Maplewood - Welcome to the jungle.

I rolled into Maplewood State Park at nearly straight up noon on June 9^th. 

My camera pretty much stayed glued to my shoulder the whole time, with a grinding hot hike of 4.5 miles. 

Certainly well into the breeding season and beyond migratory windows so the majority of birds should certainly be setting up shop so to speak. The day in the NW portions of the state was an order of magnitude hotter than in the twin cities. Back home it was 74, but in Maplewood State Park and the surrounding areas it was in the mid-80’s with a blasty sun shining down. I pulled into the trail center that is a sort of nexus for the entire park trail system with options sprawling off in all directions.

At 9,200 acres I really didn’t know how much to bite off on this trip considering I had just done 3.5 miles at Buffalo River and the heat had already set in on the prairie for that hike. I settled on some portion of the hiking club trail and some edge prairie that would loop me around and between a couple lakes (Grass, Bass, Beers). This section of the park lives up to the name and was loaded with nice forest area. The lakes provided some nice water and edge marsh habitat, but the trail segments were pure forest hiking like I used to prefer exclusively many years ago. The air was still though and the forest was nearly suffocating in the heat.

It was a non-ideal situation for bird noise, but I did find Yellow Warbler and American Redstart in droves filling in every forest and lake edge space possible. Ovenbirds filled in any remaining gaps giving at least a non-stop cacophony of song in the dark wooded spaces. Elevations rose up and dropped down regularly and I found the hike to be enjoyable and filled with solitude. Later in the hike I found a Chestnut-sided Warbler foraging in the open heat on a snag and singing from time totime as well. I had gotten onto a bit of a horse trail by this time and the more sandy path was radiating a slow burn.

I put up 52 species during the hike, a respectable number considering I was forcing a mid-day hike in the heat. With the nice forest plus lake/pond habitat I heard a Red-Shouldered Hawk calling out along with a couple Broad-winged Hawks on territory screaming in the forest.

Nothing in the effort really surprised me, but I did enjoy what I did see of the park. I kind of feel bad looking back on the park map and seeing the entire ‘West Park Area’ loaded with even higher hills (topping 1,560’) and having not gotten into that space at all. A second visit would have me explore this space by hiking and driving to the South Lida Lake areas. It seriously looks like another park left to visit and I put 4.5 miles into Maplewood in the crazy heat of the day.

With over a mile left to the car I had mis-calculated water use and was already empty. My thought was I really needed to pick up the pace back. Knowing myself I didn’t want to slow roll that mile and risk dehydration before getting to my next park on the day. I passed by the horse camp loaded with people sitting out the heat with their horses tied off in the shade. During this time I crossed few hikers on the trails and enjoyed the time alone, despite seeing a full campground and horse camp on this East Park Area.

The Great: The park is massive, didn’t feel crowded, though of course I hiked in the middle of a hot day so perhaps may more people would be moving on other days and times. I’m encouraged by the prospect of more habitat and evenelevation on the west side so this place has a lot to explore. The nexus point for a trail center really seems to provide a point to get to a large majority of the parks trail system and could easily show up at this spot and do several large loops withoutreally doubling up on any given trail.

The Meh: Beyond hitting some nasty temps, this park has a great level of available options for the hiker/birder. I’d love to see a morning effort in spring and what you can put together. Perhaps a single limiting factor is that this park is not sitting adjacent to a major river so it’s not really on the flyway in a normal sense. That can limit boom cycle bird fall out, but even in the heat over 50 species is pretty respectable.

The Verdict: This is an easy return at some point, as long as I don’t have a secondary agenda. This large of a space needs time to explore and enjoy all the elements. The prospect of some serious elevation change is exciting and I’d love to check this out in mid-May.

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