This Kettle Isn't For Tea
This is not a typical Geocache. There is no container to find and no physical log to sign at the coordinates. Rather, they will bring you to the parking lot of the Triangle Lake Bog State Nature Preserve located 1.5 miles northwest of the intersection of State Rte 44 and I-76 on the south side of Sandy Lake Rd. Here you will be able to enjoy and learn about an important geological feature of Northeast Ohio. To log this Earthcache, you must gather information as you stroll along the boardwalk and email me the answers to the questions asked at the bottom of the page. If you do not send me the correct answers within 5 days of logging this cache, I will have to delete your log.
No pets are allowed, and please do not stray from the boardwalk for this is a fragile and sensitive environment. Practice CITO (Cache In/Trash Out), stay on the boardwalk, and leave no trace--take only pictures, leave only memories. No night caching—the Preserve is opened from dawn to dusk only. Watch out for poison sumac in spring and summer.
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Earth Science Lesson:
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources has judged this site to be one of the least disturbed kettle bog lakes in the state with classic boreal vegetation zones.
More than 10,000 years ago, the last of the glaciers to cover Ohio slowly retreated back to the North Pole. This process left behind the Ohio River and the Great Lakes, but the big melt left behind much smaller signs of its passage as well: kettle lakes, some of which became kettle bogs. Lakes and rivers are more stable fixtures of the landscape because they are continuously fed by springs and rivers. Bogs, on the other hand, have no such large-scale renewable sources of water. They must depend on rain. Their change over time is different from the formation of a new river channel or a changed lake shoreline because the body of water that first gave them birth evaporates faster then rain can replace it over thousands of years.
Kettle lakes form when a piece of the retreating glacier breaks off. Rocks, gravel, and other materials wash over and cover the remnant as the glacier melts. The remnant slowly melts itself, creating a depression filled with water that forms a lake. If nothing but rain refreshes the lake, it will become a bog. As the water slowly evaporates, plants from the shoreline invade, moving inward towards the center. As the cycle of nature moves forward year by year, the dead plants form peat—organic material that never completely decomposes because of the wet, oxygen-poor conditions created by a body of water that is not freshened by springs or streams. Peat is an organic rather than a mineral soil—it is created by decaying vegetation rather than the weathering of rocks. With so few minerals available, both the water and the peat become acidic as vegetation decays.
These are perfect conditions for the growth of sphagnum moss. The moss retains water and removes what few minerals are left, thus allowing even more peat to form. It is this moss that forms a floating mat which eventually covers the surface of the water and grows thicker until it reaches the floor of the lake. As the open water disappears, zones of vegetation can be seen that emanate from the center of the bog, revealing the stages of its formation. Around the open water is the sedge—plants that make up the floating mat. The shrub zone supports leatherleaf, blueberry, cranberry, and pitcher plants. Tamaracks make up the tree zone. Between the trees and the open countryside is the lagg—a moat of open water formed by mineral-rich runoff from the soil of surrounding fields that inhibits the growth of sphagnum moss. As you move inward from moat to trees to shrubs to the floating mat, you are seeing the transformation of bog to ground that more resembles the land that surrounds it. Eventually the invasion will be complete, and no bog will remain.
The Triangle Lake Bog makes an excellent contrast to the nearby Kent Bog at the Tom S. Cooperrider State Nature Preserve. Visitors can still see the lake here that produced the bog, while the open water has disappeared at Kent, giving way to a bog meadow. Visitors can compare two different stages of the life of a bog by visiting both sites if they wish.
Sphagnum Moss
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To receive credit for this cache, please email me the answers to the questions below within 5 days of logging it.
Start at the sign located at 41 07.137 – 081 15.765. Read carefully, the information will be helpful in answering the questions.
From the end of the boardwalk at 41 07.119 – 081 15.694:
1. What role in the formation of the bog are all the plants you observe on your walk fulfilling?
2. Do these plants thrive in organic soils or mineral-rich soils?
3. What shape is the eye? How big is it?
4. A thousand years ago was the open water smaller than it is now, about the same size, or larger?
Pictures of yourself at the bog are optional, but if you would like to post any, they would be appreciated. It would be nice to build up a gallery of pictures of the bog at different times of the year. Be careful not to reveal any answers to questions in your pictures, however!
Thanks to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and permission granted for this Earthcache by Charlotte McCurdy, the Northeast District Preserve Manager. Dedicated state nature preserves represent the finest examples of Ohio’s natural features. Public visitation is encouraged but is closely regulated to protect the natural integrity of the preserves for future generations.
*** Congrats to goalie003 for being FTF! ***