Spring Bluff Nature Preserve LCFP

Spring Bluff offers high-quality areas of sand prairie, sand savanna, marsh, and graminoid fen spread over 274 acres. Spring Bluff Nature Preserve is open from sunrise to sunset. Biking is permitted on the access road, and the road along North Point Marina to the east links to bike paths in Illinois Beach State Park. Dogs are not permitted. The ridge and swale topography of Spring Bluff supports a variety of communities that stimulate the senses. Several species of heron make their home here, along with rails, willow flycatchers, marsh and sedge wrens, and woodcocks. Migrating birds hug the Lake Michigan shoreline during their fall flights and visitors may spot snipe, killdeer, broad-winged hawks, and peregrine falcons. In the fall the black oaks that dominate the ridge in the center of the preserve turn a showy red. Along the east side of the site, in a flat area of marsh and wet sand prairie, aspens change to yellow and orange. Between these bands of color, prairie dock, goldenrod, jewelweed, asters, and sunflowers speckle the prairie.