Back to Conway Conservation's home pageMOCKERNUT HILL BOTANICAL GARDEN
Mockernut Hill Botanical Garden (MHBG) is a 109-acre property located in the scenic horse country of northwest Marion County in north-central Florida between the cities of Gainesville and Ocala. The site landscape is varied karst topography with numerous sinkholes in a mosaic of hardwood forests, wetlands, pinelands, and meadows. The garden is in its early stages of development and is currently open only by special arrangement.
The land is currently owned by the Conway family, Conway Data, Inc., and the Wishard family The garden is managed by conservation ecologist Linda Conway Duever through Conway Conservation, Inc.
The Shiloh location was selected in 1989, after several years of systematic search for a manageable site with extreme variety in habitats and topography and exceptional aesthetic potential and conservation value. Over the next five years, the basic management plan was developed, and second-growth woods were cleared to open up views, enhance wildlife habitat, restore open woodlands, and establish areas for future plantings. Over seven miles of trails have been carefully laced through the landscape. Planting of seedling trees and wildflower meadows began in 1993. The first building, an office and director's residence, was built in 1998. Current activities are focused on infrastructure development.
One of the garden’s major purposes is to provide a place for Conway Data, Inc. and Conway Conservation, Inc. to explore and demonstrate techniques that can be used in conservation programs on corporate real estate.
Significant areas of the garden will be maintained in native vegetation as nature preserves. These include exemplary stands of old-growth subtropical hardwood forest dominated by live oak, swamp chestnut oak, pignut hickory, and magnolia, as well as a southern red oak - longleaf pine - mockernut hickory restoration project. Wildlife habitat management -- especially for gopher tortoises, southeastern American kestrels, eastern indigo snakes, and underground and invertebrate fauna -- is an important concern.
Some disturbed portions of the site will be developed into ornamental and experimental gardens. Plantings to be featured will include native pineland groundcover species, wildflower meadows, cold-hardy "tropicals", storm-resistant landscaping, grasses, fruit trees, endangered species, and problematic exotic species. Staff residences, offices, workshops, barns, nursery areas, and guest facilities will be clustered around an old homesite on the Shiloh Swamp tract.
The garden has an extensive network of horseback riding and nature walking trails that link into a regional greenway system through the Northwest Marion Greenway currently under development by the Conservation Trust for Florida . Preserving regional greenway - wildlife corridor functions across the landscape and maintaining controlled public access to these trails is one of MHBG’s most important objectives.