Baraboo Hills

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The Baraboo Ranges (North and South) are located in south-central Wisconsin and comprise an oval ring of hills, approximately 30 miles long and 10 miles wide. The ranges are composed of a metamorphic rock, the Baraboo Quartzite, and owe their existence to the great strength of this material. While the forces of erosion (e.g. weathering, rivers, glaciers) stripped off overlying rock layers in the past 350 million years or so, the quartzite proved extremely resistant to this assault and forms this distinctive ring of hills in the present landscape of Wisconsin. Remnants of these other layers form fairly small, isolated hills (or, buttes) throughout the area of the Baraboos.

The Baraboo Hills of Sauk and Columbia counties are all that remain of one of the most ancient rock outcrops in North America. A forested sanctuary underlain by durable rock called Baraboo quartzite, the Hills are an ecologically unique part of the Midwest. The oak, maple, and basswood forests of the Baraboo Hills constitute the largest block of upland forest still standing in southern Wisconsin. They provide habitat for more than 1,800 kinds of plants and animals.