Welcome to the Driftless Area Wetlands Centre
**Permission granted by Katrina Moyna, Environmental Education Coordinator**
In order to find the cache, you will need to get information from the 5 plaques located around the centre.
Starting at the given coords, you should be at the plaque called "Benefits of Going Native". You will then go clockwise around the top observation area looking at the other 3 plaques, and finally going to the plaque located on the observation deck on the water. You will end up going to all of the plaques multiple times.
The order of the plaques will be....
1) Benefits of Going Native
2) The Driftless Area
3) Why Wetlands?
4) Roundhouse Site
5) Gencor/Bituma Observation Deck
In order to find the cache, you will need to answer the following questions below. Your answer will not give you coords, but will tell you where the cache can be found.
1) At the first plaque, fill in the missing word..."Native plants, hummingbirds, ___________ and other beneficial insects are "made for each other". (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
2) At the 2nd plaque, fill in the missing word..."The _____________found within the Driftless Area are tall grass prairies, bur oak savannas, mesic forests, wet prairies, and marshes and flood plain forests. (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
3) At the 3rd plaque, under the "Virtual Habitat" section, "It has been estimated that freshwater wetlands hold more than 40% of the entire world's species and ______% of all animal species. (THE FIRST MISSING NUMBER TRANSLATED TO A LETTER).
4) At the 4th plaque, fill in the missing word..."On May 24th, 1896, ________ inches of rain in one hour drenched North McGregor and sent a wall of water 20ft high racing down Bloody Run vallley, washing out bridges and railroad tracks, tossing box cars around, and killing more than 20 people" (3RD LETTER OF MISSING WORD)
5) At the 5th plaque, the 2nd letter of the second animal listed on the bottom row.
6) At the 1st plaque, under the topic called "Save Water", fill in the missing word..."Once established, many native plants need minimal irrigation beyond normal ____________" (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
7) At the 2nd plaque, fill in in the missing word "During the last ________ age, most of North America was covered by glaciers which eroded scoured, and transported the soil and rocks they advanced upon" (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
8) At the 3rd plaque, under the "Clean Water" section, fill in the missing word..."Wetlands act as the Eart's filters, cleaning up water in a ___________ of ways". (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
9) At the 4th plaque, fill in the missing word..."A ________ bridge connected the west yards and the bench, an area on the bluff across Bloody Run, which railroad workers used to walk between home and work" (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
10) At the 5th plaque called Rain Chains Versus Downspouts , the 2nd letter of the last name of the person being thanked for their generosity.
11) At the 1st plaque, under the "Support Local Ecology' section, fill in the missing word..."Reccomend native plants to homeowner associations, neighbors, and civic _____________" (FIRST LETTER OF MISSING WORD).
12) At the 2nd plaque, the 3rd letter of the type of snail pictured.
If you have figured out the answers correctly, you should have a answer to where the cache can be located. PLease take care when getting and replacing the cache container. Container was one I recently obtained at my recent "Maker" event where geocachers swapped homemade containers. This cache container was created by RonTon.
****Please make note of the hours of operation of the centre when completing this cache. Building is staffed Tues - Saturday from 11am - 4pm.****
***If you want to learn more about the Driftless Area Wetlands Centre, you can visit their webpage HERE....
The Driftless Area Wetlands