Explore Grasslands National Park in Southern Saskatchewan

Plains Bison, Prairie Dogs, Dark Skies, and Canada's Last Native Grasslands

In southern Saskatchewan, near the Montana border where the Canadian plains seem to extend without horizon, a landscape that most travelers drive past without stopping is quietly one of the most scientifically and ecologically significant protected areas in North America. Grasslands National Park preserves one of the last remaining stretches of mixed-grass shortgrass prairie in Canada, the native grassland ecosystem that once covered the entire Great Plains and has since been reduced to rare fragments by agriculture. The park consists of two separate sections, the West Block near the village of Val Marie and the East Block further east, covering approximately 907 square kilometres of rolling prairie, coulees, river valleys, badlands, and the kind of genuinely vast skies that photographers travel extraordinary distances to capture.

What makes Grasslands compelling for wildlife enthusiasts is an array of species found nowhere else together in Canada. The park harbors the only black-tailed prairie dog colonies in Canada, their towns of burrows and sentry behaviors one of the most engaging wildlife spectacles in any national park. A herd of more than 300 plains bison was re-established in the West Block in 2005 and now ranges across a 181-square-kilometre section; encountering them from a gravel road in their own vast terrain is a genuinely moving experience. The critically endangered black-footed ferret, extinct in Canada for 70 years before reintroduction in 2009, inhabits the prairie dog towns. Pronghorn antelope, the fastest land mammal in the western hemisphere, race across the open prairie. Short-horned lizards, entirely unique to this part of Canada, sun themselves on warm rocks.

The 80-kilometre Ecotour Scenic Drive through the West Block’s Frenchman River Valley provides an accessible all-day route that passes bison grazing areas, prairie dog towns, geological formations, and interpretive panels explaining the human and natural history of the landscape. The East Block’s Killdeer Badlands contain exposed geological strata recording the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, the moment of the mass extinction 66 million years ago, and Parks Canada’s annual Fossil Fever program gives visitors a hands-on fossil dig experience with trained paleontologists.

Grasslands holds the distinction of being the darkest designated dark sky preserve in Canada, certified by the Royal Astronomical Society in 2009. The combination of extreme rural location and low light pollution makes the night sky here extraordinary for naked-eye astronomy, Milky Way photography, and northern lights viewing.

The village of Val Marie, population around 100, offers modest services. The town of Swift Current, one hour north of the West Block, provides the closest full range of vacation rental inventory, with cozy homes and comfortable properties that sleep groups of various sizes and include full kitchens for self-catering. Book your accommodations near Grasslands National Park through Lake.com.