Rock Fork Lakes Conservation Area is a nature preserve and former strip mine in
Boone County, Missouri. Located north of
Columbia, Missouri
Columbia is a city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It is the county seat of Boone County and home to the University of Missouri. Founded in 1821, it is the principal city of the five-county Columbia metropolitan area. It is Missouri's fourth ...
adjacent to
Finger Lakes State Park
Finger Lakes State Park is a public recreation area consisting of in Boone County near the city of Columbia, Missouri. The state park is unusual in that the site was reclaimed after having been strip mined for coal. It is one of two state ...
it is over 2000 acres of lakes, wetlands, forest, and prairie. Much of the land is severely degraded from
strip mining by the
Peabody Coal Company from 1963 to 1972. The land was acquired by the
Missouri Department of Conservation in 1979. An unstaffed shooting range is open to the public and was renovated in 2014. The 50-acre Rocky Fork Lake has a boat ramp and is used for fishing.
It is named after
Rocky Fork Creek
Rocky Fork Creek is a stream
A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or cert ...
.
See also
*
Three Creeks Conservation Area
*
Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area
Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area is a nature preserve and wetland in Boone County, Missouri. Located mainly in the Missouri River floodplain southwest of Columbia, Missouri and managed by the Missouri Department of Conservation, the wetlands are a ...
*
Rock Bridge Memorial State Park
References
External links
Official siteArea map
{{Protected Areas of Missouri
Conservation Areas of Missouri
Protected areas of Boone County, Missouri
Landforms of Boone County, Missouri