Day 2: Presque Isle

Our class had the wonderful opportunity to explore the bog on Presque Isle on "Day 2".  This bog is a wonderful place to take anyone interested in nature, nature preservation, or students of any kind.  The bog has a wonderful boardwalk, taking you to many different examples of the components of a typical bog.  Along the boardwalk, there are multiple point with sign explaining these different components of this particular bog.

We learned that a bog is an acidic wetland.  Much of a bog is composed of sphagnum and peat moss.  The varieties of plants that are able to grow in these acidic conditions are easily destroyed because they are so specialized to this kind of environment.  Some of these plants include buckbean, birch, duckweek, tamarak, horsetail, and pitcher plant, which is a carnivorous plant that captures bugs in a pocket filled with water.  These plants have special adaptations in order to obtain proper nutrients that may not be found in the acidic water of the bog.  Animals commonly found near or in a bog setting are beavers, deer, and red-winged black birds.  While at the bog, our class witnessed many deer eating grass near the wetlands! Between this bog and the shore of Lake Superior were surprisingly large sand dunes, exhibiting a great deal of succession...this was particularly exciting for me to see!  The water that composes the bog itself is the remnant water from glaciers that melted 8,000 to 10,000 years ago.  Bogs are a piece of ecological history!