Loess Hills
Natural Landmark · Pisgah, Iowa
A ridge of wind-blown silt running about two hundred miles down the Missouri River side of western Iowa, piled up by prevailing westerlies at the end of the last ice age and in places over ninety feet deep. Depth is what makes them unusual: the only comparable deposits of loess to such an extent are in Shaanxi, China. They carry prairie remnants, two National Natural Landmarks and a designated scenic byway, and they look nothing like the rest of Iowa — steep, ridged and treeless where the prairie has been kept.
Loess Hills State Forest, Pisgah, Iowa, United States
FREE. The Loess Hills Scenic Byway is a public road open year round, and Loess Hills State Forest, Preparation Canyon State Park, Stone State Park and Waubonsie State Park are free with free parking. Hitchcock Nature Center charges a small daily fee, typically a few dollars per vehicle. ⚠ THIS ROW IS PINNED AT LOESS HILLS STATE FOREST NEAR PISGAH — the landform itself runs about two hundred miles from Westfield in the north to Hamburg in the south, so treat the pin as one access point rather than the whole thing. ⚠ NO POSTCODE IS RECORDED: the feature has no single street address and OpenStreetMap returns none, so the field is left empty rather than estimated. Trails are steep, narrow and loose underfoot, and become hazardous after rain. Gravel side roads off the byway are not all maintained in winter.