Whitefish Dunes

State Natural Area (No. 175)

Location: Within Whitefish Dunes State Park, Door County. T28N-R27E, Sections 2, 3, 10. 230 acres.

Access: From the intersection of State Highway 57 and County Highway T in Valmy, go north on 57 1.1 miles, then east on Clark Lake Road (County Highway WD) 2.1 miles to the entrance of Whitefish Dunes State Park. Continue 1.5 miles to the park office and parking area. Several hiking trails lead south into the dunes. A Wisconsin State Park sticker must be displayed on all vehicles entering the park.

Description: Whitefish Dunes State Natural Area preserves the largest and most significant Great Lakes dunescape in Wisconsin. The complex of active and stabilized dunes protected by Whitefish Bay along the Lake Michigan coast contains a rich flora particularly adapted to this dynamic habitat. All stages of succession, from open beach through northern mesic and wet-mesic forest, are represented here. The lakeside fore dune is open, sandy and vegetated with common milkweed, beach wormwood, beach pea, lyrate rock cress and several beach grasses, including the state-threatened thick-spike wheat grass (Elytrigia dasystachya ssp. psammophila) and prairie sand-reed (Calamovilfa longifolia var. magna). Wisconsin's largest and most viable population of the federally-threatened dune thistle (Cirsium pitcheri) inhabits the shifting sands of the fore dune. The backside of the fore dune is forested with white birch, balsam fir, and white cedar and contains a ground cover of abundant Canada yew. The dunes farther from the lake are more stabilized and heavily wooded with northern mesic forest of sugar maple, large-toothed aspen, eastern hemlock, and American beech. Also present is a small bog lake with associated sedge meadow and frontage on Clark Lake, a baymouth bar lake. Common nesting birds include red-eyed vireo, veery, black-throated green and Canada warblers, American redstart, and eastern wood pewee. Whitefish Dunes is owned by the DNR and was designated a State Natural Area in 1980.