Environment of Iowa
The environment of Iowa has been heavily affected by agricultural production since it became a U.S. state in 1846. However, there remain natural areas in Iowa that reflect a wide varieties of environmental niches.
Ecology and biota
Iowa's natural vegetation is tallgrass prairie and savanna in upland areas, with dense forest and wetlands in floodplains and protected river valleys, and pothole wetlands in northern prairie areas. Most of Iowa is used for agriculture, crops cover 60% of the state, grasslands cover 30%, and forests cover 7%; urban areas and water cover another 1% each.Presettlement biota
In 1840 Isaac Galland noted a large number of fauna in Iowa, including bison, elk, deer, raccoon, fox squirrel, mountain lion, lynx, gray wolf, black wolf, coyote, bear, beaver, otter, muskrat, mink, rabbits, opossum, skunk, porcupine, groundhog, timber rattlesnake, prairie rattlesnake, bull snake, black snake, water moccasin, garter snake, water snakes, turkey, prairie chicken, quail, swan, geese, brant goose, duck, crane, crow, blackbird, bald eagle, "grey eagle", buzzard, raven, mourning dove, passenger pigeon, woodpeckers, woodcocks, hummingbird, and the honeybee. Galland also included a list of edible flora readily available in Iowa, including strawberry, blackberry, raspberry, gooseberry, plum, crabapple, hickory nut, black walnut, butternut, hazelnut, pecan, grape, cherry, black haw, red haw, pawpaw, and cranberry.The first comprehensive listing of bird species in Iowa was compiled by Charles Rollin Keyes in 1889 which listed 262 species. The first comprehensive listing of mammals in Iowa was made by Herbert Osborne in 1890.
Natural areas
There is a dearth of natural areas in Iowa; less than 1% of the tallgrass prairie that once covered most of Iowa remain intact, only about 5% of the state's prairie pothole wetlands remain, and most of the original forest has been lost. Iowa ranks 49th of U.S. states in public land holdings.Threatened and endangered species
As of 2016, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service the lists of threatened and endangered species in Iowa have included the following:Federally endangered animal species:
- Indiana bat
- Higgins eye pearly mussel
- Topeka shiner
- Iowa Pleistocene snail
- Pallid sturgeon
- Least interior tern
- Sheepnose Mussel
- Spectaclecase
- Poweshiek Skipperling,
- Piping plover, except Great Lakes watershed
- Northern long-eared bat
- Skipper, Dakota
Locally extinguished animals are:
- American burying beetle
- Winged mapleleaf mussel
- Scaleshell mussel
- Orange-footed pimpleback mussel
- Fat pocketbook pearly mussel
- Gray wolf *
- Gray western Great Lakes wolf
- Bat, Indiana entire
- Note: Wolves occasionally reappear in Iowa, roaming south from home ranges in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
- Prairie bush-clover
- Mead's milkweed
- Northern wild monkshood
- Eastern prairie fringed orchid
- Western prairie fringed orchid
- Carolina parakeet
- Passenger pigeon
Landforms and topography
- The Paleozoic plateau, also known as the Driftless Area, is a region of scenic, high relief landscapes includes such features as resistant, bluff-forming bedrock outcrops, deep V-shaped valleys, caves, springs, and sinkholes. Glacial deposits and loess are thin or absent over most of the region.
- The Des Moines lobe, a remnant of the extensive prairie wetlands that once covered the Des Moines Lobe. Often called the Prairie Pothole Region, the Des Moines Lobe was glaciated up until 12,000 years ago during the Wisconsin glaciation. The area is marked by rolling terrain and ridges. Historically, this area was peppered with small interconnected swamps, most of which were drained for farmland. The Iowa Great Lakes occur along the western edge of the Des Moines lobe.
- The southern Iowa drift plain covers most of the southern half of Iowa. This is probably the most familiar landscape to travelers, since most of Interstate 80 in Iowa runs through the SIDP. The classic Iowa landscape, consisting of rolling hills of Wisconsin-age loess on Illinoian till. The SIDP is some of the most productive agricultural land in the world.
- The Mississippi alluvial plain includes generally level areas of stream terraces, paleochannels, backwater sloughs, and oxbow lakes within the broad Mississippi River valley.
- The Loess Hills consist of very thick deposits of loess in far western Iowa deposited during the Wisconsin and Illinoian periods. Highly eroded, leaving stark, beautiful "golden hills.
- The Iowan surface in northeast Iowa is covered with eroded Illinoian till with moderate loess formation, frequently in the form of paha ridges, muted relief except for steep rolling hills near river valleys, and deeper valleys. These picturesque hills are depicted in many of the landscapes of Grant Wood.
- The northwest Iowa plains are rolling hills consisting of eroded soils developed since pre-Wisconsinan glaciation, but with significant amounts of loess.
- The Missouri alluvial plain is perhaps the only truly flat region of Iowa, the Missouri Alluvial Plain contains areas of terraces, sloughs, and oxbows. Its valley trench is not as deep as the Mississippi River system, and the Missouri River is contained in a much narrower channel. In Iowa, the eastern border of the Missouri Plains is the Loess Hills, forming steep rounded bluffs.
Water
Some communities, such as Iowa City resort to additional carbon filtration and lime softening coagulation-sedimentation to make the water more palatable. Water treatment is effective but comes at a price; while the Des Moines' advanced filtration system has led to water quality ranked among the nation's best. In January 2015, the Des Moines Water Works "sued drainage districts in three northern Iowa counties, claiming the tiles there act as a conduit that accelerates the movement of fertilizer from farm fields into Iowa waterways". Between 2010 and 2015 more than 60 Iowa cities and towns had high nitrate levels in drinking water.
In 2015, there were a record number of beach closures because of harmful algal bloom in Iowa.