Our friends in Prairie Smoke are hosting an interesting field tour on August 23, and they’re inviting Prairie Enthusiasts to join them. The following was provided by Ed Pfannkoch, President of Prairie Smoke.

The Driftless Region with its unique Karst topography encompasses parts of SE Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa. You are invited to a Karst Sinkhole Tour, August 23rd, from 1:00 pm to approximately 3:00 pm. We will be guided by Jeff Green, a retired hydrologist from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. He has thirty years of experience in the Driftless area exploring sinkholes and mapping springsheds with dye tracing.

Feel free to invite friends and neighbors to attend this tour to explore some unique features of the Driftless region with an expert who will be available to share his knowledge and answer questions.

Please plan on carpooling if possible since we will be driving between a couple sites with limited parking.

FIELD TRIP LEADER:

Please RSVP to prairiesmokemn@gmail.com so we know how many people to expect.

LOCATION:

We will be touring primarily near Fountain, MN, “Sinkhole Capital of the USA”. Park on 320th Street at the intersection with Highway 52, south of Chatfield, near the Parsley Bridge Canoe Access. From there we will drive to Fountain and walk a quarter mile down the Root River Trail to the Sinkhole Education Kiosk. Then, we will drive to the big sinkhole next to Highway 52 to talk about stormwater as it relates to sinkholes before we go to the Fountain Big Spring, five minutes from the city. The tour will wrap up around 3:00 pm, and you are welcome to join us at the Karst Brewery in Fountain for further discussions of sinkholes and prairies.