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Dry Island
Buffalo Jump
(The following text was taken from the above
website. There are some fabulous professional pictures on this site as
well.)
Dry Island Buffalo Jump Provincial Park is named for two of its features, a
"buffalo Jump" and a "dry island." About 700 years ago, aboriginal hunters
used the cliffs to drive buffalo to their deaths so that they could harvest
the meat and hides. And, over the millennia, erosion has created an isolated
island ... one of the few places where it's possible to walk on grasslands
as they were before the extensive cultivation that now characterize the
region.
The park is notable for its features. The lands along the banks of the Red
Deer River, which cuts through the park, are a rolling grassland and a rich
cottonwood riparian habitat. Between these bottom grasslands and cottonwoods
and the top rim of the valley are countless formations, sometimes called
hoodoos, that have been sculpted by rain, wind, and ice over the millennia.
While the grasslands are lovely, the sculpted canyon walls are breathtaking
and unique.
These habitats support a variety of wildlife and plants that uniquely depend
on them for their survival. Since most of this type of habitat is already
dedicated to farming, if we wish to protect unique species, we have to
protect the wild lands that support them. If you want to read more about this
type of habitat and the unique species that depend on them visit the web
site: Alberta's Special Places.
After intensive lobbying by the citizens of Huxley, Alberta, the Provincial
Government established the park in 1970. For the most part, the park
consists of a gate which is locked in the evening and picnic facilities at
the bottom of the road that leads down from the gate to the bottomlands of
the park. There are a number of easy to find footpaths in the park. In wet
weather, the gate is locked because the mud in this area becomes
particularly slippery making the steep road impossible to drove even with a
4-wheel vehicle. |
