This photograph coming from a scouting mission in the pine lands with my son. the trek also included a test drive of hos truck which is designed to do off road exploration. I love this location and I promise more photos and details form this location in the Pine barrens of New Jersey.
I love water lilies and the Pinelands has some of the greatest water lilies in the world.
SITE DESCRIPTION: The acquisition of the Franklin Parker Preserve in 2003 by the New Jersey Conservation Foundation was a momentous occasion in conservation. This 9400 acre preserve is a keystone piece of land, linking the expanses of Brendan Byrne, Wharton, and Penn State Forests and creating a more contiguous, and therefore more viable, Pinelands National Reserve. Franklin Parker Preserve offers access to a wide variety of Pine Barrens habitat by way of sand roads. Pitch-pine forests and cedar swamps are joined by blueberry fields, lakes, and pristine tributaries of the Wading River. The former cranberry bogs are currently being restored to a variety of native wetland habits. The preserve is home to an impressive array of rare flora and fauna, including numerous State threatened and endangered species, and even some nationally and globally rare species. This is also a great area for stargazing.
The central region of the Pine Barrens contains several areas of pine and oak forest that resemble the surrounding forests with one major exception: from a standing position, one can gaze over the top of the tree canopy. The Pine Barren Plains, known locally as the Pygmy Forest, contains trees that may attain a height of only about four feet at maturity. New Jersey contains the world’s largest acreage of this globally rare forest community, which can be seen within portions of Warren Grove Recreation Area. Many researchers believe that this unique stunted forest ecosystem is partly the result of the fire ecology of the Pinelands.
Today’s aerial shots of the Tabernacles historic site called Tunking Mill. It was a cold winter day which has some beautiful landscapes which I enjoyed photographing.The location has that beautiful Pine Barrens aka Pine lands silence to it.
