetlands State Natural Area on the DNR’s website at: www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/er/sna/sna305.htm.
About the Trip Leaders
Mary Linton is a wetland ecologist and aquatic biologist. Mary's special interest is in aquatic communities, particularly amphibians, dragonflies and damselflies, and aquatic beetles. As far as she is concerned, a day spent swimming in a crystal clear lake, wading the riffles and pools of a northern trout stream, or mucking about a fertile wetland could not be better spent. Mary's ecological articles have appeared in Evolution, Ecology, Evolutionary Ecology, Canadian Entomology, Herpetological Review, American Naturalist, and the Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Sciences, as well as popular magazines. Her poetry has appeared in Appalachia, Aethlon, Blueline, Builder, Country Feedback Magazine, Poetry Motel, and Seeding the Snow.
Todd Davis teaches creative writing and environmental studies at Penn State University’s Altoona College. His poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, have won the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Prize, and have appeared or are forthcoming in such journals and magazines as The North American Review, Orion, Indiana Review, Iowa Review, West Branch, River Styx, Arts & Letters, Quarterly West, Green Mountains Review, Poetry East, Many Mountains Moving, Natural Bridge, Epoch, Rattle, The Louisville Review, The Nebraska Review, and Image. In September 2002, his first book of poems, Ripe, was published by Bottom Dog Press. Some of the poems from Ripe, were anthologized in A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry (University of Iowa Press, 2003) and in Visiting Frost: Poems Inspired by the Life and Work of Robert Frost (University of Iowa Press, 2005). His second book of poems, Some Heaven, was published by Michigan State University Press in March 2007. Garrison Keillor featured two of the poems from this book on The Writer’s Almanac, and former poet laureate Ted Kooser featured Davis’ poem, "Sleep", also from Some Heaven, in his American Life in Poetry column. His most recent book, The Least of These, is expected out September, 2009.”
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WETLANDS AND POETRY 2009
No prior experience in wetland biology or poetry writing is required - we love interacting with all voices. So whether you are a beginner or are working on your 5th book - Welcome. The trip will be limited to 12 participants, so don't wait to reserve your chance for 4 days with mink frogs, Mary Oliver, waterfalls, Wendell Berry, black spruce, Maxine Kumin, loons, Seamus Heaney, pitcher plants and Jane Kenyon.