Why this park
Dry Branch State Park covers 2,169 acres of the Western Highland Rim northwest of Hohenwald, at the meeting point of Lewis, Hickman and Perry counties. Nobody can visit it yet: the park's page says the land is closed to the public while staff prepare it for visitors, and it gives no opening date.
What makes the place worth drawing grows beside a small stream. In the wet ground along Dry Branch lives Tennessee yellow-eyed grass, a federally endangered plant, and the park's page calls this the largest and least-disturbed population in the state. The federal Fish and Wildlife Service describes clumps of twisted, deep green leaves rising from swollen bases, and a small brown cone at the tip of a thin stalk up to 28 inches long. In August and September the cones put out pale yellow flowers, each open only from late morning to midafternoon.
The story
The botanist Robert Kral described the species in 1978. Most of its relatives grow in acid soil, but this one needs thin soil over lime-rich rock, wet all year, and plenty of light; shaded by trees and shrubs, it fades. In 1991 the Fish and Wildlife Service listed it as endangered, when only seven sites were known, five of them in Tennessee.
The park's page credits Andrea Bishop, a botanist with the state's Natural Heritage Program, with finding Tennessee's largest population, in a wetland along Dry Branch that the page calls globally rare. International Paper Company owned the land. Her find led the state to designate part of it as a natural area in 2003, the page says. The Nature Conservancy bought the tract from the company in 2006, and the state bought the land from the Conservancy in 2007 and made it a permanently protected natural area. The state classed it as a natural area for science rather than recreation, and kept it closed to the public.
The plant still needs tending. The Fish and Wildlife Service's 2014 review counted seven populations in Tennessee, all in Lewis County, and Dry Branch was the only one it listed as owned by the state. The grass needs active care, the review says, such as cutting back woody growth to keep its ground open to the light, and the park's page says staff here are restoring the seeps, glades, barrens and native woods.
In June 2025 Lewis County's government announced that two of its natural areas, Dry Branch and Devil's Backbone, would become state parks, and the county mayor thanked Governor Bill Lee for funding them. On September 23, 2026, the state dedicated Dry Branch as Tennessee's 68th state park, NewsChannel 9 reported, and the land keeps every protection it had as a natural area. The station's report put the protected land above 2,500 acres; the park's page says 2,169. The page adds that Dry Branch is the first Tennessee state park to be fully off the power grid, and plans call for self-sustaining buildings, a visitor center among them.
When to go, and what to wear
For now there is no season to visit, since the park is closed. When it opens, NOAA's Hohenwald station, about six and a half miles east-southeast and some 980 feet up, gives a fair idea of the weather.
Late summer is the yellow-eyed grass's season, when it blooms in the August and September heat. August averages a high near 87°F and a low near 66°F, and September is the driest month, with about 3.8 inches of rain. Wear a light long-sleeve tee and long pants. The CDC says ticks live in grassy, brushy and wooded ground, and suggests permethrin-treated clothing, an EPA-registered repellent and a full tick check afterward.
Groundwater keeps the seeps and fens wet in every season, so wear waterproof boots. The park's page asks visitors to clean their footwear so they don't carry in invasive species, which makes a stiff brush worth packing.
Spring is mild and wet: April averages a high near 71°F and a low near 47°F, with about 5.6 inches of rain. December is the wettest month, at about 5.7 inches, and January averages a high near 48°F and a low near 28°F. In winter, wear layers, a rain shell and a warm hat.
Know before you go
- Dry Branch is closed to the public. As of early November 2026, the park's page says it is not yet open while staff lay the groundwork for visitors, and gives no opening date. Stay off the land until it opens.
- In 2025, the Lewis County Herald reported, the natural area had no parking lots or trails. The county described plans then for trails, campsites, picnic tables and education programs, but in September 2026 NewsChannel 9 reported that a master plan, still being written, will settle what visitors may do there.
- When the park opens, its page asks visitors to keep to marked routes, obey posted closures, clean their shoes and never collect plants. Tennessee law forbids taking the yellow-eyed grass without the landowner's permission, the Fish and Wildlife Service notes, and here the landowner is the state.
- Hours, fees and closures change, so check Dry Branch State Park's page before you go.
Sources: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, "Tennessee Yellow-eyed Grass (Xyris tennesseensis)" and "Tennessee yellow-eyed grass (Xyris tennesseensis Kral) 5-Year Review: Summary and Evaluation" (Alabama Ecological Services Field Office, 2014); "Two New State Parks Confirmed for Lewis County," Lewis County Herald (June 5, 2025); The Nature Conservancy, "Tennessee's Top Conservation Wins"; WTVC, "Tennessee has a new state park. Here's where you'll eventually be able to explore it," NewsChannel 9 (September 24, 2026); Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, "Preventing Tick Bites"; NOAA, U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020, Hohenwald station; Wikipedia; Dry Branch State Park, tnstateparks.com.
