Fern Forest Nature Center 5.0 (reviews)

Surround yourself with the peaceful wildlife and plant life in Fern Forest Nature Center! It's a great way for kids to get up close to the beautiful native plants, as well as the local wildlife. There's even a display of live native reptiles! Pretty cool!

Start your experience at the entrance boardwalk which will take you to the Exhibit Hall. Here, you can check out the interpretive exhibits of the park's natural history as well as the historical side to the park itself.  (It's here you get the live reptile displays!)

Make sure you bring your walking shoes because there are a number of beautiful walking trails at the Fern Forest Nature Center which you can enjoy that will take you deep into the nature that surrounds you!

The Cypress Creek Trail is an easy, half-mile wheelchair-accessible journey through a cypress-maple swamp and transitional communities. 

The Prairie Overlook Trail is a one mile loop through an open prairie as well as an oak/cabbage palm community, which then takes you to an 8 foot observation platform! What can you see from up there? Do you feel like you're one of the birds in the trees?

The Maple Walk takes you through red maple swamp (it really is a swamp, so make sure you take boots as it will probably be soggy and muddy!)

Wetlands Wander is an interpretive trail along a canal to a beautiful butterfly garden, and the sensory garden trail is great for those kids who just want to take it easy. This is a quiet area for relaxation and reflection.

Spend the whole day enjoying nature - bring your own food and enjoy lunch at one of the 6 picnic tables (no fires or grills though)

A lovely family day out in nature at the Fern Forest Nature Center! Perhaps you will come away having made some new friends (the butterflies and reptiles that is!) You never know!