MEEC maintains two miles of walking trails through the front meadow, prairie and woods. Our trail guide allows visitors look deeper into these ecosystems and the plants and animals that live on the property. Our resource center also houses a great number of field guides you can use on-site to identify plants and animals you encounter. Use the interactive map or download the trail guide PDF below.

Attachment: 
PDF icon Nature Trail Guide.pdf

Trail locations

1. Oak Hickory Woodland

As you enter the woods on the way to stop #2 you are walking through a dry, upland oak/ hickory/ dogwood woodland. Its dryness is a function of the topography – the surface features which are a...

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2. Woodland Fen

A fen is a type of wetland which is fed primarily by ground water. (Bogs, by contrast, are fed almost exclusively through precipitation.) The water is usually around 55° F (13° C...

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3. Moist Woods

This area of the woods is a good place to see stratification, described in the chart on page 9. The plants of the herbaceous (non-woody, broad-leaved) ...

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4. Prairie Edge

As you emerge from the woodlands, notice the change in the feel of the air – the environmental factors of temperature, light, wind. This is the boundary between two microclimates...

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5. Prairie Overlook (Bench)

Ohio’s pre-settlement landscape boasted prairies interspersed among the tracts of forests. The tallgrass prairies that once covered about 4% of Ohio (more than a million acres) exist now as mostly...

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6. Old Field Succession

This area is an old field that has not been farmed since the mid 1960s. During the intervening years, the process of ecological succession has slowly worked to repair the effects...

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7. Osage Orange Tree

The Osage orange (Maclura pomifera) is not native to Ohio – it originated in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas. Unlike some non-native species, they do not dominate native species and are not...

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8. Bench in Dry Woods

One of the strongest threads that knits together an ecological community is the transfer of energy in the form of food between individuals. We’ve already seen an example of a predator-prey...

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9. May Apple Community

From April through July, look for plants about one foot tall which resemble miniature “umbrellas” (less than a foot in diameter). If you are hiking in May look for a white flower at the juncture...

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10. Soehnel Meditation Grove

The nature preserve trail ends at the Soehnel Meditation grove, and you are invited to pause at the benches to reflect on your experience of walking the trail through the woodland and prairie...

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11. Front Field

The western 40 acres of Mount Saint John is an area that was formerly an agricultural field and orchard. Today it contains our forb, shrub and tree nurseries, an organic community garden and...

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