Isle Royale National Park

Journeying to Isle Royale National Park is almost as difficult as visiting a foreign country, perhaps more so, due to its remote location. An island fortress in Lake Superior, the national park has endured so magnificently in large part thanks to its remoteness.

The National Park Service and the Grand Portage Band of the Lake Superior Chippewa have agreed to work together on efforts to protect park and tribal fishery resources in Lake Superior from a deadly fish disease known as viral hemorrhagic septicemia, or VHS.

Loons, mergansers, cormorants and other waterfowl are dying by the thousands in the Great Lakes due to an invasion of non-native species that are threatening to turn the lakes' ecosystem upside down. At Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes National Lakeshore even piping plovers, a threatened species, are dying.

Climate change slowly is changing the landscape of America’s national parks. As temperatures warm and storm traits alter, ecosystem change is anticipated and expected to carry a range of impacts.

Talk volcanoes and national parks and folks usually think of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, and perhaps Lassen Volcanic National Park. In truth, though, there are at least 13 units of the national park system that have a volcanic past in some form or fashion.

I've long wanted to visit Isle Royale National Park. The mix of rock and forest surrounded by Lake Superior has intrigued me for many years, as has the park's resident wolf and moose populations.

Non-native species that arrive in the Great Lakes via ballast waters are a substantial threat to the native fisheries in the lakes. At Isle Royale National Park, officials are implementing regulations with hopes they'll reduce the numbers of non-natives that infiltrate Lake Superior.

President Bush isn't going to like this. The House of Representatives has adopted an Interior Appropriations Bill that contains more money than he proposed for the agency. But would the president veto funding that would help clean up sewage in the Great Lakes and work to stop the spread of invasive, non-native species in the lakes?

As times grow increasingly tougher, financially, for the National Park Service, individual parks can find a bit of a lifeline in non-profit friends groups. The latest non-profit to surface is the National Parks of Lake Superior Foundation.