Bauer Brockway Barrens

State Natural Area (No. 325)

Location: Jackson County. T21N-R3W, Section 16. 240 acres.

Access: From the intersection of Highways 94 and 54 in Black River Falls, go east on 54 0.4 mile, then east on West Bauer Road 3.8 miles, then north on Brockway Road 0.2 mile to a parking area east of the road.

Description: Bauer-Brockway Barrens features scattered jack pine and Hill’s oak within a matrix of sand prairie and shrubs located on the level sandy soils characteristic of the extinct Glacial Lake Wisconsin. American hazelnut and New Jersey Tea dominate the shrub layer while sand prairie species dominate the understory with little blue-stem, June grass, western sunflower, bastard-toadflax, cream wild indigo, flowering spurge, yellow flax, pale-spike lobelia, sand primrose, and bird’s-foot violet. Composites are especially diverse with five asters, four species of goldenrod, and three species of blazing-star. The site has a diverse butterfly component including one of the most diverse moth fauna of any other barrens in the state. The federally endangered Karner blue butterfly (Lycaeides melissa samuelis) occurs here along with the state-threatened phlox moth (Schinia indiana) and frosted elfin butterfly (Callophrys irus). Five other rare butterflies occur here - dusty (Atrytonopsis hianna), cobweb (Hesperia metea), and Leonardus skippers (H. leonardus leonardus), mottled duskywing (Erynnis martialis), and the Gorgone checkerspot (Chlosyne gorgone). Wild lupine, the larval food of the Karner blue butterfly, has been planted in some of the restored areas to help maintain healthy numbers of this endangered species. Indian Grave Creek runs northwest southeast through the barrens adding to the overall site diversity. Bauer-Brockway Barrens is owned by the DNR and Jackson County and was designated a state natural area in 1997.