Huiras Lake State Natural Area in Fredonia

 

Located in the Town of Fredonia within the 435-acre Huiras Lake Woods and Bog Natural Area, 113-acre Huiras Lake is an Ozaukee Washington Land Trust preserve and a DNR-designated State Natural Area. This preserve contains a 26-acre lake with an undeveloped shoreline, 80 acres of hardwood forest and a conifer swamp. The lack of recent disturbances combined with absence of introduced exotic plant species renders this area among the most pristine wetlands in southeastern Wisconsin. Additionally, Huiras Lake’s plant communities are very unusual for the southeastern Wisconsin region; they are more typical of those found in Northern Wisconsin.

 

Plant species include round-leaved sundew, pitcher plant, leather-leaf, huckleberry, small cranberry, round-leaved shinleaf, bog St. John’s wort, and bogbean. Surrounding the eastern edge of the lake are extensive forested wetlands dominated by black ash, green ash, red maple, silver maple, yellow birch, paper birch, and basswood. Near the lake large tamarack and white cedar are co-dominant, along with Canada mayflower, yellow blue-bead-lily, jack-in-the-pulpit, and marsh fern. Pockets of mature mesic hardwoods with sugar maple, beech, red oak, basswood, and white pine are found to the south. An excellent waterfowl nesting and migration site.

 

Identified by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology as an ebird hotspot. Bird species include Yellow Warblers, Song Sparrows, Red-wing Blackbirds, and Eastern Kingbird.

 

For more information, go to the Ozaukee Washington Land Trust website or the DNR website.

For a DNR property map, click here.

For a trail map, click here.

 

Story Links:

Cynthia Lorenz: Artist in Residence at Huiras Lake State Natural Area. (2019)

Emily Rudolph: Artist in Residence at Huiras Lake State Natural Area. (2023)

Jordan Acker Anderson: Artist in Residence at Huiras Lake State Natural Area (2024)

 

Gallery (click to enlarge)