> Date sent: Mon, 22 Sep 2003 13:48:56 -0400 > Subject: Jackson County preserve > From: Susan Miller > To: > > Hi Bruce > Do you know anything about a 250 acre nature sanctuary off (or on) Wolf > Lake Road in Napoleon Township? (just south of Little Wolf Lake) > Supposedly the land was donated to the Nature Conservancy but I can't > find any info on it. Thanks. Sue Miller > From: Roy Dane To: Cc: Sent: Monday, September 22, 2003 3:10 PM Hi The place you are referring to is the Lefglen Preserve. I personally don't know much about the place. I do know that it isn't marked ( there are no signs nearby marking it's location ). I've driven by the general area several times, and have actually hiked into what I **THINK** might be the preserve, but to this day, I can't say for sure that I have actually been there. You may want to look in the local bookstores for a book titled "Natural Michigan" and another titled "More Natural Michigan" . I think the Lefglen Preserve is listed in one of those two books. By the way I just did a quick Google search for "Lefglen" and found the following link that describes the history of the preserve. http://www.michigannature.org/lefglen.htm . By the way, the preserve is owned and maintained by the Michigan Nature Association. Unfortunately the above link does not provide any information on just where exactly the preserve is. Roy -------------------------------------------------------------- Bruce, This is what I found on the Michigan Nature Association site. Also found out that access is from Wolf Lake Road just across from Rexford. Rexford runs to the west and on the east side of Wolf Lake there is supposed to be a circle drive that is the trailhead for a trail running east into the woods. -- Sue Lefglen Nature Sanctuary 210.48 Acres in Jackson County Situated in a picturesque part of southern Jackson County, and embodying the best of its natural features, Lefglen is a collection of varied terrains which include wooded upland, cattail marshes, swales, lakes, tamarack bog, oak groves, flowering well, and prairie. It is little wonder that plant and animal lists are long. Lefglen is one of the unusual places in Michigan where northern and southern flora intermingle; 690 native plant species from 116 plant families have been identified here. Lake Nirvana is completely surrounded by an extensive marsh, in the most inaccessible part of which annually nest one pair of sandhill cranes. Visiting Lefglen you can find rare wildflowers, and nine species of native orchids. Over fifty kinds of birds nest at the sanctuary. A number of mammals and seven kinds of reptiles have been catalogued here. A mollusk study showed Lefglen has 26 species of gastropods. Eight different salamander species are found in the vernal ponds. History Lefty and Glenna Levengood walked ³Glen Run Path² in the early 40ıs as young people who enjoyed the ³Beech Grove² where they watched nesting owls in late winter and impatiently waited for flowering skink cabbage and wild flowers of spring, the caddis fly frogs, salamanders, toads, wood ducks, spring warblers, and other woodland flora and fauna of swamp and hill. They dreamed of making the area a nature preserve. They managed to acquire several contiguous pieces of property starting with Leftyıs grandfatherıs farm woods, in the family since 1895, and made purchases from other local owners who called them Œthe two nature nuts.² Each parcel was given a name reflecting their view of the nature there: ³Easter Pond,² ³Lake Nirvana,² ³Pinelandia² and Moon run.² Having heard of the MNA purposes and wishing relief from spiraling property taxes, the Levengoods sold their holdings to the MNA in 1970 for far below market value to establish Lefglen Nature Sanctuary. But the Levengoods did not stop there; they continued to acquire adjacent land, then later sold the MNA at bargain prices. In case you have not guessed by now, Lefglen is a contraction of Lefty and Glenna, certainly a most fitting name for this outstanding sanctuary. -------------------------------------------------------------- Roy- I got this from Sue. The text following her paragraph to me is from the web site you gave me. I wonder where she got the location information? Bruce -------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Bruce I think I remember seeing the location description she mentions in "Natural Michigan". I walked that trail once, but was never sure if I was on the preserve or not. I remember talking to Bob Whiting and some of the other longtime members of Jackson Audubon, and they told me that the access to the preserve was somewhere behind the County Park which is just North of Rexford Road on Wolf Lake Road. Again there are no signs marking the preserve, so you really have no way of knowing where the preserve is. Connie Spotts actually lives in the South - Central portion of Jackson County on Crispell Lake. To the best of my knowledge, she has never been to the Lefglen Preserve. Roy