Brush Creek Canyon State Preserve

Brush Creek Canyon is a 217-acre preserve containing a rugged forested gorge along the Silurian Escarpment. Located two miles north of Arlington in Fayette County, it was dedicated as a biological and geological state preserve in 1968.

About the Land

Located on the western edge of the Paleozoic Plateau landform region, Brush Creek Canyon exemplifies the dramatic landscape of a prominent ridge extending through northeast Iowa known as the Silurian Escarpment. The steep slopes and exposed bedrock of this preserve are formed by 150-foot-tall outcrops of Silurian (435 million years old) dolomite of the Hopkinton Formation. Older, underlying shales are of Ordovician age (450 million years old). In many places, large blocks of dolo­mite have separated from the cliffs and slumped onto the soft, wet shales underneath, often rotating and leaning as they shift position. The spectacular bluffs and slump blocks are the result of a long history of natural stream erosion in the Brush Creek valley.

Directions

1. From the town of Arlington, take Highway 187 (Eisenhower Road) west and northwest for two miles to 90th Street (sign: Brush Creek Canyon State Preserve—3 miles). 
2. Turn sharply east (right) onto 90th Street and go 1 mile to “E” Avenue (State Park sign).
3. Turn north (left) and go 1 mile to the preserve entrance (sign: Brush Creek Canyon State Preserve).

Plants

A total of nearly 270 plant species have been found in the preserve. The rugged topography provides a variety of habitats, ranging from northand east-facing slopes that are deeply shaded, humid, and cool to southand west-facing slopes that are sunny, warm, and dry. 

Cliff faces host an interesting community of ferns, forbs, and shrubs, and are often dominated by Canada yew. Red oak, sugar maple, white oak, and basswood are the dominant tree species on the slopes. Blue beech and ironwood dominate the understory, with leatherwood, downy arrowwood and bladdernut found on the upper slopes. 

Additionally, flat to gently rolling upland woods are found at the top of the slopes. White oak and shagbark hickoryare characteristic overstory trees here with beaked hazel, gray dogwood,and wild honeysuckle inthe understory. 

The narrow bottomland forest along Brush Creek is subject to periodic flooding. Box elder, green ash, cottonwood, hackberry, and American elm are common in this habitat. Silky dogwood, ninebark, and nannyberry can be found here along with black raspberry, prickly ash, and poison ivy.

Wildflowers & Greenery

Woodland wildflowers are abundant throughout the forest, with spring beauty and hepatica beginning to bloom in March. In late summer, spotted jewelweed, zig­zag goldenrod, crooked stem aster, and arrow-leaved aster can be seen in flower. 

The fronds of northern lady fern, rattlesnake fern, bulblet bladder fern, fragile fern, interrupted fern, broad beech fern, and northern maidenhair fern add variety to the woodland community. 

Mats of mosses, liverworts, walking fern, and bishop’s cap cover boulders in rocky ravines. A small prairielike area once known as Chimney Rock can be found on top of a large block of dolomite in the center of the preserve.

Birds

More than seventy-five species of birds, including many neotropical migrant birds (nesting in North America and migrating to Central and South America for the winter) can be seen at this preserve, with sixty-seven of them finding suitable breeding habitat. Several species that need large tracts of unbroken forest for breeding are found in the preserve, including:

• American redstart
• Louisiana waterthrush
• Ovenbird
• Yellow-throated vireo.

The preserve is open to hiking and picnicking. Hunting is not permitted. Other natural areas along the Silurian Escarpment include Mossy Glen, Bixby, and White Pine Hollow State Preserves, Backbone and Echo Valley State Parks, and Volga River Recreation Area.

Brush Creek Canyon is an unstaffed satellite of Volga River Recreation Area.