Hickory Preserve Background Information
Hickory Preserve Facts!
Written by Jean Huffman, Land Management and Restoration Coordinator
Hydrology and water features
Aquifer recharge value - The property has an extremely high recharge rate of 15-20
inches per year, increasing water yield in the underlying Floridan Aquifer.
Watershed - The entirety of the property boundary falls within the St. Marks/Wakulla
River watershed and is part of the Upper Wakulla River and Wakulla Spring Basin
Management Action Plan area, meaning that conservation of the proposed project will
directly benefit the health of the Wakulla River and Wakulla Spring.
It is within the Black Creek, subbasin/branch of the St. Marks/Wakulla River watershed,
runoff from the property drains into the extensive wetlands of Black creek.
Wetlands – Forested wetland/Maple Swamp with small intermittent stream, small branch
of Black Creek
Pond, seep and ditches – A small circular pond was made in the late 1950s or early
1960s by digging out a circular pond and damming the surface runoff at the head of the
Northeastern wetland system. A short distance downslope from the pond water
sometimes seeps out of the ground at the head of the intermittent stream that runs
through the maple swamp. In the early 1900s ditches were dug through this system and
into the upland portion of the property to drain two small wetlands.
Topography/Elevation
The land has a wide range of elevation (for Florida!) with high hills in the west and
relatively steep slopes leading down to the maple swamp. Elevation ranges from a low
of about 98 ft at the lowest point on the Eastern side wetlands, to a lofty 190 ft on the
highest hill of the Western side of the property.
Plant Communities
Most of the uplands of Hickory Preserve tract were once Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory
woods, but the trees on the western part of the tract were cut before 1937, the land was
used for agriculture and then later planted to offsite pines (we plan to restore this area).
On parts of the eastern portion of the tract the trees were not all cut, and the land was
not used for intensive agriculture, this is where the rarest and best-condition habitats
occur.
This property has three main types of plant communities.
1. Maple Swamp. A beautiful maple-dominated swamp occurs on the lowest portions of
the property. This wetland is contiguous with and drains to Black Creek and its large
downstream wetlands. Within this forested wetland occurs an intermittent or seasonal
stream that drains into Black Creek and is part of the large Black Creek wetland system.
2. Red Hills Hickory-Oak Slope Woods occurs in a small area on the western side of
the preserve. It is a variation of the Shortleaf Pine-Oak Hickory community that occurs
along ravine slopes, just upslope from hardwood swamps or forests. This ecological
community occurs on approximately seven acres of the Hickory Preserve tract, just
upslope from the forested wetlands. This stand includes some large old Mockernut
Hickory trees, White Oaks, Post Oaks, and Live and Laurel Oaks that were present as
large trees on 1941 aerial photographs, and some groundcover and midstory plants that
are characteristic of these rare forests, including Carolina Goldenrod, Bosc’s Panicgrass
and Late purple aster. It also has several other plants that are rare in Florida but more
widespread in Appalachia and other regions to the North (such as Joe Pye-weed and
Northern Witch-hazel). Hickory Preserve tract also has a Florida state-listed fern,
Southern Lady Fern (Athyrium asplenioides) in the lowermost part of the slope forest.
3. Mixed Oak-Pine forests cover most of the uplands of the Preserve. They have a
canopy of planted loblolly pines with scattered large live oaks and many small live and
laurel oaks and other hardwoods on old pasturelands. Many large beautiful old live oaks
were present when the land was open pasture (as can be seen in their spreading
growth form). Before settlement and clearing for agriculture these areas were Shortleaf
Pine-Oak-Hickory woodlands.
Restoration and Management
The only place where Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory Woods occur in Florida is in the Red
Hills region around Tallahassee. Prior to land clearing for plantation agriculture in the
19 th century Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory woods were the predominant vegetation cover
of the uplands of the Red Hills. But because they occur on soils that are good for
agriculture, most were cleared early, and nearly all remaining stands have been lost to
development, logging and/or fire exclusion (for more on the history and ecology of
SPOH see Clewell 2013). Although long ago Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory Woods were
the most widespread habitat type in the Red Hills, it is now extremely rare with only a
few small examples remaining.
Red Hills Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory Woods (SPOH) in good condition, are
characterized by an open canopy of shortleaf pine and upland fire-loving hardwood
trees such as Mockernut Hickory, Post Oak, Southern Red Oak, White Oak, and Black
Oak. They have a rich, diverse ground cover of grasses and wildflowers, including Little
Bluestem grass, Silky Indian grass, Big Bluestem, Compass plant, Golden Asters,
Liatris and many, many others. We would like to restore our upland areas that were
once pasture closer to their SPOH origins. We will use nearby good condition stands of
SPOH as our reference sites for restoration (Scrub Course at Tall Timbers and Red Oak
Hill at Jubilee are our best reference sites)
A restoration plan is in the process of being drafted in coordination with all our
stakeholders and people who are the most knowledgeable about these unique Red Hills
ecological communities. And the work of restoration will take place over many years,
however, we can say that the first steps of restoration and management of HP will be to:
1. Remove Invasive, non-native plants that threaten the native plants and animals.
The Hickory Oak Slope Woods have spreading, invasive Silverthorn shrubs, which are a
high priority to control, and the rest of the property has other invasive species, such as
Coral Ardisia, Nandina and others that will be removed.
2. Work to restore the open aspect and diverse groundcover of wildflowers and
grasses of Shortleaf Pine Oak Hickory woods. We plan to accomplish this by thinning
dense upland hardwoods (primarily laurel oaks, water oaks and sweetgums) and pines
to encourage long-dormant grasses and wildflowers to grow once they are exposed to
more sunlight.
3. Restore the more diverse tree canopy of Shortleaf Pine Oak Hickory woods that
were once present before the land was cleared for agriculture including Post oak, Red
oak, White oak and Shortleaf pine. We will encourage existing groundcover but also
reintroduce native wildflowers and grasses of the Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory
community if necessary.
Wildlife
Currently, Hickory Preserve is home to bobcats, white-tailed deer, foxes, raccoons,
opossums, migrating and resident birds including the threatened swallow-tailed kite,
turkeys barred owls and red-shouldered hawks. It is also home to many small
mammals, reptiles and amphibians, and insects. Protecting this land will allow these
species to continue to thrive, and restoring it will greatly improve habitat for most of
them and for the many animals (most with declining populations) that require the open-
canopy structure and rich, diverse, herbaceous ground cover that occurs in open, fire-
maintained Shortleaf Pine-Oak-Hickory habitat (such as Bobwhite Quail, Gopher
Tortoises and Fox Squirrels). Protecting this land will also benefit wildlife into the future
by serving to help provide a vital connection between existing conservation lands to the
east and west.
More Land Use History
This land has a long history of agricultural use. From before the1930s through the
1960s this land was used for pasture.
The cleared land was maintained in its open state, and was likely used as pasture, until
around 1970 when all except a small part of the pasture was apparently abandoned and
started to grow up to shrubs and trees. By 1990 there was a closed canopy of mostly
hardwood trees across almost the entire parcel with few pines.
In the 1990s the open portion of the western pasture area was planted to pines, and
there was major thinning and clearing within the larger hardwood grownup pasture. This
was followed by planting pines in rows mixed with the larger existing oaks (visible on 96
aerial). By 2001 pines had grown and were visible on aerial photos. 2007 closed
canopy again. The 2009 aerials show that the western pines were recently thinned, and
the 2012 aerial shows the eastern pines were thinned. Summary, mid to late 1990s
pines were planted in both eastern open pasture and in much of the property around
existing oaks. They were thinned between 2008 and 2012.
