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Public Law 91-661 as amended by Public Law 97-405 was enacted by the U.S. Congress on 08 Jan 1971, to "preserve, for the inspiration and enjoyment of present and future generations, the outstanding scenery, geological conditions, and waterway system which constituted a part of the historic route of the Voyageurs who contributed significantly to the opening of the Northwestern United States." Voyageurs National Park was officially established under these laws by the Secretary of the Interior on 08 Apr 1975.
"The uniquely scenic and historic Voyageurs National Park, 36th in our National Park System, stands as a monument forever to the dedicated citizens and conservation organizations whose vision, ingenuity and courage matched the splendor of this superlative wilderness area.
Rich in the history of the early, exciting exploration of our great country, Voyageurs will serve as a living legacy linking generation to generation and century to century."
Richard M. Nixon, 1971
Water dominates the landscape of Voyageurs National Park; within its boundaries, more than 30 lakes fill glacier-carved rock basins. Four large lakes - Rainy, Kabetogama, Namakan and Sand Point - cover almost 40 percent of the 218,054 acres of Voyageurs, making it one of the few water-dominated parks in the National Park Service system and the only park unit draining northward to Hudson Bay. Hundreds of rocky islands and a myriad of coves and bays are scattered throughout these large lakes. In the midst of all this water lies the Kabetogama Peninsula, a 75,000 acre roadless land mass. The topography of the peninsula and much of the rest of the park is rugged; rolling hills are interspersed between bogs, beaver ponds, swamps and smaller lakes.
Gross Area Acres - 218,200
Visitation - FY 2001: Total Recreation Visits - 249,853
Park visitation is highest from May through August when boating, camping, fishing, wildlife-watching and hiking are the main visitor activities. In the fall, canoeists and kayakers can experience the beautiful colors of Voyageurs during a season with less visitors and few insects. From January through March, the park is a primary destination for winter snowmobile vacations.
The park lies in the southern part of the Canadian Shield, representing some of the oldest exposed rock formations in the world. This bedrock has been shaped and carved by at least four periods of glaciation. In the years since the last period of glaciation, a thin layer of soil has been created which supports the boreal forest ecosystem, the "North Woods," of Voyageurs National Park.
Voyageurs is a land rich in human history. The park's waterways were an important stretch of the "voyageurs' highway" from the Great Lakes into the interior of the western United States and Canada. Voyageurs National Park was named for the French-Canadian canoemen who traveled these waters in their birch-bark canoes. The days of the voyageurs are long gone, but the waters they traveled remain and continue to influence and be influenced by humans. It is these waters and the accompanying scenery, geology and rich cultural and natural resources that give Voyageurs its national significance, significance that grants its protection for the enjoyment of present and future generations.
Through the years, people have lived in what is now Voyageurs National Park. They have hunted and fished for food, used its resources for building shelter and enjoyed its beauty.
The area's first inhabitants, the Indians, lived in harmony with the land. Planning their lives around nature's calendar, they fished, hunted, trapped and gathered wild rice, maple sugar and berries. Plants and animals not only provided food, but shelter as well.
In their birch bark canoes, singing as they paddled, the French-Canadian voyageurs transported guns, kettles, fabric, and other goods to trade with the Indians for furs. They moved beaver and other pelts and trade goods between Montreal and the Canadian Northwest. The route of these adventuresome men, who paddled 16 hours per day, became so established that the 1783 treaty ending the American Revolution specified that the international boundary should follow their "customary waterway" between Lake Superior and the Lake of the Woods. Today, Voyageurs National Park adjoins a 56-mile stretch of that Voyageurs Highway.
The voyageurs worked for fur trade companies who were mainly interested in beaver furs, which were made into fashionable hats worn by the wealthy Europeans. By 1850, fur hats were no longer popular and the fur trade declined.
With the arrival of steamboats, roads and railroads, the Voyageurs National Park area changed quickly as more and more people arrived. The 1893 discovery of gold on Little American Island in Rainy Lake brought many people to the area. A boom town called Rainy Lake City sprang up to support the seven gold mines that were worked. The mines were not successful, and by 1910, the gold miners were gone.
The real change for the area came with the arrival of loggers. They cut millions of trees, white and red pine, spruce and fir. The virgin timber found in the area was gone by 1920.
Commercial fishing for sturgeon, walleye, northern pike and whitefish began around the time of the gold rush, but it reached its peak in the 1930's. Caviar, the salted eggs of sturgeon, was a delicacy that brought big money.
As more and more people settled in this area and sportfishing became more popular, resorts began to develop along the shores of the lakes to accommodate the increasing number of tourists.
The voyageur's character has been described as daring if not brave, knowledgeable though uneducated. Above all, he was colorful. Understandably, varying accounts of these men's lives exist. Daniel Harmon, a partner in the North West Company, wrote of them in 1819: "...the Canadian Voyageurs possess lively and fickle dispositions; and they are rarely subject to depression of spirits of long continuance, even when in circumstances the most adverse. Although what they consider good eating and drinking constitutes their chief good, yet when necessity compels them to it, they submit to great privation and hardship, not only without complaining, but even with cheerfulness and gaiety... Trifling provocations will often throw them into a rage," Harmon continued, "but they are easily appeased when in anger, and they never harbour a revengeful purpose against those by whom they conceive that they have been injured."
Whether by flattery or other motives, voyageurs were convinced to risk lives to advance the fur trade. And risk them they often did. The enemy took the form of rival fur company representative, unfriendly Indians, or nature's forces. They came to know the country well, and they, along with the Indians and lumberjacks, gave this region the bulk of its place-names, such as Grassy Portage, Lake Kabetogama, and Cutover Island. It is interesting to note that the park's place-names are predominantly water-related. Even today, the ridges and hilltops in Voyageurs National Park bear no name.
The park lies in the southern portion of the Canadian Shield. The ancient sediments that comprise the shield represent some of the oldest rock formations exposed anywhere in the world. Younger rock formations do not appear here. Perhaps they never existed, but more likely glaciation simply removed them. At least four times in the past one million years, continental glaciers, ice sheets two miles thick, bulldozed their way through the area. They removed previous features, leaving mostly level pock-marked rock up to 2.7 billion years old. Hundreds of ponds, lakes and streams now nestle in the depressions, and some rock surfaces in the park still bear the scrape marks. The glaciers gouged out the lake and river beds and set the stage for vast forests. You might say that the Voyageurs Highway was a gift of the glaciers.
Look out across the landscape here and you will see the elements of the fur trade itself. The waters provided the "highway;" fur-bearing animals provided the goods; and the boundless forests provided the materials for the birch-bark canoe, that marvel of environmental adaptation. The canoes were constructed of birchbark, cedarboughs, and cedar or spruce root bindings sealed with pitch. It was a skill developed by the native Americans and readily exploited by the European explorers. The canoes were light, easily navigable, and quickly repaired with native materials. For several generations the fur trade was the continent's biggest industry, returning investments up to 20-fold. It has been described by one historian as a vast empire held together by nothing stronger than birchbark.
Nature's abundance is evident in other ways here. Osprey, eagle, and great blue heron nests occur throughout the park. Be observant and you will likely see kingfishers, mergansers, loons, and cormorants. Since water covers one-third of the surface of the park, aquatic animals are common. Creating ponds, the beaver provides not only his own habitat, but also the environment needed by aquatic plants. These plants provide food for aquatic insects and some fish. The fish, in turn, support the wide variety of fish-eating birds. Beavers are fare for coyotes and timber wolves.
Perhaps nothing so symbolizes Voyageurs National Park's enduring primitive character as the presence of its wolves. The park is in the heart of the only region in the continental United States where the eastern timber wolf survives. Wolves are shy and secretive, and contrary to folklore, they pose virtually no threat to humans. Their wariness and small numbers make it unlikely that you will see them during a visit, though you might see their tracks in the winter. Wolves usually live in packs of two to twelve. They may kill large animals such as deer and moose for food, but more frequently feed upon beaver. The timber wolf may cover as many as 40 miles in a single night and can run several miles at 30 to 35 miles per hour. To hear the wolf's lonesome howl on a moonlight night is a rare treat.
When the waterways begin to open up in the spring after a long frozen winter, animals stir from a season's rest. Migratory birds return to summer in the North. It's one of the best times to observe them in the park area. Both spring and fall favor those who seek quiet enjoyment of nature's continuous show. For many, the display of colors marks a highlight of the North Country year.
January
Chickadees cheerfully call "chick-a-dee-dee-dee" (black capped) and "chick-che-day-day" (boreal).
Lake ice expands as it thickens, pushing the up ridges to relieve the pressure. Exact location of ice pressure ridges is not predictable.
Ice crystals in the air bend the sunlight forming sundogs or small rainbows on each side of the sun.
In days past, ice sledges hauled mail and supplies across the frozen lake surfaces from Crane Lake through Kabetogama to Rainy Lake.
February
Harsh winters to the north cause irruptions or invasions of the tiny boreal owl in search of food.
Deer spend the days on sunwarmed southern slopes and nights in dense conifer cover.
Watch and listen for ravens to find wolf kills. Wolf scat deposited on open ice is recycled further by scavenging ravens.
Late in the month a raven carries a branch to build its nest. Eggs will be laid by late March.
March
A fox litter of four to six pups is born and the pair stay together as parents until the fall when the young disperse.
Fisher travel the frozen ground and downed trees of the forest edge searching for small mammals.
Canada jays nest in late March while the snow still covers the ground.
Northern lights are most active now and in September.
April
Canoes and baskets made by the Ojibwe of birch bark stripped from trees just as the sap begins to flow in early spring.
Drumming of male ruffed grouse echoes like a motor through the woods. While standing on a log, the male creates the sound with rapid forward and upward strokes of its wings, accelerating then decelerating.
Fringed, bright red tree flowers burst out on maple trees.
The American woodcock signals with numerous "peent" before he spirals in tightening circles upward 300 feet. On the ascent his wings make a shrill twittering. He then glides zigzagging back to the ground chirping as he goes, all to attract a mate.
May
Chickadees nest in cavities in rotting small trees, not far above the ground.
Moose frequent springs where they lick sodium-laden water to replenish bodies malnourished from winter diet of twigs.
Creeks entering the large lakes boil with spawning suckers. Bald eagles and osprey hunt from nearby trees. The white-throated sparrow evokes the northwood with its call of "Old Sam Peabody, Peabody."
Tamarack trees leaves come out in bright green. New growth on the balsam fir gives the tree a bright green fringe color.
June
Night chorusing of loons, the tremolo, wail and yodel, echoes across the lakes as loons stake out nesting territories.
The understory of the black spruce bog is festooned with cotton balls, the white blooms of cotton grass. A closer look reveals the delicate pink blooms of bog laurel and bog rosemary.
Mosses "bloom making a miniature forest of erect growing stems tipped with spore-bearing capsules.
July
Nightime air in open meadows twinkles with flashing patterns of male fireflies signaling. The ground twinkles with females reciprocating the signal.
Ojibwe women gather in baskets sweet fern, rosehips, sarsaparilla roots, dogwood bark and other native herbs for medicine.
Yellow-bellied sapsuckers punch rectangular patterns of holes in the bark of trees creating a feeding station where they lap up the sap with a brush tipped tongue. The flowing sap attracts insects which they eat.
An ugly brown water bug crawls out of the water. From the split skin of its back emerges the crumpled wings and body of a dragonfly. Gradually the wings expand to the shape of an adult. Nymphs from a single laying of hundreds of eggs hatch at the same time.
August
Called "Plenty of Blueberries Moon" by the Ojibwe picking and drying blueberries for use throughout the year. During 1920's and 1930's they were brought to "blueberry stores" for resale across the country.
Purple banks of large leafed asters cover meadows and forest openings.
The Perseid meteor shower peaks on the 11th.
Late in the month the flycatchers migrate south because of plummeting insect numbers following early frosts.
September
Squirrels hang from the tips of shrubs to gather ripe hazelnuts.
Bald eagles congregate in trees near shallow bays in the Kabetogama Narrows area to feast on drying tulibees.
Crows gather in flocks to migrate farther south for the winter.
Late in the month Ojibwe women made new bulrush mats to cover wigwams.
October
The American toad has begun to burrow with its back legs into loose soil. Keeping just below the frost line it will reach depths up to three feet from the surface by mid-December.
Bull moose approach each other stiff legged, head and antlers slowly swaying back and forth. After furtive glances, one decides to avoid the confrontation and moves on.
Beavers are most active on land to build up an underwater cache of branches and a layer of body fat. The cache helps the young survive the winter and the body fat will help the adults.
November
Starting in mid-October the Whitefish and other members of the trout family spawn.
Ruffed grouse diet changes from berries and green leaves of the winter diet of buds.
Young wolves learn to test ice forming on the beaver ponds and lakes by learning forward and hitting the ice with a paw.
December
Tracks in the snow reveal the life and death struggles between deer and wolves, mouse and weasel, grouse and owls.
All mammals are fully furred with long winter guard hairs.
Still crisp mornings echo with the popping sound of sapwood in trees freezing.
Pine grosbeaks arrive from the north to feed on fruits of sumac and mountain-ash and buds of birches and maples.
This information was provided by the National Park Service
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This site is in no way associated with the United States Government, the Department of the Interior or the National Park Service
