Seton Falls Park natural area

E. 233 St. bet. Seton Ave. and Baychester Ave.

Seton Falls Park contains a thriving freshwater wetland and a forest largely undisturbed since the American Revolution. Together these ecosystems provide 34.7 acres of habitat to over 30 species of birds. Rattlesnake Creek, a mostly underground waterway, is surrounded by a floodplain forest dominated by red maple (Acer rubrum), sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua), and American elm (Ulmus americana) as well as shallow emergent marshes with fringed sedge (Carex crinita), green arrow arum (Peltandra virginica) and pickerelweed (Pontederia cordata), at the bottom of a sheer, rocky ravine. Floodplain forests grow on mineral soils in the lowlands of river floodplains and deltas.

The low areas of Seton Falls Park along the stream corridor are annually flooded in spring and high areas are flooded irregularly. Above the ravine, oak-hickory and successional forests are dominant. Historically Rattlesnake creek was fed by the surrounding watershed and coursed to the southeast through forests and marshes, eventually entering the Hutchinson River. Today, the creek is fed by drinking water, and the creek is pumped out of the park since the stream corridor was filled and developed downstream of the park in the 1970s.

Seton Falls Park is home to a plethora of animals including salamanders, dragonflies, chipmunks, tree frogs, swifts, hawks, thrushes, woodpeckers, and butterflies. The monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) is frequently seen around Seton Falls Park's lawn.