National Parks
Important Places Protected and Preserved for All of Us
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Glacier National Park
Glacier National Park is in Montana. It is in the Rocky Mountains. One one side of the Rocky Mountains, water flows toward the Pacific Ocean. On the other side, water flows towards the Gulf of Mexico. The line between the two sides is in the Rocky Mountains. It is called the Continental Divide. Glacier National Park is on the Continental Divide.
In Glacier National Park you can see nature. There are mountains. There are lakes. There are waterfalls. There are trails. You can also see wildlife.
Over 10,000 years ago, glaciers moved across the land. Glaciers are big sheets of ice. They made big dents in the land. These became valleys. Some areas of ice are still there. Some have melted. Grinnell Glacier was still ice one hundred years ago. Now it has melted.
White people came to this area in the 1800's. They wanted to hunt animals for fur. They wanted to dig up minerals. Later, people saw it was a beautiful place. It became a National Park in 1910.
Now people visit the park. They do not want to hunt the animals. They do not want to dig up the ground. They want to enjoy the beauty of the park.
Glacier National Park is in northern Montana.
People can hike there. The Park workers built hiking trails.
Logan Pass is between Clements Mountain and Reynolds Mountain. It is a pass or path between the mountains.
People built roads. People built a big sign.
Glacier National Park has many beautiful lakes. Bowman Lake is one of them.
People build boardwalks so visitors can walk around.
There is a hotel called The Lodge.
There is a Visitor Center.
These are pictures of Grinnell Glacier. It was all ice when the first picture was taken. It was 1936. Over time, the glacier melted. In the last picture it is 2006. The glacier is mostly gone.
Many kinds of animals live in Glacier National Park.Mountain goats and bighorn sheep, black and grizzly bears, deer, moose, and elk. Small numbers of gray wolves began returning in the mid-1980s Bald eagles are among the more than 250 kinds of birds that live in or pass through the park. Trout, turtles and an salmon can be found in the numerous lakes and streams.
Plants include bear grass (see above), wildflowers,lodgepole pines, spruces, firs, hemlocks, and cedars,
Lichen grow on rocks in Glacier National Park.