Palo Pinto Mountains State Park Partners (PPMSPP) was established to help preserve, protect, and improve the natural beauty of Palo Pinto Mountains State Park. We are a volunteer-based, 501(c)(3) non-profit organization working in partnership with Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD).

About Us

The goal for PPMSPP is to work with TPWD in a cooperative relationship that helps them carry out their goals. We depend on the energetic input from people who care about the park and who support us by joining, donating, volunteering or purchasing our concessions.

PPM State Park Partners-Board of Directors:

• Terry Carver, President  Email:
• Mark Hickerson, Vice-President
• Tommy Lackey, Treasurer
• Janis Janes, Secretary
• Danny Miller, Past President
• Craig Carver, Director
• Dale Hamilton, Director
• Mark Hickerson, Director
• Bill Hopkins, Director
• Greg Hughes, Director
• Tonya Orsini, Director
• Laura Sharp, Director
• Kella Staller, Director
• Roseatta Stephens, Director

Become a Member Today:

Individual - $25, Senior - $20, Family - $40, Business - $50,
You can also include an additional donation by selecting “Other” on the online payment option and include the total of your membership + donation. All membership/donations are 100% tax deductible.

Select the “DONATE” button to the right to pay with CC or mail your check to:
PPMSPP
PO Box 201
Strawn, TX 76475

Our Partners in Action

Over the past few years, the Partners have been working hard to help the Park prepare for
opening day. Our projects have included:

• Trail clearing and cleaning - 2023-present.
• Helped with the purchase of insulation for the temporary maintenance barn, surveillance camera on the back park gate and tractor tire repair.
• Purchased an all-terrain Action Trackchair and 2 GRIT all-terrain wheelchairs with funds received through a grant from the Ken W. Davis Foundation. These chairs will be available for use in the Park, free of charge.
• Collected 3000lbs of plastic film for the NexTrex recycling program, awarding the Park 3 new park benches. A special “Thank you” to the Strawn Chamber of Commerce and The Each and Everyone Foundation for sponsoring bench # 2 and # 3, and to our PPMSPP Members, Weatherford Tractor Supply, Gordon, Strawn, and surrounding area folks that contributed their recyclable plastic film (grocery bags) to help us reach our goal.
• Participated in assembling of fish habitat structures that were installed around the fishing pier.
• Participated in the 2025 Golden Cheeked Warbler Survey for TPWD.
• Participating in the Strawn Farmer’s Market. Raising awareness and meeting new park enthusiasts – 2023-present.
• Purchasing 2 mounted binocular views with EnChroma lenses to correct color blindness. These lenses will not affect non-colorblind users and will be mounted on the accessible trail in the Park. These binoculars will be purchased with funds received though our 2 nd grant from the Ken W. Davis Foundation.

In the beginning stages of the park, several volunteer groups assisted with Park projects:

• Fort Worth Audubon Society, May 2013 – Native Bird Survey
• Native Plant Society (Cross Timbers Chapter) & Texas Master Naturalist, January 2014 - Designed & Built Butterfly Garden – January 2014
• Trail Work Day, March 2015 – Over 20 volunteers, including the Texas Equestrian Trail Riders Association (TETRA) and the North Texas Range Riders (NTTR), cleared several miles of equestrian and hiking trails.
• Star Parties 2013/2014/2015 - The Texas Astronomical Society of Dallas (TAS) and the Fort Worth Astronomical Society (FWAS) have both provided volunteers and telescopes for semi-annual stargazing parties beginning in the Spring of 2013.
• Strawn Chamber of Commerce, April 2015 - 2015 Texas Trash-Off/Keep Strawn Beautiful Clean-up Day – Volunteers scraped and painted picnic tables at old city park below Lake Tucker.

Your membership supports our efforts to ensure that Palo Pinto Mountains State Park is well funded and developed and the natural beauty of this North Texas gem is preserved for future generations. All funds are used for park improvement and educational efforts.

Click an image below to enlarge.

About the Park

Texas Parks & Wildlife Department acquired the original acreage for the park in October, 2011, using funds from the sale of Eagle Mountain Lake State Park (located near Fort Worth). With the acquisition of several smaller parcels, the property now encompasses 4,871 acres of beautiful, rugged, undeveloped terrain.

The newest state park in Texas, is located in the Western Cross Timbers Ecoregion of North Central Texas. The property offers great topographical diversity as well as a great variety of plants and wildlife. As the name implies, the Park is situated in the Palo Pinto Mountains. The name Palo Pinto roughly translates to "painted stick" in reference to the juniper trees of the area. The isolated, rugged mountains have been called a northern extension of the Hill Country and indeed they are both dissected plateaus featuring karst topography with similar vegetation, including Post Oak, Mesquite, Live Oak, Blackjack Oak, Texas Ash, Cedar Elms, Cedar and Ash juniper and native Pecan. The park is mostly rugged and hilly with sandstone and limestone escarpments, steep slopes, with intermittent small areas of prairie. The topography is such that there are a great number of striking scenic overlooks, where you can see for miles and miles. Two great features of the park are Palo Pinto Creek and Tucker Lake:

• Palo Pinto Creek, which runs along the northern edge of the park, is a major tributary to the Brazos River. It is a very scenic creek with several deep pools that are good for swimming and fishing.
• Tucker Lake - The centerpiece of the park is Tucker Lake, a 90-acre lake that was built in 1937 by the WPA as the water supply for the nearby city of Strawn. This beautiful, deep lake is set in a bowl surrounded by green hills covered in juniper, oak and elm. The Lake not only provides beautiful scenery and serene solitude but also fantastic fishing.

Wildlife observers to the park will see such animals as white-tailed deer, turkey, birds of prey, waterfowl, songbirds, reptiles and various small mammals. Fish found in the park include bass, catfish, crappie, bluegill and sunfish.

Palo Pinto Mountains State Park has attracted a great amount of interest throughout the state:

• KERA (PBS) - http://keranews.org/post/take-sneak-peek-newest-state-park-texas
• TPWD - https://tpwd.texas.gov/newsmedia/releases/?req=20140522d
• Fort Worth Star-Telegram - http://www.star-telegram.com/news/local/community/fort-worth/article3867741.html
• Fort Worth Star-Telegram Editorial - http://www.star-telegram.com/opinion/editorials/article3868569.html
• TETRA - http://tetra.memberlodge.org/page-1690536
• Breckenridge American - http://www.breckenridgeamerican.com/news/ci_25520869/
• Fort Worth Star Telegram Op-ed - http://www.star-telegram.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/other-voices/article16541441.html

For More Information

For more information about Palo Pinto Mountains State Park, visit our Facebook Page https://www.facebook.com/PaloPintoMtns or contact Superintendent James Adams at 254-210-3015 or via email at  

For more information about Palo Pinto Mountains State Park Partners, please contact us:

phone – 817-688-5157 (text only)
email -
address - P.O. Box 201, Strawn, TX 76475