Twin Falls Resort State Park

The forest provides habitat for a vast array of plants and animals and protects the quality of the watershed. It also provides places for recreation and relaxation. These ecosystems are complex webs of organisms that include plants, animals, fungi, and bacteria. The park’s total size is 3,776 acres and the area within the old-growth designation is 777 acres. Common tree species include: scarlet oak, red oak, chestnut oak, white oak, black oak, yellow poplar, eastern hemlock, black gum, red maple, various hickories, sourwood, and dogwood. Both mountain laurel and great laurel are common and often large in size. Jackson Branch, which is entirely within Twin Falls Resort State Park, consistently produces one of the highest average Stream Condition Index scores calculated by the WV Department of Environmental Protection from among the thousands of streams sampled. Jackson Branch is one of that agency’s reference streams against which all other streams are compared to determine the relative ecological health of the stream and the forest which surrounds it. Twin Falls Resort State Park is completely surrounded by forest, more than 90% of which is corporately-owned and actively and aggressively timbered. The visual impact of this juxtaposition of management is not lost on the public and is frequently commented upon in conversations with park rangers. Designation in the Old-Growth Forest Network further enhances the value of this site both as an educational tool and as an ecological example. The relatively easy access to this forest provides tremendous opportunities for people to recreate in a location they will know is among the purest and cleanest places on earth.