Spicer Lake Nature Preserve

The county frame; acquired 1978

Two sizes: Spicer Lake is a county park wrapped around a state nature preserve, and the two have different sizes. In 1978, the county's master plan records, the park board — assisted by the South Bend Audubon Society, the Indiana Chapter of The Nature Conservancy, and the Indiana Department of Natural Resources — acquired forty acres at Spicer Lake in the county's northwest corner on County Line Road, and the ground was dedicated as a State Nature Preserve. The board's holding grew to 320 acres around Spicer and Lancaster Lakes: that is the park. The DNR's own nature-preserve guide gives the dedicated preserve within it at 196 acres, protecting the two lakes; both figures stand, each at its own meaning. The preserve was named a Wetland of Distinction in 2018, and the Schurz Visitor Center has stood on the ground since 1991.

The trails run around the wetland basin. The county's current park brochure states "over five miles of trails surround the wetland basin"; the county's 2019–2023 master plan carries seven miles of hiking trails for the park; the Indiana Birding Trail's account says over six. All three stand with their carriers. The signature walk is the quarter-mile boardwalk through the wetland — the brochure's own measure — and the named paths include the Pfeil Family Trail, a crushed-limestone path to the Stankus Observation Deck over the lake, and the Glacier Flats Trail at the Buttonbush Swamp. Fishing and boating are prohibited at Spicer Lake, the county states — the preserve's trails are for walking and watching, and the birding record (the preserve is an Indiana Birding Trail destination) is their documented use.

Sources:

1. St. Joseph County Parks, Spicer Lake Nature Preserve park brochure (the 320 acres, the over-five-miles of trails, the quarter-mile boardwalk, the Pfeil Family Trail and Stankus Observation Deck, the Glacier Flats Trail, the fishing and boating prohibition).
2. St. Joseph County Parks, Spicer Lake Nature Preserve Master Plan Map 2019–2023, and Five Year Master Plan 2014–2018, p. B-25 (the 1978 forty-acre acquisition and its partners, the dedication, the growth to 320 acres, the seven-mile trail figure, the Schurz Visitor Center, the 2018 Wetland of Distinction).
3. Indiana DNR, Nature Preserves guide, Spicer Lake Nature Preserve (the 196-acre dedicated preserve; the ownership; the two lakes).
4. Indiana Birding Trail, Spicer Lake Nature Preserve (the over-six-miles trail figure).