Big Basin Prairie Preserve, Protected prairie in Clark County, Kansas, US

Big Basin Prairie Preserve is a protected natural area in Clark County featuring a circular basin depression roughly 100 feet (30 meters) deep and about one mile (1.6 kilometers) wide. The surrounding landscape includes rolling hills, small canyons, and a permanent pond at the center of the depression.

In the fall of 1878, during the Northern Cheyenne Exodus, the Big Basin was one of the places where Northern Cheyenne people camped and rested. At that time the area was unoccupied and perhaps not even generally known to settlers. Later, the basin served as a landmark and watering site for cattle drives heading north from Texas to Kansas railroads.

The preserve is named for the mile-wide Big Basin, a sinkhole depression that served as a landmark and watering site on cattle drives from Texas to Kansas railroads. Janie Stein formed the Big Basin Foundation in 1972 to protect bison and pronghorn; her son John Paul Stein wrote a song about her work.

U.S. Routes 283 and 160 run together through the Big Basin, and the basin west of the highway is privately owned, so visitors stay on the public eastern side. The preserve is open to the public and holds bison, which should be given room. St. Jacob's Well lies in Little Basin, a short distance east of the main depression.

St. Jacob's Well, a sinkhole 84 feet (26 m) wide and 58 feet (18 m) deep in Little Basin, has never been known to go dry. Willard D. Johnson of the U.S. Geological Survey described it in 1901 as having every appearance of having formed rather recently. The preserve's elevations run from 2,200 to 2,360 feet above sea level.