The Misquah Hills are a range of mountains in northeastern

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over t ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. They are located in or near the

Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW or BWCA) is a wilderness area within the Superior National Forest in the northeastern part of the US state of Minnesota under the administration of the U.S. Forest Service. A mixture of forests ...

within

Superior National Forest Superior National Forest, part of the United States National Forest system, is located in the Arrowhead Region of the state of Minnesota between the Canada–United States border and the north shore of Lake Superior. The area is part of the grea ...

. Eagle Mountain, the highest point in Minnesota at 2,301 feet (701 meters), is considered to be part of the Misquah Hills.

Geography

The Misquah Hills are oriented east-to-west, north of the Brule River valley,Berkey, Chas P. "Preliminary Report of the Levelling Party." ''Annual Report, for the Year 1881.'' Ed. Winchell, N. H. Geological and Natural History Survey of Minnesota. p. 135. St. Paul, 1882. and south of Cross Lake and Winchell Lake. Their peaks are all within four miles east and seven miles west of Misquah Lake, and include several of the highest points in Minnesota. More broadly, the term has been used to include the ridges and monadnocks to the south of the Brule as well. Point 2260, Gaskin Mountain (2245 ft), and Point 2230 (misidentified by Grant and Winchell as the highest point in the state) are all within the Misquah Hills by the strict definition, and Eagle Mountain (2301 ft), Peak 2266, Lima Mountain (2238 ft),

Brule Mountain Brule, Brulé or Brûlé may refer to: Native American * Brulé, a branch of the Sioux tribe * Brulé (band), a Native American World Beat Places Canada * Brule, Alberta, hamlet in Alberta * Brule, Nova Scotia, a community in Nova Scotia Unit ...

(2226 ft), and Pine Mountain (2194 ft) are commonly included. Adding to this confusion, the preliminary report of the original leveling party included three unnamed knobs three miles east of the Brule Mountain in the Misquah Hills as well, roughly in the area of Peak 2266. Their elevation above the surrounding plateau does not exceed 600 feet. Eagle Mountain, the highest point in Minnesota at 2301 feet (701 meters) above sea level, is about 1700 feet above nearby

Lake Superior Lake Superior in central North America is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface areaThe Caspian Sea is the largest lake, but is saline, not freshwater. and the third-largest by volume, holding 10% of the world's surface fresh wa ...

. At this modest elevation the Misquah Hills nevertheless are the highest points for over five hundred miles (~800 km) in any direction, as well as the second-highest range of the

Canadian Shield The Canadian Shield (french: Bouclier canadien ), also called the Laurentian Plateau, is a geologic shield, a large area of exposed Precambrian igneous and high-grade metamorphic rocks. It forms the North American Craton (or Laurentia), the anc ...

in the US, after the

Adirondack Mountains The Adirondack Mountains (; a-də-RÄN-dak) form a massif in northeastern New York with boundaries that correspond roughly to those of Adirondack Park. They cover about 5,000 square miles (13,000 km2). The mountains form a roughly circular ...

Geology

The bedrock of the Misquah Hills is a

granophyre Granophyre ( ; from ''granite'' and ''porphyry'') is a subvolcanic rock that contains quartz and alkali feldspar in characteristic angular intergrowths such as those in the accompanying image. The texture is called granophyric. The texture can b ...

within the

Duluth Complex The Duluth Complex, the related Beaver Bay Complex, and the associated North Shore Volcanic Group are rock formations which comprise much of the basement bedrock of the northeastern part of the U.S. state of Minnesota in central North America. Th ...

, a relatively recent addition to the larger

Precambrian The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of th ...

rock formations of the

. This complex was formed during the Midcontinent Rift event. The rock type of the Misquah Hills ranges from

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies un ...

quartz monzonite Quartz monzonite is an intrusive, felsic, igneous rock that has an approximately equal proportion of orthoclase and plagioclase feldspars. It is typically a light colored phaneritic (coarse-grained) to porphyritic granitic rock. The plagio ...

monzodiorite Monzodiorite is an intrusive rock with a composition intermediate between diorite and monzonite. It is defined in the QAPF classification as coarse-grained igneous rock in which quartz Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica ( ...

. These rocks date to 1106.0±5.1 Ma, placing them in the middle of the

Stenian The Stenian Period (, from grc, στενός, stenós, meaning "narrow") is the final geologic period in the Mesoproterozoic Era and lasted from Mya to Mya (million years ago). Instead of being based on stratigraphy, these dates are defined ...

period of the

Mesoproterozoic The Mesoproterozoic Era is a geologic era that occurred from . The Mesoproterozoic was the first era of Earth's history for which a fairly definitive geological record survives. Continents existed during the preceding era (the Paleoproterozoic), ...

era. The Misquahs are geological cousins of the Adirondacks and the Laurentian Mountains of

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirte ...

; they bear some visual resemblance to these ranges, though on a smaller scale.

Ecology

The Misquah Hills are thickly forested, though there are granite outcrops and exposed bedrock in many places. The forest cover consists largely of

balsam fir ''Abies balsamea'' or balsam fir is a North American fir, native to most of eastern and central Canada (Newfoundland west to central Alberta) and the northeastern United States (Minnesota east to Maine, and south in the Appalachian Mountains to ...

and varieties of

spruce A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the subfam ...

;

eastern white pine ''Pinus strobus'', commonly called the eastern white pine, northern white pine, white pine, Weymouth pine (British), and soft pine is a large pine native to eastern North America. It occurs from Newfoundland, Canada west through the Great Lake ...

red pine ''Pinus resinosa'', known as red pine (also Norway pine in Minnesota), is a pine native to North America. Description Red pine is a coniferous evergreen tree characterized by tall, straight growth. It usually ranges from in height and in trun ...

quaking aspen ''Populus tremuloides'' is a deciduous tree native to cooler areas of North America, one of several species referred to by the common name aspen. It is commonly called quaking aspen, trembling aspen, American aspen, mountain or golden aspen, tr ...

paper birch ''Betula papyrifera'' (paper birch, also known as (American) white birch and canoe birch) is a short-lived species of birch native to northern North America. Paper birch is named for the tree's thin white bark, which often peels in paper like ...

, and

northern white cedar ''Thuja occidentalis'', also known as northern white-cedar, eastern white-cedar, or arborvitae, is an evergreen coniferous tree, in the cypress family Cupressaceae, which is native to eastern Canada and much of the north-central and northeastern ...

are also common in the area. The Misquahs are part in the

Laurentian Mixed Forest Province The Laurentian Mixed Forest Province, also known as the North Woods, is a forested ecoregion in eastern North America. Among others, this terminology has been adopted by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. Similar, though not n ...

, a transition zone between boreal forest to the north and broadleaf forests to the south..

Exploration

The Misquah Hills were surveyed by Newton H. Winchell, Minnesota state geologist, and

Ulysses Sherman Grant Ulysses Sherman Grant (February 14, 1867 – September 21, 1932) was an American geologist. He was the son of Lewis A. Grant and Mary Helen Pierce. Biography Ulysses Sherman Grant was born in Moline, Illinois on February 14, 1867. He graduated ...

in the 1890s, who, using an

aneroid barometer A barometer is a scientific instrument that is used to measure air pressure in a certain environment. Pressure tendency can forecast short term changes in the weather. Many measurements of air pressure are used within surface weather analysis ...

mistakenly gave the title of highest peak in Minnesota to an unnamed 2230-foot summit near what is now called Winchell Lake. A

United States Department of the Interior The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government headquartered at the Main Interior Building, located at 1849 C Street NW in Washington, D.C. It is responsible for the ma ...

survey team remeasured several summits in the Misquahs in 1961, using

aerial photographs Aerial photography (or airborne imagery) is the taking of photographs from an aircraft or other airborne platforms. When taking motion pictures, it is also known as aerial videography. Platforms for aerial photography include fixed-wing aircra ...

and

benchmarking (geolocating) Benchmarking, also known as benchmark hunting, is a hobby activity in which participants find benchmarks (also known as survey markers or geodetic control points). The term "bench mark" is used only to refer to survey markers that designate a ce ...

, resulting in the current set of height measurements.

Recreation

Hiking in the Misquah Hills has long been overshadowed by the vast amount of excellent canoeing in the lakes of the

. Many of the peaks remain unnamed, most are only accessible by water, and only Eagle Mountain, Lima Mountain, and Pine Mountain have summit trails.U.S. Geological Survey. (various quadrangles) aps 1:50,000. Washington D.C.: USGS, 1971.

Notes

{{Mountains of Minnesota Mountain ranges of Minnesota Superior National Forest Landforms of Cook County, Minnesota