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How IT ONCE WAS ... <br />The Chain of Lakes and the watershed were <br />blessed with rich natural resources — clean <br />water, diverse vegetation, abundant birds <br />and wildlife. <br />During the past 35,000 years the landscape of <br />the watershed was worked and reworked by <br />glaciers. The glaciers left a landscape of <br />rolling, well - drained uplands dotted with lakes <br />and wetlands in low areas. The Chain of Lakes <br />Early settlers near Kohlman Lake in Little <br />Canada <br />lie along an old river valley of the St. Croix <br />River. During the last glaciation, gravels and <br />soils were deposited in the valley, and large <br />chunks of ice were left in low areas, forming <br />the chain of lakes. <br />At the time of the original land survey (1845- <br />47) most of the watershed was covered by oak <br />woodland or oak savannah, with scattered <br />groves of northern pin oak, bur oak, white oak, <br />and aspen trees, and an underbrush of young <br />oak and aspen sprouts, hazel shrubs, prairie <br />grasses and flowering plants. <br />Isaac Higbee surveyed much of the Phalen <br />Watershed area in 1847. He described the area <br />near Lake Phalen in the following way: "This <br />township is rough and broken sandy land. <br />Timber is Burr, Black (northern pin) and white <br />oak, maple, elm and ash, nothing remarkable <br />about it. The Town of St. Paul on section 6 is a <br />beautiful site, and will some day be a place of <br />some importance." <br />While the vegetation and original landscape of <br />the watershed have changed greatly since the <br />time of settlement, some evidence of the <br />original landscape remains: <br />Scattered clusters of large, pre- settlement oaks <br />remain in some older neighborhoods and <br />parks. A few acres of remnant prairies remain <br />along railroad tracks, near wetlands, and in <br />other undeveloped open spaces. <br />And beginning with the native peoples who <br />hunted here and set fires that maintained <br />the prairies and oak woodlands, people have <br />been part of the Phalen Watershed land- <br />scape for many generations. <br />Oak savanna and woodlands in the northern <br />Twin Cities area; similar to those present at <br />settlement <br />© PHALEN CHAIN OF LAKES WATERSHED PROJECT <br />Page 21 <br />