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That recognition validated six years of work at Cranberry Highlands led by Golf Course Superintendent David Barber. The Audubon program offered advice which helped guide Barber in developing an effective conservation and wildlife enhancement program.
That program encompassed the entire golf course. Projects included placing nesting boxes for certain bird species, environmentally sensitive pest-management techniques, water quality management and conservation, maintaining food and protective cover for wildlife, reducing the use of chemicals, educational outreach, and more.
As a result of that work, Cranberry Highlands maintains a balanced environment in which golfers and wildlife live and play in harmony. Insect control, for example, is accomplished by providing homes to birds for whom insects are a diet staple. A growing variety of owls, butterflies, bats, hawks, deer, amphibians, fish and small animals now live in a natural ecosystem where wildlife thrives and golfers flourish.
In the spring of 2009, Barber built a nature trail in a wooded area of Cranberry Highlands, between holes three and four, for which guided tours are available upon request.
Right from the start, Cranberry Highlands was created to celebrate the hilly wooded landscape that is the hallmark of Western Pennsylvania’s terrain. Designed by W. R. Love Golf Course Architects of College Park, Maryland on a 332-acre site which includes an assortment of sensitive environmental features, Cranberry Highlands was built to showcase the area’s four-season ecosystem and its rugged topography
Group tours along the Cranberry Highland Nature Trail are available by appointment with Cranberry Highlands. The trail loop is one half mile long; a compete tour takes approximately one hour. Call 724-776-7372 to arrange a time for your group to walk the trail with a staff member as your guide. A limited number of tour guides are available, so advance booking – which is separate from tee time reservations for golfing – is essential.
Most of the man-made features you will see along the trail were created from natural materials which are indigenous to the area or made from recycled manufactured items including golf cart windows, pipe, and scrap lumber.
Of the 332 acres in the Cranberry Highlands site, only 186 have been developed as a golf course. Much of the remaining space has been dedicated to natural preservation, enhancement and educational purposes. Community organizations including the Boy Scouts have been involved in the development of the Cranberry Highlands Nature Trail. And we welcome the active involvement of other organizations which, like Cranberry Highlands, share the Audubon’s philosophy of land conservation and stewardship.
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