Recipe for a Sand Dune

Recipe for a Sand Dune (HM15W9)

Location: Michigan City, IN 46360 Porter County
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Country: United States of America
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N 41° 41.193', W 86° 59.752'

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From the kitchen of Mother Nature

1. Dig a huge hole with a glacier. Use the ice to grind up millions of tons of rock and dirt and make ridges around the edge of the hole.

2. Fill the hole with glacial meltwater. Stir your brand new lake with strong prevailing northwest winds.

3. Find the grains of sand needed for your dunes that are mixed within the ridges. The challenge is to sort the sand from all the clay, pebbles, and rocks.

4. Use wind-whipped waves to erode the ridges and sort out the grains of sand. (The clay will settle to the bottom of the lake and the bigger rocks won't move far.) The sand will be washed by waves and currents to the south and east parts of the lake.

5. Watch sandbars and beaches form at the water's edge. Continue to use wind and waves to wash more sand to the beach and blow the "beached" sand inland.

6. Use marram grass, cottonwood and basswood trees to slow the wind so the sand grains are dropped. Watch the due rise higher and higher as the plants catch more sand.

Note: This recipe can be tricky since the amount of water depends on rain and snow. When the lake level rises the dunes may erode; when the level falls the dunes will grow. Either result is natural and beautiful. Don't get your heart set on just one level. Give the recipe room to move and enjoy the changes you see. That's the beauty of nature's recipe.
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HM NumberHM15W9
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Placed ByNational Park Service
Marker ConditionNo reports yet
Date Added Saturday, September 13th, 2014 at 7:56pm PDT -07:00
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Locationbig map
UTM (WGS84 Datum)16T E 500343 N 4614975
Decimal Degrees41.68655000, -86.99586667
Degrees and Decimal MinutesN 41° 41.193', W 86° 59.752'
Degrees, Minutes and Seconds41° 41' 11.58" N, 86° 59' 45.12" W
Driving DirectionsGoogle Maps
Area Code(s)219
Closest Postal AddressAt or near 8420 E Lake Front Dr, Michigan City IN 46360, US
Alternative Maps Google Maps, MapQuest, Bing Maps, Yahoo Maps, MSR Maps, OpenCycleMap, MyTopo Maps, OpenStreetMap

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