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Red Tail Hawk

Plan Your Visit

Hours of Operation

Park: daylight hours

Visitors Center: daily
Sunday-Monday: 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Tuesday-Thursday: 8 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Friday-Saturday: 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.

Directions
Take I 65 to Harding Place, Exit 78. Travel west on Harding Place (or Battery Lane) to Granny White Pike. Turn left and travel south to Otter Creek Road and turn left (across from Granny White Market).
Detailed directions
To the park | From the park

Park Activities


Hiking Trails Natural Area

Points of Interest


  Warner Parks
  Travelers Rest - home of John Overton
  Brentwood City Parks
  Natchez Trace Parkway
  Historic Franklin

Get Involved


  Friends of Radnor Lake
Radnor Lake State Park is located in Davidson County in the midst of the Overton Hills, south of Metropolitan Nashville in the Oak Hill Community. This natural area provides a variety of scenic spots and a diversity of natural habitats ranging from the lake, to streams and placid sloughs. Wildlife and numerous species of plants are in abundance. It is a place that provides scenic, biological, geological, and passive recreational opportunities not found in other metropolitan areas of Nashville's size.

Recent Park Event

Friends of Radnor Lake Present Governor Phil Bredesen with Environmental Award
(Click link above to read more and for a photo slideshow)

Hiking Trails

Radnor Lake is observed as a nature sanctuary, so the trails are strictly used for hiking and wildlife observation.

From The Tennessee Conservationist's Great Hikes With Fran Wallas:
Radnor Lake State Natural Area Offers an Easy Hike for People Wild About Wildflowers

Trails are off limits to pets and no jogging is allowed.

Hiking Trail Map

Natural Area

Radnor Lake State Park provides a variety of scenic areas and a diversity of natural habitats. It even has some of the highest hills in the Nashville Basin. Wildlife is amazingly abundant. One can observe geese, herons, coots, and other birds as well as many species of salamanders, frogs, snakes, lizards, turtles, and mammals. Hundreds of species of wildflowers, mosses, fungi, ferns, and other lesser plants as well as trees, shrubs, and vines add to the natural ecological diversity of the area.

Radnor's geology is also fascinating and complex. The rocks, which form its hills and valleys, were deposited on the floor of a shallow, tropical, inland sea 500,000,000 years ago.

The 85-acre lake for which the site is named was impounded in 1914 by the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company to furnish water for steam engines and livestock at nearby Radnor Yards. It was intended that the site would provide a private hunting and fishing preserve for L & N officials and their guests. Soon after construction of the lake, many birds discovered it and began to feed and rest there during their annual migration. In 1923, the executive vice-president of L & N stopped all hunting and declared the area a wildlife sanctuary at the request of the Tennessee Ornithological Society. In 1962, the area was purchased by a construction firm and plans were made to subdivide the property for a housing development. Shortly thereafter, public sentiment arose to preserve the area as a park. In 1973, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, with the financial assistance of the Federal Government and thousands of concerned citizens, purchased the Radnor site as the first official state natural area.

Hiking, nature study and observation, photography, and research are the major activities presently enjoyed by Radnor's many annual visitors. It is a place that provides scenic, biological, geological, and passive recreational opportunities not found in other metropolitan areas of Nashville's size.

Visit the Natural Areas web site.

Programs

Several programs are planned throughout the year. Some include canoe floats, wildflower walks, astronomy night hikes, nature hikes, programs on snakes, cave ecology, and birds of prey, plus a whole lot more. Call park for more information.

Friends Group

Please take a moment to visit the Friends of Radnor Lake web site!

Tour Buses

Buses not appropriate for east entrance. Call park for more information.