A black Ford pickup truck speeds past on the gravel road, kicking up a wave of dust. Tim Yager shakes his head slightly and gestures to the forested hill behind us. “Most people have no idea this is here,” he says with a smile. Yager, deputy manager for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge, is going to take me back in time. He leads the way along a backroad in this quiet corner of northeastern Iowa. A small sign indicates the Fern…
