Driftless Drive:
Northeast Iowa's Wild Edge
There aren’t many places in Iowa where you will encounter a steep-grade-ahead sign. However, if you take the Great River Road National Scenic Byway, leaving north out of Eagle Point Park in Clinton, Iowa, you will encounter quite a few of them as you meander along the Mississippi River Valley. It’s a drive worth taking your time with.
The path winds through Iowa’s Driftless Area in the state’s northeastern corner, a Paleozoic Plateau region featuring limestone bluffs and boreal microhabitats. In Iowa, the area’s boundaries are roughly defined by the Mississippi River and the regions drained by the Upper Iowa, Yellow, Turkey, and Maquoketa rivers. It features some of Iowa’s most important natural sites, like Effigy Mounds National Monument, Yellow River State Forest, Pikes Peak State Park, and Maquoketa Caves State Park.
Iowa's
Driftless
Counties
Howard
Winneshiek
Allamakee
Chickasaw
Fayette
Clayton
Buchanon
Delaware
Dubuque
Jones
Jackson
Clinton
Why “Driftless”?
This region of Iowa is geologically distinct from the rest of the state because it was bypassed by the last continental glaciers, preserving a rugged landscape of steep limestone bluffs, deep valleys, and cave systems. In geologic terms, "drift" refers to glacial debris, such as silt, gravel, and rock, that retreating glaciers leave behind. Because this pocket of land was never covered by the massive ice sheets of the last glaciation, it lacks these deposits and is "drift-less."
The Wisconsin Glaciation was the most recent major advance of the Laurentide Ice Sheet. This massive sheet of ice reshaped the geography of North America, particularly the Upper Midwest, and is responsible for many of the defining physical features of the modern landscape, including the Great Lakes.
Extent of glaciation over North America at the last glacial maximum.
Image adapted from USGS map.
At its peak, the glacier covered nearly all of Canada, the Upper Midwest, parts of New England, and the northern Great Plains. It was incredibly thick, reaching over two miles in places. The immense weight of this ice actually depressed the Earth's crust, and it is still slowly recovering today through a process known as isostatic rebound.
The ice sheet did not move south in a perfectly straight line. Instead, it flowed like thick batter, following low-lying areas and river valleys. This created distinct "lobes" of ice that moved at different rates. The collision area between lobes formed hills and depressions like those of the kettle moraine in Wisconsin.
Waterfall at Dunning's Spring Park in Decorah, Winneshiek Co.
Unique Driftless Landscapes
Because the ice didn't scour it, the Driftless Area retains a particularly unique set of steep, north-facing cliffs known as algific talus slopes. These areas stay cool to cold year-round, which has preserved rare ice age plants and snails that aren't found anywhere else.
The karst features of the Driftless are rich in limestone, leading to a high concentration of caves, sinkholes, and underground springs. This kind of landscape forms when the water falling on the surface interacts with the subsurface through cracks and fractures that have dissolved into the bedrock. After traveling underground, this water is discharged from springs. The constant flow of cold groundwater from such springs makes Iowa’s Driftless one of the best regions for cold-water trout fishing. In fact, the area is home to nearly all of Iowa's coldwater trout streams, which makes it a special place for local anglers and river advocates.
The Driftless is also known for goat prairies that exist amongst the steep slopes and bluffs. Because of their hard-to-reach locations, species diversity remains high in these sites. Unfortunately, the topography often requires challenging manual labor to protect them from fast-spreading cedar species no longer checked by fire events. Many of northeastern Iowa’s goat prairies are struggling to survive.
Algific talus slope outside Bellevue State Park, Jackson Co.
Driftless Secret: Iowa's Ice Age Snail Survives
by Michelle Turner
There is a secret in the woods. An ancient creature, hiding in an ancient place. Lurking under crevassed cliffs of mossy limestone. So seldom seen, its existence blends with legend and lore. If your mind is conjuring visions of Bigfoot, you’ll have to think smaller. Much smaller. The creature in question is the endangered Iowa Pleistocene snail, and it does indeed exist, though in dangerously low numbers. These snails were listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1978.
Iowa Pleistocene snail (Discus macclintocki)
The Iowa Pleistocene snail (Discus macclintocki) is a living fossil, a remnant of the last ice age. Although fossilized ancestors were identified in 1928, it wasn’t until 1955 that a living specimen was found in Northeast Iowa, occupying rare algific talus slopes.
A few years ago, a small group of conservationists was led through a Jackson County wildlife area by Russ Wolf, a soil technician with the Natural Resources Conservation Service. In the early 2000s, Wolf was part of a statewide Iowa Pleistocene snail population study.
Hiking off the beaten path through tall timber and dense underbrush, Wolf brought the group to the bottom of a towering bluff, protected by a small stream at its base. Carefully stepping along the slope, Wolf instructed the group to gingerly turn over decaying leaf litter, keeping sharp eyes out for the tiny brown snails, less than a quarter of an inch in size. Under Wolf's guidance, the conservationists identified a few of the little brown snails, and the outing was considered a success.
The snails’ habitat is often affected, even destroyed, by logging, quarrying, and grazing. Placing these areas in a refuge and directing hiking trails away from these slopes are the first steps in protecting not only the Iowa Pleistocene snails, but also other rare inhabitants, such as northern monkshood, Iowa golden saxifrage, and several species of ferns.
Above the forested hills of St. Donatus sits Pieta Chapel, Jackson Co.
View from the Outdoor Way of the Cross, St. Donatus
Wings Over the Driftless
The Driftless Area lies along the Mississippi River, making it part of a critical migration corridor for a wide variety of raptors and waterfowl. The abundance of trees in the area provides a haven for birds and other animals dependent on large, intact forests and woodlands.
Trumpeter swans in Clinton County
Fish Farm Mounds State Preserve features about 30 conical mounds built
by Woodland-period Native peoples between 100 BCE and 650 CE
Grassroots Guardians
Because of its unique history and heritage, many regional organizations and initiatives are devoted to protecting and preserving the area. Here are just some of the grassroots efforts being undertaken within the Driftless:
The Driftless Area Restoration Effort (DARE) is a larger collaboration including Trout Unlimited and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, focused on restoring coldwater streams and habitats in the region. Together, they utilize the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP) funding for these efforts.
The Driftless Water Defenders is an advocacy group in Northeast Iowa focused on legislative and scientific efforts to monitor water quality and challenge industrial agricultural practices (like CAFOs) that threaten the sensitive karst topography, porous limestone, and coldwater streams unique to the area.
The Fishers and Farmers Partnership connects landowners with conservation partners to offer cost-share and technical help for stream restoration, floodplain reconnection, and buffer installation. They advocate for improved grazing and fertilizer management, which benefits both farm profitability and local water quality.
The Iowa Prairie Network is a group of grassroots prairie enthusiasts who organize prairie walks and workdays. Region 4 of this network covers the Driftless Area. They often focus on “orphan prairies,” which are small, high-quality remnants in the Driftless that aren't big enough for major state intervention but contain rare flora that needs protection from encroachment.
The Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation works in the Driftless through local land donors. One example of their work in the region includes the Bear Creek Project, where local donors have helped to purchase and protect algific talus slopes. Another example is the Heritage Valley project, which works with local farmers to create conservation easements to keep steep goat prairies and blufflands intact while still allowing flat uplands to be farmed.
The Maquoketa River Watershed Management Authority works to address water quality, flood management, soil health, and other environmental issues associated with the Maquoketa River and its watershed area. Members represent cities, counties, and soil and water conservation districts from the nine counties in the watershed—Fayette, Clayton, Buchanan, Delaware, Dubuque, Jones, Jackson, Clinton, and Linn. They have worked to develop and implement a watershed management plan to create a roadmap for future projects. Their proximity to the University of Iowa helps to involve current students in the process.
The Eastern Iowa Habitat Partners include the following organizations: Clinton, Jackson, Dubuque, and Clayton County Conservation, Iowa DNR, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation, and others. Their main objective is to work more cooperatively on areas that may not receive as much attention, with a focus on remnant sites. They recently held a work session at Manikowski Prairie, where local staff and volunteers cut woody species out of the remnant prairie on the property.
View from the Driftless Scenic Byway, Allamakee Co.
View from Phelps Park, Decorah
Local Champions
There are also many county-level efforts underway that play a vital role in protecting this special landscape.
In Allamakee County, Friends of Yellow River State Forest has funded a solar array, trail equipment, miles of hiking/equestrian paths, and Run the Forest races to support trout habitat in streams like Little Paint and Big Paint Creeks. The Allamakee County Conservation Foundation backs the Driftless Area Education and Visitors Center in Lansing with youth programs on local geology and ecology. Friends of Pool 9 restores river backwaters and islands through cleanups and habitat work for migratory waterfowl.
In Clayton County, the Conservation office leveraged local fundraising—including from Motor Mill Trail Runs—to secure an Iowa DNR Forest Resiliency Program grant, expanding tree planting from Osborne Park into a multi-site initiative. The Turkey River Watershed Alliance monitors and publicly shares water quality data along the river—especially vital for Bloody Run trout stream, site of recent Sierra Club and Trout Unlimited advocacy.
In Clinton County, the Beaver Island Habitat Rehabilitation and Enhancement Project (HREP) was a multi-million dollar initiative recently completed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It helped to restore the ecological health of the Mississippi River backwaters near Camanche. The project created an essential deep-water habitat to ensure fish survival during winter while simultaneously using the dredged material to build elevated berms for hardwood forest regeneration. This massive engineering effort is helping to reverse decades of habitat degradation and ensure a sustainable environment for wildlife. The county is also adjusting conservation strategies at Manikowski Prairie to adapt to the potential federal listing of the regal fritillary butterfly as a threatened species, necessitating careful "patch-burn" techniques and mechanically removing aggressive red cedars and dogwood that threaten to overtake the rare hill prairie landscape.
In Delaware County, Backbone Lake Friends was formed as a non-profit volunteer organization dedicated to supporting Backbone State Park (Iowa’s first state park). Originally formed to address the siltation of the lake, the group has evolved into the primary citizen-support arm for the park, filling funding and labor gaps that the state DNR cannot cover alone. The Hawkeye Fly Fishing Association and Trout Unlimited have recently collaborated on a TUDARE project, which funded a major restoration of Bear Creek and Spring Branch Creek.
In Dubuque County, the Friends of the Mines of Spain helps manage the 1,400-acre recreation area south of Dubuque. They provide funding and volunteers for prairie restoration projects within the park. The Branching Out tree program in Dubuque is a partnership between Alliant Energy, the non-profit Trees Forever, and local communities. Its primary goal is energy efficiency through nature. The program strategically places trees to shade homes, reducing energy use during hot Iowa summers while providing more food and habitat for wildlife. The county also sponsors the Mowing to Monarchs initiative, which is a partnership between Dubuque County Conservation and the ISU Extension Master Gardeners. The program assists county residents in establishing small native plant gardens, pocket prairies, or prairie meadows.
In Jackson County, the Friends of Maquoketa Caves has helped to fund and staff efforts to restore remnant hill prairies in and around the park. They collaborate with AmeriCorps volunteers to document rare plant communities and remove invasive woody vegetation that threatens sun-loving native plants. They also help to maintain the boardwalks in the park to keep humans off the cave floors. This prevents hikers from trampling the tiny invertebrates and salamanders that live in the cave mud, which in turn supports the larger cave ecosystem. Project Wingspan is a collaborative conservation initiative led by the Pollinator Partnership, with Jackson County Conservation serving as a key local partner to create critical habitat for the rusty patched bumblebee and monarch butterfly. The program’s primary goal is to address the shortage of native plant seeds by training volunteers to harvest genetically adapted species from high-quality prairies in the region. Once collected, these seeds are cleaned and redistributed to new restoration sites, effectively building a connected pollinator corridor across the Midwest.
In Winneshiek County, their conservation office is currently working on developing the Dry Run Trail and Neste Valley Recreation Areas. This will connect the Prairie Farmer and Trout Run trails, creating a 40-mile paved network through Northeast Iowa’s diverse landscape of prairies, limestone outcroppings, and wetlands. Once fully developed, the area will offer amenities such as camping, hiking, and conservation education, honoring the Neste family who helped protect the land. They also sponsor the Driftless Safari, which is an educational scavenger hunt that encourages families to explore the region's unique natural landscape between Memorial Day and Halloween. Participants travel to designated “hidden gem” locations, including remote prairies, trout streams, and historical sites. The Upper Iowa River Watershed Management Authority (UIRWMA) is a coalition of cities, counties, and soil and water conservation districts working together to reduce flood risks and improve water quality across the 1,000-square-mile watershed. Their work has been particularly active through the Iowa Watershed Approach (IWA) program, and they focus on holding rainfall where it lands to prevent flash flooding and reduce nutrient runoff into local cold-water streams.
This is just a small sampling of the diverse and complex efforts underway to protect and preserve this unique part of our state. If you drive through the Driftless Area in Iowa, you’ll gain a better appreciation of what makes the region so special and worthy of protection. Be prepared to take your time. The roads in the Driftless take you where they want you to go. Let them.