Burning Coal Vein and the Columnar Junipers

The North Dakota Badlands sit atop thick beds of lignite, a soft brown coal. When a seam is exposed and ignited, by a lightning strike, a prairie fire, or even the natural heat of decomposition, it can smolder underground for a very long time, creeping along the coal bed and slowly consuming it. The Burning Coal Vein was one of the most famous of these fires, reported to have burned for well over a century before it finally went out.

As the coal burns, it bakes the clay and sandstone above it into a hard, brick-red rock called clinker or scoria, which weathers into some of the most colorful buttes in the badlands. What looks like a scene of geologic calm is in fact shaped by slow-motion fire, and the reddened ridges across this country are the scars of seams that burned long ago.

The heat and chemistry of the burning ground helped create the setting for the grove of columnar junipers that grow near the vein. Rocky Mountain junipers usually spread low and wide, but here a number of them rise as tall, slender columns, a growth form unusual enough that botanists have studied and collected from the grove. The pillars stand out sharply against the pale grassland and the eroded badlands behind them.

The junipers, the clinker, and the memory of the fire together make this a place unlike anywhere else on the northern plains. It has long drawn the curious, and the surrounding grassland gives it a hushed, end-of-the-road quality that rewards those willing to make the drive.

The badlands and grasslands of western North Dakota have been home to Native peoples for thousands of years. The Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara farmed and traded along the Missouri to the east, and the Lakota and other Plains tribes hunted bison across this open country. Their trails, camps, and knowledge of the land run through the whole region, and the Little Missouri River that carved these badlands was a route long before any road.

Today the site lies within the Little Missouri National Grassland, the largest national grassland in the country, a patchwork of public range that preserves the badlands character of the region. It is managed for grazing, wildlife, and quiet recreation, and it keeps this remote corner much as travelers would have found it a century ago.

Reaching the Burning Coal Vein means driving gravel and dirt roads south from Medora into the grassland, and those roads can turn to slick gumbo after rain or snowmelt and strand a vehicle. Summer and early fall, when the ground is dry, are the safest times to visit, with long daylight and warm days on the open prairie.

Fall brings cooler air, golden grass, and clear skies, an especially fine time for the badlands. Winter is cold and the roads are often impassable, and spring can be muddy, so timing a visit to dry weather is the key to reaching this out-of-the-way place safely.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.