Share Your Northwoods Story
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Remember summers at the family cabin? Did you learn to catch trout in a clear, cold forest stream? What does it feel like to ski silently under towering pines?
Wisconsin’s Northwoods mean something different to all of us, and every story from these woods is another reason they should be protected.
Please use the comments on this page to share your story of what the Northwoods mean to you. Your stories will help us protect Wisconsin’s threatened forests. You can contact us to share photos or other information.
Tags: Forest Preservation, Northwoods Preservation, Wisconsin
November 19th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
When my grandfather retired, he built a small cabin just outside of Glidden, near Clam Lake. It was a magical place for me as a child. Fishing for musky, swimming in the lake, exploring the woods. I’ll never forget the night a black bear ambled up to the window to check us out! Although my grandfather is no longer there, the memories remain, and the trees we planted together behind the cabin still grow.
November 25th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
In 1925 my Great Grandfather bought a piece of land sight unseen between Eagle River and St Germain in Vilas County. He built a cottage that still stands to this day, and for four generations, aunts, uncles, cousins and family friends of the Peckarskys have flocked to the Northwoods, our home away from home. In a way, our cottage on little Lake Finley really feels more like home to many of us than the places we leave behind. It is where we gather in the summer months and around the holidays, to enjoy the many outdoors activities right out our front door. It is hard to pin down one particular thing that makes this part of the world so special to me and my family. On summer days, we relished the opportunity to swim and canoe in the clean, sandy-bottomed lake, fish for bass and pike and watch Bald Eagles soar or perch in the enormous white pines around the lakefront. In the winter, we would go out cross-country skiing in the woods during the day, then turn the outside lights on at night for my brother and I to play our nightly 1 on 1 hockey game in the makeshift rink we shoveled off on the lake or huddle around the TV for a Packer or Badger football game. Although my big brother dominated those hockey games, he lacked the patience for ice-fishing, so I always managed to bring home more perch. I truly hope that the Northwoods remains as special a gathering place for my children and my brother’s children as it was for us.
November 25th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Even though I’m from Chicago, it’s safe to say that I grew up at a summer camp in Wisconsin’s Northwoods. While at Camp Nebagamon for 15 years as a boy, and then a man, I always took the time to enjoy the woods–be it via hiking, canoeing, or bicycling trips. There was nothing like the sound of the wind through the trees, or the occasional call of a bird I had never heard before. What a shame it would be to prevent kids in the future from experiencing such things!
December 4th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
“Up north” is a huge part of who I am! I grew up spending my summers barefoot on the shores (and in the waters) of Lake Finley in Vilas County. Its clear water and sandy-bottom are still pristine after all these years. I am so spoiled by this refreshing lake that I hardly enjoy swimming anywhere else. From my dad I learned an appreciation for the majesty of the bald eagles and the haunting sounds of the loons. Some of my favorite memories of my childhood times “up north” are fishing for small mouth bass with my grampa, fishing for blue gills and sunfish using velveeta cheese and salami that my mom gave us for bait, blueberry picking in the woods with my gramma, sailing the “Mighty Mo” with my family in the moonlight, paddling the “yellow canoe”, hiking way back in the woods with my dad learning how to use a compass to find a small bog lake, and shoveling the snow off the lake to create a labyrinth of skating “trails” with snow forts in between. In this place I learned to love the water, and to this day find comfort in being near water. I am now a professional freshwater ecologist who is (my definition) someone who never got tired of playing in the water after they grew up. :) Even though they grew up in upstate New York, my children share my love of this special place in the Northwoods. Maybe it’s genetic?
May 6th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
Growing up we spent 2 weeks every summer at a resort on Eagle Lake in Eagle River Wisconsin. My children are the now 4th generation in my family to go up north every summer. I attribute those summer vacations in the Northwoods as the driving force behind my appreciation and concern for the environment. I am graduating this week with a degree in in Environmental Studies and I dont think that would ever have happened if it werent for the beautiful Northwoods as inspiration.
July 16th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
I moved to Wisconsin’s North woods when I was 19 years old, (that was some 31 years ago.) I first lived near Eagle River, then near Rib Lake, and now in Florence County.
I support ELPC’s efforts and I for one would love to see the Chequamegon/Nicolet be designated wilderness or some similar designation – giving priority to wildlife and recreation rather than silviculture. Yet it is not “fragmentation” due to logging that is the major threat to this forest. Invasive species are a bigger threat and logging plays a big part in introducing and spreading new invasives.
I have done research on Chimney Swifts – they once nested abundantly in the north woods – in large hollow trees, but now they are very rare here and have had to resort to nesting in urban and agrarian habitats. I have had my Chimney Swift research published but government forestry agencies seem to turn their back on the fact that this bird is nearly extinct in it’s native habitat.
Each May and June I do bird surveys in the Chequamegon/Nicolet Forest. In some areas of the forest, the presence of Brown-headed Cowbirds and their parasitic actions are abundant. I see lots of thrush and ovenbird eggs distributed randomly on roads and other clearings – these are eggs the female cowbirds have removed while laying their own eggs. Each June and July I watch as songbirds such as Yellow throated Vireos and Scarlet Tanangers work hard to feed cowbird fledgelings. These cowbirds are not the result of logging as much as the result of development and agriculture.
I know this is a tough concept for most of us to swallow, but I have to proclaim that It is largely our animal based diets that are causing this type of agriculture to exist. Dairy, beef, and grain farms allow these cowbirds a foothold in habitat they would otherwise shun. If we all went vegan, we could eliminate the lion’s share of this type of agri-business. (This is because it is MUCH more efficient eating plants directly – rather than feeding plants to animals for food.) Eating a plant based diet can reduce our environmental footprint 20 fold.
Yes, the biodiversity of the north woods is decreasing, but the remedy is not as simple as decreasing logging – logging is only a very small part of the problem. It is our everyday consumptive choices that really make an impact.
Yet…
It would be nice to see the ELPC go after the state and county forestry – this is where the real devastation occurs. These agencies do a much greater percentage of clear cutting than the Feds and they don’t give much time or money to the effects on rare species – their job is not to make the birds sing, but to make the ledger sing.
In my opinion, Don Waller’s article refers to permanent fragmentation – due mostly to development and agri-business. His words don’t apply directly to logging.
So while I support the ELPC’s efforts to curb logging in the north woods, I think we are spending lots of effort on the symptoms rather than the true cause.