Yucatan Wildlife Management Area

Nature sets the scene for many fond summer memories. It may have been sleeping under the stars with friends in your backyard, telling ghost stories by a crackling fire with s’more-smudged faces, playing night games with neighbors, or all the above rolled into summer camp.

Whispering Hills Girl Scout Camp provided its campers with cherished memories for more than 40 years. Hardwood forests, a sandstone cliff, stunning trees, and a sprawling meadow drew girls back to the camp year after year, offering memories to last a lifetime. When two major floods damaged the campgrounds, resulting in over a million dollars in estimated repair costs, the owners knew it was time to close the camp.

After the camp’s decommissioning ceremony in 2015, developers and farming operations quickly showed interest in the property. That’s when TPL stepped in to help preserve the campground area as an outdoor escape.

We worked with the Girl Scouts to transfer the camp to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. Now it’s open to everyone as the 840-acre Yucatan Wildlife Management Area—creating much-needed recreational opportunities in a part of the country where only 5 percent of the land is in public ownership.

“Luckily, we’re going to keep it in the public domain, which we’re excited about,” says Tish Bolger, CEO of the Girl Scouts of Minnesota & Wisconsin River Valleys. “So it will be used by other people moving forward and keep all of its natural beauty.”

The steep limestone bluffs and deep stream cuts mark the property as part of the Driftless Area—a patch of rugged terrain straddling the borders of Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Most of the upper Midwest is flat or gently rolling hills, a landscape scoured smooth by advancing glaciers in ice ages past. But the Driftless Area remained untouched by glaciers, retaining the sharp angles and rough edges of the bluffs and river valleys. That topography made farming more complex, creating a refuge for wildlife.

Several rare species call this land home, including the endangered timber rattlesnake and a rare plantain. In addition to providing wildlife habitat and safeguarding water quality, the land is highly valued for public hunting, fishing, hiking, and wildlife viewing.

Funding was provided from Minnesota’s Outdoor Heritage Fund as recommended by the Lessard-Sams Outdoor Heritage Council.