Great Lakes - Lake Erie Shoreline and Conneaut Creek

Pennsylvania’s portion of the Great Lakes ecoregion begins with its 45-mile stretch of shoreline along Lake Erie. Many streams drain from adjacent Erie and Crawford counties, the Central Lowlands Province, into the lake. Lake Erie moderates the area’s climate, which produces specialty agriculture, like vineyards, which are found nowhere else in our region. This area is within the larger St. Lawrence River Basin.

The Great Lakes - Lake Erie shoreline and Conneaut Creek region encompasses the western portion of Pennsylvania’s Lake Erie coastline from Presque Isle and Bay west to the Ohio border and includes the watersheds of the many tributaries to the lake. Two WPC focus areas are the Lake Erie front and Conneaut Creek. Conservation targets include forests, bluff face seepages, marshes, swamps, beaches, oak savannah and sandplains.

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The native biodiversity of the Lake Erie front is greatly threatened by habitat loss due to development. Specific threats include fragmentation of undeveloped areas along the coast, invasive plant and animal species, and poor management of forests and farmlands in the region. The Conneaut Creek drainage includes expanses of forests and swamps, and a host of aquatic species.

The 3,131-acre David M. Roderick Wildlife Reserve (State Game Lands 314), purchased by WPC in 1991, is part of a 5,000-acre tract of land spanning the Pennsylvania and Ohio border and managed by the PA Game Commission. In 2004, WPC purchased the 540-acre Coho tract and turned this land over to DCNR, establishing Erie Bluffs State Park.

Meet Genny McIntyre - WPC's first vice president for Institutional Advancement