Live cameras in Decorah, United States

Decorah is a small river town in the far northeast corner of Iowa, the seat of Winneshiek County, with about 7,600 residents in the 2020 census. It sits in the Driftless Area, a region the last glaciers skipped, so instead of flat cornfields the Upper Iowa River winds between steep limestone bluffs, springs and wooded hills. Norwegian immigrants shaped the town: Luther College is here, the Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum is the largest museum in the country devoted to a single immigrant group, and Nordic Fest fills the streets each July. Dunning's Spring, a waterfall a short walk from downtown, is a local favorite.

The cameras on this page come from two places. Most are Iowa DOT cameras on the highways of northeast Iowa, including U.S. Route 52 and Iowa Highway 9, which meet at Decorah. Some are traffic cameras and some sit at road-weather (RWIS) stations that also measure pavement and air conditions; the snapshots refresh about every five minutes and are most useful in winter, when snow and ice reach this corner of the state early. The other view is famous far beyond Iowa: the Decorah eagles nest stream run by the Raptor Resource Project and shared by Explore.org on YouTube, watching a pair of bald eagles at their nest north of town.

Decorah is on Central Time, UTC-6 in winter and UTC-5 during daylight time. The eagle year follows a steady rhythm that the project has documented for many seasons. Courtship and nest building pick up in the fall, eggs usually arrive in mid to late February, chicks hatch from late March into early April, and the young fledge in mid to late June after about eleven weeks in the nest. In early October the nest is usually quiet, with the adults visiting now and then to add sticks.

Midwinter brings the coldest mornings, so the road-weather views are at their most telling from December to February. For a mountain-west contrast with more wildlife, see our Jackson Hole page in Wyoming.

Sources: Decorah, Iowa - Wikipedia · Decorah Eagles - Raptor Resource Project · Iowa 511 - Iowa DOT.