Headlands Dunes State Nature Preserve

Headlands Dunes is a 25-acre preserve just to the east of Headlands Beach State Park. The sand dunes just off shore of Lake Erie are rare in Ohio because most of the area adjacent to the lake has been developed. Surprisingly, a number of plants that originated on the Atlantic coast grow in this small nature preserve.

It is thought that they reached this far into the continent thousands of years ago when the immense weight of ice-age glaciers made this part of the continent sink downward. This allowed seawater to reach into Lake Ontario. The Atlantic coastal vegetation followed this ocean incursion into the continent and eventually spread to the shores of Lake Erie.