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| Hoosier Prairie's oak savanna. Indian Dunes NPS photo. |
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| Prairie Marsh and Savanna trails map. Indiana DNR. |
The 0.8-mile hike consists of a stem and two connected loops in a 1547-acre area being restored and protected by a variety of agencies from the U.S. and Indiana governments to private nature preservation organizations. It’s located a few miles south of the main park.
To reach the trailhead, from Chicago take either Interstate 90 or Interstate 94 east. Go right/south onto Indiana 912, which becomes Cline Avenue. The road ends at Main Street in Griffith, Ind. Go right/west onto Main Street. In a little more than a mile, look for a parking lot on the street’s left/south side; if you’ve crossed Kennedy Avenue, you’ve gone too far. The stem trail heads south from the lot’s east side.
You’ll begin by crossing prairie that is part of the original land a nature conservancy purchased in 1970. Their goal was to save some of the last few acres of prairie as the pioneers would have seen much of this part of the state when they arrived in the early 1800s.
In about 0.05 miles, you can take a very short spur to the right/west. The 30 acres spread before you was a wheat field when purchased and added to the protected prairie in 1974. With very little assistance from man, the field over the decades has largely returned to its natural prairie state. Asters, big bluestem prairie grass, goldenrods, rattlesnake master, and tall coreopsis dominate the landscape with bobolink, goldfinch, meadowlarks, sparrows calling it home.
The stem reaches the first loop, the Prairie Marsh Trail, at 0.1 miles. Turn left/west onto it. The route enters true virgin prairie.
It’s a good mix of dry and mesic prairies. The dry prairies, found on the higher ground, are reminiscent of those found to the west on the Great Plains. Mesic prairies are on the lower ground, which usually has wetter soils and are typical of what grows in central Indiana and Illinois. Note how the plants of the two prairie types differ with just a few feet of elevation change.
After the trail curves south, a connector trail heads left/east. Go onto it, and at the next junction, you’ll reach the second loop, or the Savanna Trail. Take it clockwise by going left/northeast.
If hiking on a warm summer day, you may notice a pleasant scent in the air. It comes from sweetfern, which grows along this stretch of the loop. It and the bracken found here are rare prairie plants in Indiana.
The trail soon enters an oak savanna, a prairie in which trees grow widely apart. In this part of Indiana, black and white oaks are most common in savannas.
Although those two oaks prospered here thanks to their ability to resist drought, a common condition in prairies, their hardiness proved their undoing. Settlers thirsting for wood cut almost all of the oaks during the 1800s. Today, oak savannas – once Indiana’s dominant type of prairie – are now rarer than grasslands.
As the loop reaches its southeast side, beyond the small oak trees is a small marsh, known as a wet prairie. Sedges grow in the water but also prairie cordgrass and bluejoint grass. Several wildflowers also can be spotted, including grass pink orchid, marsh blazing star, marsh phlox, and prairie sundrops.
The next trail junction is with the connector to the Prairie Marsh Trail. Go left/west onto the connector, then at the next intersection take a left/south onto the Prairie Marsh.
On the south side of that loop, the trail heads past another prairie marsh. In contrast to cattail-dominated wetlands found across much of the Midwest, this marsh enjoys a wide variety of flora. That helps make it a haven for a variety of salamanders, birds, reptiles and insects. Of all the prairie types crossed on the trail, you’re most likely to see wild animals here.
Other animals you’ll spot on the trail include white-tailed deer, red fox, minks, woodchucks, and eastern chipmunks. Red-tailed hawks often circle overhead, looking for a meal of white-footed mice or meadow voles. Yellowthroats, song sparrows, and swamp sparrows can be heard singing.
At the next two trail junctions, continue straight/north. You’re back on the stem trail that goes to the parking lot.
