A Snapshot and The Scoop: Lava Lake

What in the world is a large lake and its surrounding wetlands doing just a few miles from bare black lava flows of Craters of the Moon National Monument and dry hills deep in the heart of the Arco Desert of Idaho? While most rain or snowfall in this high-elevation desert tend to get soaked up by the porous lava fields that make up the area, occasionally conditions are right for that water to stick close to the surface, as it does here at Lava Lake. A combination of less-porous rock covered by a thick layer of sediment runoff from the surrounding hills leaves pockets of watering holes like this lake available to support desert life. Most of the water still sinks into the Eastern Snake River Plain Aquifer, creating a Lake Erie-sized reserve of water underground. A desert on the surface, an ocean underneath, and the two mix at places like that pictured above.