Located in southwestern South Dakota, Badlands National Park consists of nearly 244,000 acres of sharply eroded buttes, pinnacles, and spires, blended with the largest protected mixed-grass prairie in the United States.The 64,000 acres of designated official wilderness are a reintroduction site for the black-footed ferret, the most endangered land mammal in North America. The Stronghold Unit of the park, co-managed with the Ogallala Sioux Tribe, includes sites of 1890's Ghost Dances.
The more than 11,000 years of human history here pale in comparison to the eons-old paleontological resources. Badlands National Park contains the world's richest Oligocene epoch fossil beds, dating from 23 to 35 million years old. The evolution of mammal species such as the horse, sheep, rhinoceros, and pig are studied in the Badlands formations.
The bizarre landforms called badlands are, despite the uninviting name, a masterpiece of water and wind sculpture. They are near-deserts of a special kind, where rain is infrequent, the bare rocks are poorly consolidated and relatively uniform in their resistance to erosion, and runoff water washes away large amounts of sediment.
On average, the White River Badlands of South Dakota erode one inch per year. They are formidable redoubts of stark beauty where the delicate balance between creation and decay, that distinguishes so much geologic art, is manifested in improbable landscapes - near moonscapes - whose individual elements seem to defy gravity. Erosion is so rapid that the landforms can change perceptibly overnight as a result of a single thunderstorm!
Throughout Badlands National Park, weird shapes are etched into a plateau of soft sediments and volcanic ash, revealing colorful bands of flat-lying strata. The stratification adds immeasurably to the beauty of each scene, binding together all of its diverse parts. Viewed horizontally, individual beds are traceable from pinnacle to pinnacle, mound to mound, ridge to ridge, across the intervening ravines. Viewed from above, the bands curve in and out of the valley like contour lines on a topographic map.
A geologic story is written in the rocks of Badlands National Park, every bit as fascinating and colorful as their outward appearance. It is an account of 75 million years of accumulation, with intermittent periods of erosion, that began when the Rocky Mountains reared up in the west and spread sediments over vast expanses of the plains. The sand, silt, and clay, mixed and interbedded with volcanic ash, stacked up, layer upon flat-lying layer, until the pile was thousands of feet deep. In a final phase of volcanism as the uplift ended, white ash rained from the sky to frost the cake, completing the building stage.
Bison are the large dominant plant grazers in the grassland ecosystem of the northern Great Plains. Appreciative visitors use up a lot of film when they are lucky enough to see them in the park. Reintroduced in 1963 after an absence of about 100 years, a portion of the 600-animal-herd can often be seen while driving along the Sage Creek Rim Road, searching with binoculars from the Pinnacles Overlook, or hiking in the Sage Creek Unit of the Badlands Wilderness.
If you see a buffalo in the park, you are observing the same animal as the tourist next to you watching bison. Common usage makes these terms interchangeable, although biologists are more fussy in limiting "buffalo" to wild cattle native only to Africa and Asia.
No longer free to roam millions of acres of prairie, the badlands bison are kept within the boundaries of the park to prevent "trespass" onto surrounding private and public grazing lands. This also separates them from their once infinite lunch bucket of grass and deprives them of a cool beverage from the permanent waters of the White and Cheyenne Rivers. Additionally, predators like the wolf and grizzly bear, which removed part of the weaker, older, or young animals to control population size, are no longer allowed to live in this part of the country.
The black-footed ferret (Mustela nigripes) is considered to be the most endangered land mammal in North America. Thought to be extinct in the 1970s, a small colony of this member of the weasel family was found on a ranch near Meteetse, Wyoming; in the time since, canine distemper swept through the colony, killing all but eighteen ferrets.
Black-footed Ferret
Buttes, Pinnacles, Spires
Bizarre shapes are etched into a plateau of soft sediments and volcanic ash, revealing colorful bands of flat-lying strata.
Oligocene Epoch Fossil Beds
Badlands National Park contains the world's richest Oligocene epoch fossil beds, dating from 23 to 35 million years old.
From Westbound Interstate 90, take exit 131 (Cactus Flat) or exit 110 (Wall). Follow signs to Badlands National Park. From Eastbound Interstate 90, take Exit 109 near the community of Wall. Follow signs directing vehicles south approximately seven miles to the Pinnacles Entrance of the park. From Highway 44, Highway 44 intersects with Highway 377 in the town of Interior. Follow 377 two miles to the Interior Entrance to the park.
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