Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek Preserve is a Florida State Park. It includes more than of varied habitats on and adjacent to the Lake Wales Ridge in Polk County. A number of rare and threatened or endangered plants and animals are found in the park.
Description The park includes over on the Lake Wales Ridge in Haines City. The park is part of the Florida Forever Catfish Creek project, which was created in 1990 to protect and restore more than of high scrub ridges, lakes scattered within the ridges, and part of the shoreline of Lake Pierce. As of 2025, the state of Florida had acquired of the project land. Two pre-European contact archaeological sites, the Ingram Ranch Site (archaeological site designation PO10677) and Snodgrass Island Site (PO3866), are in the park.
Ecosystem The park includes scrub, sandhill, scrubby flatwood, mesic flatwood, xeric hammock, bottomland hardwood forest, basin swamp, sandhill upland lake, wet flatwood, blackwater stream, seepage slope and floodplain swamp habitats. Rare plants found in the park include scrub morning glory, scrub plum, pygmy fringe tree, cutthroat grass, scrub mint, Florida blazing star, Lewton's polygala, and scrub buckwheat. The park is also home to protected and rare animals such as the Florida panther, wood stork, Florida scrub jay, bald eagle, gopher tortoise, Florida sand skink, Florida scrub lizard, Florida black bear, blue calamintha bee, Morris' tiny sand-loving scarab, Archbold bess beetle, Archbold cebrionid beetle, and tough buckthorn bee.
Access There is no entrance charge. Florida state parks are open between 8 a.m. and sundown every day of the year (including holidays).
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