Little Grand Canyon

摘要

Hidden within the forested hills of southwestern Illinois, just eight miles from where 1 grew up, is the Little Grand Canyon, renowned tor ferns, wildflowers, and an abundance of snakes. This roughly east-west box canyon has sandstone cliffs and steep wooded slopes that rise nearly 400 feet on the east, north, and south. The west end, guarded by two huge, white-faced escarpments, flares out onto the low floodplain of the Big Muddy River. Huge, cavelike overhangs in the shaded, north-facing cliffs make ideal dens for snakes, including rattlesnakes, copperheads, cottonmouths, and nonpoisonous species, which hibernate by the thousands among the rocks.