Latta Plantation Nature Preserve

In 1981, the Mecklenburg County Park and Recreation Department first opened Latta Plantation Park, a 654-acre "Nature Preserve." After the creation of the Nature Preserve Master Plan in 1997, the name was officially changed to Latta Plantation Nature Preserve. In the 1800's, most of the area was a cotton plantation owned by Mr. James Latta, a traveling merchant who first purchased the land in 1799. A portion of the acreage was used as a Boy Scout camp in the 1940's. Military exercises have also been conducted on the property. The property was purchased from several different owners including Crescent Resources and The Nature Conservancy. R. H. Johnson Construction once owned the majority of the property. Crescent Resources had harvested timber in some areas of what is now preserve property. The 2,810 square foot Latta Plantation Nature Center was first opened in 1982 as the Ranger Interpretive Center. The Center's name changed to Latta Plantation Nature Center in 1998 and the facility underwent its first major renovation in 2002.   Latta Plantation Nature Preserve is the County's largest nature preserve and protects over 1,343 acres of natural communities including the Beatties Ford Basic Forest natural heritage site. The preserve forms a green peninsula extending into Mountain Island Lake, the drinking water source for over 700,000 residents in Mecklenburg and Gaston counties. Its diversity of natural communities includes upland and bottom land hardwood forests, open fields, streams, and a Piedmont Prairie restoration site protecting the federally endangered Schweinitz's sunflower and Michaux's sumac. The Preserve is part of the Mountain Island Lake Important Bird Area, designated by the National Audubon Society due to its diversity of wintering waterfowl, breeding and migratory songbird species, and protection of bottom land hardwood forests, a threatened natural community in North Carolina.