| Fast Facts |
location
50 miles northeast of Green Bay
ecoregion
Great Lakes
project size
190,000 acres
preserves
Bay Shore Blufflands, Mink River Estuary, Kangaroo Lake, Meridian Park, North Bay, Shivering Sands
public lands
five state parks; multiple federal lands including Green Bay Islands Wildlife Refuge and Plum, Pilot and Cana islands; Toft Point and Central Peninsula owned by the University of Wisconsin
partners
Door County Land Trust, The Ridges Sanctuary, Ducks Unlimited, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, University of Wisconsin at Green Bay, Illinois Natural History Survey, the Green Fund
natural events
neotropical migratory songbirds arrive to feed, mid-May; stunning orchid display, early June; salmon, trout and bass fishing, summer | |
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Jutting north into Lake Michigan, the Door Peninsula’s rugged coastline and thick forests beckoned early sailors and continue to draw thousands of visitors each year. |
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Rocky shoreline, Lake Michigan.
© G. Alan Nelson |
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It is easy to imagine the Door Peninsula, with its 100-foot bluffs and rocky headlands, inspiring a mixture of awe, relief and terror in early sailors on the Great Lakes. To arrive safely, captains had to navigate the dangerous currents between the tip of the peninsula and Washington Island. So many perished that the French called the channel Portes des Mortes—“Death’s Door”—thus giving both peninsula and county their current names. More lighthouses line the complex shoreline of Door County than any other county in the United States.
Once on land, however, sailors were met with a rich abundance. In spring and summer dozens of different native orchids burst into bloom. Ancient dwarf white cedars grow slowly out from the rocky face of the western bluffs, never getting large and heavy enough to collapse. Conifer forests fringe wetlands that harbor unique species like the Hine’s emerald dragonfly, believed to be extinct for 40 years before its stronghold here was rediscovered. |
Hine’s emerald dragonfly.
© Paul Burton |
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This rich diversity attracts increasing numbers of tourists and new residents to the peninsula each year. With this influx of people, however, have come rural development and pollution, both of which threaten fragile wetlands and the plants and animals that depend on them. Exotic species invasions are a pervasive threat as well. | |
The Nature Conservancy has been working to protect the Door Peninsula since the early 1960s, when we helped The Ridges Sanctuary, a National Natural Landmark, acquire critical acreage. Land acquisition and conservation easements have remained a key element of our strategy here, and we have acquired seven preserves totaling more than 3,000 acres. We manage these properties with the help of a cadre of dedicated volunteers. We also work with local landowners to promote ecologically compatible land management techniques.
Learn more about The Nature Conservancy's work in Wisconsin. |
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| Conservation Profile |
targets
native orchids like yellow lady’s slipper and ram’s-head lady’s slipper, dwarf lake iris, Hine’s emerald dragonfly, sand ridge and swale wetlands, marl fens, lowland white cedar swamps
stresses
rural residential development, exotic species, improper forest management, agricultural runoff
strategies
acquire land and easements, promote ecologically sound public policies, raise public funding for conservation, engage community in natural resource management, combat invasive species
results
protected 3,000 acres; helped found the Green Fund to raise money for land protection | | | | |
