Chicago’s Best Nature Preserves
Free Chicago Nature Outings

Full List of Mike MacDonald’s Favorite Chicago-Area Preserves
Plan a Free Chicago Nature Adventure

Chicago is the Place for Wildflowers & Outdoor Outings

The Chicago area is unique in its natural beauty and biodiversity. There is so much nature around Chicago that you can plan weekly nature walks, weekend getaways, and outdoor adventures for an entire lifetime. In fact, there are more than 400 square miles of protected natural area within fifty miles of downtown Chicago. That’s more nature than thirty-four of the fifty-nine national parks. And with over 1,700 native plant species, the Chicago region blows the doors off ANY national park! Yes, more species that the national parks of Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Great Smoky Mountains, all of them.

Every day, from mid-April through mid-September, Chicago’s prairies and woodlands put on a continuous show of wildflowers. And each week, I post an alert of local national-park quality blooming  events. So, the next time you’re longing to commune with nature, you don’t need to plan an expensive vacation to the western United States. Just stop by ChicagoNatureNOW! to find out what’s happening and to plan a Chicago nature adventure. And, to insure that you don’t miss one glorious moment, subscribe for free to receive our weekly nature alerts by email.

Why These Preserves?

The nature preserves presented are showcase preserves. They represent what I’ve determined from years of experience to be the finest examples of the natural history of the region known as Chicago Wilderness. It is an area formed by glaciers that receded about 13,000 years ago and is defined by its unique geology and habitats that extend around the lake from southeast Wisconsin into northwest Indiana. Just like the national parks showcase the finest nature that America has to offer, my showcase preserves highlight the rich biodiversity and habitats of the Chicago region.

There are hundreds of nature preserves within the Chicago are, totaling over 1,700 native plant species, and I encourage you to visit these special places. Unfortunately, most have been overrun by more than two hundred weedy invaders from other regions and continents, leaving behind just a handful of local species behind to Chicago’s natural history. These invaders appear beautiful on the surface. But, if left unattended by land managers and volunteers, very few native plants would survive. Over my many years photographing for Chicago Wilderness magazine, I have fallen in love with a special smattering of sites that are not only exceptional in terms native biological diversity, but they are especially beautiful and provide an escape from urban life. They’ve stolen my heart, and my hope is that they’ll steal yours, as well.

As the battle to remove the invaders continues, and ecological restoration breathes new life and beauty into an increasing number of degraded sites, I will continue to explore and to add more high-quality nature preserves to this website.

North Chicagoland

Chiwaukee State Prairie Natural Area (Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin)

This rare remnant prairie overlooking Lake Michigan is of great biological significance and sensory satisfaction. Starting in May, wander amongst the vast array of plants that bloom in sublime profusion.

Illinois Beach Nature Preserve (Zion, Illinois)

Vast, unpredictable, and wild: Owls, turtles, coyotes, and swarms of bees. Endless flowers and black oak trees. By a lake called Michigan and a river named Dead, come to this place if only one choice you have.

Middlefork Savanna (Lake Forest, Illinois)

Wide trails navigable by foot or by bike guide you past open stretches of wetland, prairie, and savanna. See frogs and turtles, egrets and herons, elusive mink, and birds that perch on tall flowers and make them dance.

Somme Prairie Grove (Northbrook, Illinois)

This black soil savanna is among the rarest places on Earth. Almost lost to the ages, it was rediscovered and restored to health. Now abounding with life, this preserve proves in one visit the benefits of saving places like this.

Northwest Chicagoland

Bluff Spring Fen (Elgin, Illinois)

Hidden behind a quiet cemetery, this peaceful place is wild and brimming with life: ever-changing worlds of savanna, prairie, and fen that bring enjoyment throughout the seasons.

Lake in the Hills Fen Nature Preserve (Lake in the Hills, Illinois)

Experience the wide-open space of the vast prairie and fen. Hike the rolling terrain and disappear into the horizon.

Shoe Factory Road Prairie (Hoffman Estates, Illinois)

Atop a small, gravelly hill sits a gem of a prairie that puts on summer-long flower shows and provides a fabulous view of the tallgrass prairie below.

West Chicagoland

Belmont Prairie (Downers Grove, Illinois)

Nestled within a quiet neighborhood, this remnant prairie is intimate and unusually colorful. In June, pink and purple erupt in every direction. From July through September, the landscape is showered in gold.

Fermilab Prairie (Batavia, Illinois)

Wide-open space where you can lose yourself in the towering grasses and flowering plants. Watch coyotes, scare up deer, and marvel in the wonder of this prairie reconstruction.

Johnson’s Mound (Elburn, Illinois)

This wooded glacial kame is rich in spring wildflowers and a hike through the ravines provides a quiet and peaceful nature experience.

Wolf Road Prairie (Westchester, Illinois)

Hike the sidewalks left behind from a construction project halted by the Great Depression and experience nature’s comfort while in the embrace of the savanna, the wetland, and the prairie.

Southwest Chicagoland

Black Partridge Woods (Lemont, Illinois)

Hidden beneath the bluffs, a sparkling stream curls through an emerald woodland lush with spring flowers. Maples immerse you in autumn gold. And winter turns a pewter panorama into an expanse of shining silver.

Lockport Prairie Nature Preserve (Lockport, Illinois)

This rare and expansive prairie is built upon a base of dolomite limestone. Buffered by river and wetland, the prairie comes to life with squadrons of water-loving dragonflies and fields of pink nodding wild onion.

Messenger Woods Nature Preserve (Homer Glen, Illinois)

Springtime finds me wandering the woodland. Mesmerized by hypnotic fields of bluebells and white trilliums, I cross the same stream for the fifth time. Disoriented, I wonder where I am. It’s easy to lose yourself here.

O’Hara Woods Preserve (Romeoville, Illinois)

With an invigorating jolt of green and an eye-popping carpet of spring ephemerals, this intimate woodland is a springtime paradise and a visually explosive place to visit.

Pilcher Park (Joliet, Illinois)

Spring is the time to visit. Under a leafless woodland in the blackest of muck, skunk cabbage emerges, initiating a chain reaction of sparkling wildflowers that spreads across the forest floor.

Spears Woods (Willow Springs, Illinois)

A daydream come true. Discover the beauty and drama of the seasons as you make your way around wetlands, through open woodlands, and over rolling panoramas of prairie.

Theodore Stone Preserve (Hodgkins, Illinois))

Here lies a tale of two prairies: one, a tallgrass prairie, dense and looming, soft in soil; the other, rare and rocky, where stunted plants rooted in dolomite limestone grow few and far between.

South Chicagoland

Gensburg-Markham Prairie (Markham, Illinois)

Conveniently located amidst the urban sprawl is a large, luscious prairie. Just exit the tollway, enter the magical gate, and leave your worries behind.

Kickapoo Woods and Prairie (Riverdale, Illinois)

In an urban locale where there is little nature exists, the prairie here provides a wonderful oasis where peace can be found.

Pembroke Savanna Nature Preserve (Hopkins Park, Illinois)

Life abounds under the dome of black oaks of this rare sand savanna. From glass lizards and six-foot snakes to enigmatic gophers and their omnipresent mounds, to flowers of all fashions, this is not a refuge—this is paradise.

Powderhorn Marsh and Prairie (Chicago, Illinois)

A beautiful gem hidden within Chicago’s city limits with a unique topography formed by the forces of Lake Michigan. Once inside and surrounded by nature, you may very well forget that you’re in the city at all.

Raccoon Grove Nature Preserve (Monee, Illinois)

A springtime woodland adventure: Listen for rapid, hollow percussions of woodpeckers. Watch wary warblers as they flash about and perch only for an instant. And inhale the essences of bluebell and leek along the winding creek.

Northwest Indiana

Heron Rookery Trail (Michigan City, Indiana)

Follows the banks of the Little Calumet River for, quite possibly, the best place in Indiana Dunes National Park for spring wildflowers.

Miller Woods (at Paul H. Douglas Center for Environmental Education) (Gary, Indiana)

In this black oak savanna within Indiana Dunes National Park, wildflowers blossom from spring into fall. Hike past rolling dunes and flooded swales, where beavers startle with slaps from their tails, then over high dunes to reach the Lake Michigan shore.