The Big Muddy Badlands are a series of

badlands Badlands are a type of dry terrain where softer sedimentary rocks and clay-rich soils have been extensively eroded."Badlands" in '' Chambers's Encyclopædia''. London: George Newnes, 1961, Vol. 2, p. 47. They are characterized by steep slopes, ...

in southern

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada. It is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and to the south by the ...

, Canada, and northern

Montana Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...

, United States, in the Big Muddy Valley and along Big Muddy Creek. Big Muddy Valley is a cleft of erosion and sandstone that is long, wide, and deep. The Big Muddy Valley and Big Muddy Badlands were formed over 12,000 years ago near the end of the last ice age when a

glacial lake outburst flood A glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) is a type of outburst flood caused by the failure of a dam containing a glacial lake. An event similar to a GLOF, where a body of water contained by a glacier melts or overflows the glacier, is called a j� ...

occurred from a pre-historic

glacial lake A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity. They are formed when a glacier erodes the land and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier. Formation Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10,0 ...

located at present-day

Old Wives Lake Old Wives Lake is a shallow endorheic salt lake in south central Saskatchewan, Canada, about south-west of Moose Jaw. The lake is fed by the Wood River but seasonal water relatively flattened the terrain, and as such results in significant m ...

. Big Muddy Lake is a large

salt lake A salt lake or saline lake is a landlocked body of water that has a concentration of salts (typically sodium chloride) and other dissolved minerals significantly higher than most lakes (often defined as at least three grams of salt per liter). I ...

at the heart of the badlands. Two other notable lakes, Willow Bunch Lake and Lake of the Rivers, are farther upstream in the valley. A prominent feature of the badlands is Castle Butte (), which is an outcrop of sandstone and compressed clay that protrudes above the flat prairie. It has a height of and a circumference of . It is located south of Bengough on Highway 34, about halfway between Big Muddy Lake and Willow Bunch Lake.

Jean Louis Legare Regional Park The Rural Municipality of Willow Bunch No. 42 (Canada 2016 Census, 2016 population: ) is a List of rural municipalities in Saskatchewan, rural municipality (RM) in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan withi ...

is a campground and golf course near Willow Bunch at the northern end of the valley. Ranching and tourism are important industries in the sparsely populated area. Tours of the badlands are arranged from the nearby town of

Coronach A coronach (also written coranich, corrinoch, coranach, cronach, etc.) is the Scottish Gaelic equivalent of the Gol, being the third part of a round of keening, the traditional improvised singing at a death, wake or funeral in the Highlands of Sc ...

Important Bird Areas of Canada

Within the Big Muddy Valley and Badlands are four

Important Bird Areas An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations. IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...

of Canada covering five

s and almost of habitat. All four sites are important for the nationally endangered

piping plover The piping plover (''Charadrius melodus'') is a small sand-colored, Passerellidae, sparrow-sized wader, shorebird that nests and feeds along coastal sand and gravel beaches in North America. The adult has yellow-orange-red legs, a black band acro ...

. *Alkali Lake (SK 016) () at only is the smallest IBA in the valley. The IBA is located at the eastern edge of the Big Muddy Badlands and encompasses the small Alkali Lake that straddles the

border Borders are generally defined as geography, geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by polity, political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other administrative divisio ...

with Montana. Alkali Lake is known as ''Salt Lake'' on the Montana side of the border. *Coteau Lakes (SK 017) () covers two lakes – West and East Coteau Lakes – and a total area of . West Coteau Lake has one dam and East Coteau Lake has four dams, all of which are used to control water levels. The East Coteau Lake has a

sodium sulphate Sodium sulfate (also known as sodium sulphate or sulfate of soda) is the inorganic compound with formula Na2SO4 as well as several related hydrates. All forms are white solids that are highly soluble in water. With an annual production of 6 mill ...

mine Mine, mines, miners or mining may refer to: Extraction or digging *Miner, a person engaged in mining or digging *Mining, extraction of mineral resources from the ground through a mine Grammar *Mine, a first-person English possessive pronoun M ...

on its shore at Sybouts. * Big Muddy Lake (and surroundings) (SK 018) () at is the largest IBA in the valley. It encompasses most of Big Muddy Lake and the surrounding landscape. * Willow Bunch Lake (SK 020) () at is the second largest IBA in the valley. It has one of the three largest breeding concentrations of piping plovers in the

Canadian Prairies The Canadian Prairies (usually referred to as simply the Prairies in Canada) is a region in Western Canada. It includes the Canadian portion of the Great Plains and the Prairie provinces, namely Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. These provin ...

Canada's Historic Places

Sam Kelly Sites

In the 19th and early 20th century, the Badlands formed the northern end of the "Outlaw Trail", a series of trails and stopping areas utilized by outlaws in the American West spanning from Canada to

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. Outlaws such as Henry Borne and his brother Coyote Pete, Sam Kelly, the Pigeon Toed Kid, and the notorious

Sundance Kid Harry Alonzo Longabaugh (1867 – November 7, 1908), better known as the Sundance Kid, was an outlaw and member of Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch in the American Old West. He likely met Butch Cassidy (real name Robert LeRoy Parker) during a hunti ...

turned up in the area. In 1999, of land was set aside as the Sam Kelly Sites () in the Canadian part of the badlands and put on the

Canadian Register of Historic Places The Canadian Register of Historic Places (CRHP; , ), also known as Canada's Historic Places, is an online directory of historic places in Canada which have been formally recognized for their heritage value by a federal, provincial, territorial ...

. The historical site contains nine archaeological sites, including stone rings and effigies, caves, and homestead remains.

Buffalo Effigy

The Buffalo Effigy () was constructed by local

Indigenous people There is no generally accepted definition of Indigenous peoples, although in the 21st century the focus has been on self-identification, cultural difference from other groups in a state, a special relationship with their traditional territ ...

from

fieldstone Fieldstone is a naturally occurring type of stone, which lies at or near the surface of the Earth. Fieldstone is a nuisance for farmers seeking to expand their land under cultivation, but at some point it began to be used as a construction mate ...

overlooking West Beaver Creek near the border with Montana. The 64-hectare site was formally recognized in 1999. Besides the Buffalo Effigy, there is a stone cairn and at least eight stone rings.

Minton Turtle Effigy

The Minton Turtle Effigy () is located on a hill overlooking Big Muddy Badlands and Big Muddy Lake. The

effigy An effigy is a sculptural representation, often life-size, of a specific person or a prototypical figure. The term is mostly used for the makeshift dummies used for symbolic punishment in political protests and for the figures burned in certain ...

is long and wide. It was first identified by Thomas Kehoe in 1965. He believed it represented a

turtle Turtles are reptiles of the order (biology), order Testudines, characterized by a special turtle shell, shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Crypt ...

; however, others, including

Indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology) In biogeography, a native species is indigenous to a given region or ecosystem if its presence in that region is the result of only local natural evolution (though often populari ...

elders, believe it represents a

badger Badgers are medium-sized short-legged omnivores in the superfamily Musteloidea. Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united by their squat bodies and adaptions for fossorial activity rather than by the ...

. The site is a protected area and is fenced off with an informative plaque describing the turtle.

Gallery

File:Big Muddy NWMP Post.jpg, alt=Photograph of the old Big Muddy North West Mounted Police (NWMP) post (1902-1917). Building originally built by James Marshall, then traded to the Mounties for a larger barracks located across the road., NWMP Post in the Big Muddy Badlands, circa 1902 File:Hole in the Wall Coulee Big Muddy.jpg, Entrance to Hole in the Wall Coulee File:Castle Butte Panorama.jpg, Panorama of Castle Butte

References

External links

The Minton Turtle Effigy
* {{Authority control Badlands of Canada Geography of Saskatchewan Natural history of Saskatchewan Landforms of Saskatchewan Happy Valley No. 10, Saskatchewan Canadian folklore Important Bird Areas of Saskatchewan