Springfield Conservation Nature Center – June 2020

My husband and I did a short hike at the Springfield Conservation Nature Center in late June. It’s a place I anticipate we’ll explore more fully in the months to come. The area is an oasis with high volume traffic arteries on two sides…neighborhood and lake on the other sides. We started out our first hike on the Boardwalk Trail (map) but extended to the Sycamore Cut-off down to the bridge over a branch of Lake Springfield….downhill to the lake level then back up. The forest is dense with a different kinds and ages of trees…there are cliff faces too. The paths are gravel. We spotted a great blue heron (still roosting) in shallow water….and a very active small bird in the bushes nearby (maybe a prothonotary warbler). There were probably some invasive plants in the mix – but they didn’t seem to be overwhelming. The slideshow below contains my favorites from the pictures I took with my bridge camera.