Bass River State Forest is a

state park State parks are parks or other protected areas managed at the sub-national level within those nations which use "state" as a political subdivision. State parks are typically established by a state to preserve a location on account of its natural ...

Ocean County Ocean County is a county located along the Jersey Shore in the south-central portion of the U.S. state of New Jersey. It borders the Atlantic Ocean on the east. Its county seat is Toms River.New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delawa ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. The park, named for the Bass River which crosses through it, shelters a portion of the environmentally sensitive

Pine Barrens Pine barrens, pine plains, sand plains, or pineland areas occur throughout the U.S. from Florida to Maine (see Atlantic coastal pine barrens) as well as the Midwest, West, and Canada and parts of Eurasia. Perhaps the most well known pine-barre ...

but also provides a variety of recreational resources to visitors. The park is operated and maintained by the

New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry In the state of New Jersey, the New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry is an administrative division of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. In its most visible role, the Division is directly responsible for the management and ...

History

The first of New Jersey's state forests, Bass River State Forest was acquired by the

New Jersey Legislature The New Jersey Legislature is the legislative branch of the government of the U.S. state of New Jersey. In its current form, as defined by the New Jersey Constitution of 1947, the Legislature consists of two houses: the General Assembly and the ...

in 1905 for public recreation, water conservation, and wildlife and timber management. The lands were once occupied by the Absegami, a branch of the

Lenape The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...

tribe of

Native Americans in the United States Native Americans, also known as American Indians, First Americans, Indigenous Americans, and other terms, are the Indigenous peoples of the mainland United States ( Indigenous peoples of Hawaii, Alaska and territories of the United States ...

Lake Absegami

The Lake Absegami, created in the 1930s, provides swimming, boating and canoeing.

Absegami Natural Area

A trail through the Absegami Natural Area provides access to a pine/oak woods and a small Atlantic white cedar bog, also containing

red maple ''Acer rubrum'', the red maple, also known as swamp maple, water maple, or soft maple, is one of the most common and widespread deciduous trees of eastern and central North America. The U.S. Forest Service recognizes it as the most abundant nativ ...

s and

magnolia ''Magnolia'' is a large genus of about 210 to 340The number of species in the genus ''Magnolia'' depends on the taxonomic view that one takes up. Recent molecular and morphological research shows that former genera ''Talauma'', ''Dugandiodendr ...

s. The Absegami self-guided trail is in length.

West Pine Plains Natural Area

The West Pine Plains Natural Area preserves a

pygmy forest In anthropology, pygmy peoples are ethnic groups whose average height is unusually short. The term pygmyism is used to describe the phenotype of endemic short stature (as opposed to disproportionate dwarfism occurring in isolated cases in a ...

, a globally rare stunted forest ecosystem consisting of pine and oak trees that reach a canopy height of as little as four feet at maturity. The forest supports the endangered

broom crowberry ''Corema conradii'' is a species of flowering plant in the heath family known by the common name broom crowberry. It is native to eastern North America, where it has a disjunct distribution, occurring intermittently from Nova Scotia to Massachus ...

and twelve rare species of

moth Moths are a paraphyletic group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies, with moths making up the vast majority of the order. There are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, many of w ...

Batona Trail

The

Batona Trail The Batona Trail is a hiking trail through New Jersey's Pine Barrens. The trail is one of the longest in the state, behind the Delaware and Raritan Canal Trail, the section of the Appalachian Trail within the state, the Liberty-Water Gap Trail, ...

passes through the park, as well as nearby

Wharton Wharton may refer to: Academic institutions * Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania * Wharton County Junior College * Paul R. Wharton High School * Wharton Center for Performing Arts, at Michigan State University Places * Wharton, ...

and

Brendan T. Byrne State Forest The Brendan T. Byrne State Forest (formerly the Lebanon State Forest) is a state forest in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Its protected acreage is split between Burlington and Ocean Counties. Description The Brendan T. Byrne State Forest is the ...

References

External links

NY-NJTC: Bass River State Forest Trail Details and Info
New Jersey state forests Protected areas of the Pine Barrens (New Jersey) Parks in Ocean County, New Jersey {{OceanCountyNJ-geo-stub