Bell Museum: May in the Big Woods by Tom Nelson

Canon PowerShot G10

At Clear Lake in south-central Minnesota, early May is a crucial time for plants and animals. Wildflowers have only a few days to bloom and be pollinated before the hardwood canopy fills in, shutting off the sunlight. Warblers and other songbirds are just arriving from their wintering grounds in the Caribbean, Central America, and even the jungles of South America. Some will nest here; others will move on to more northerly breeding grounds.

Clear Lake, near the town of Waseca, Minnesota, sits at the edge of a great hardwood forest known at the time of European settlement as "The Big Woods." Named for the immense size of its trees, the woods covered over 3,000 square miles of south-central Minnesota. It sheltered a wide variety of animals. After 150 years of settlement, the big carnivores are gone and the woods have been reduced to a few scattered woodlots.

The foreground of this diorama is by John Jarosz. The plant models are by Ruth Self and Dorothy Mierow. Francis Lee Jaques (pronounced "JAY-kwees") painted the background. This diorama is a gift from Edward A. Everett.
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