Welcome to Indian Lakes State Forest. There is a day use fee of $1.85 that can be paid with a qr code or a website. The sign says if you don't have connectivity to pay when you do have signal. Be mindful of your surroundings. This is wild Florida so you might see some wild animals, beautiful flora and fauna, and get bitten by flying critters like mosquitoes and yellow flies and get bit by ticks and chiggers. This cache is hidden before you get to the fee area. You are searching for a regular lock n lock type container in the scrub oaks
In addition to sandhills dotted with sinkholes, natural community types
found on the forest include depression marshes and mesic flatwoods. Driving down State Road 326 you can see a mix of longleaf pines, sand post oaks and turkey oaks in some of the nicer sandhills on this land. A mix of wildflower color and wiregrass is also visible here, especially the fall after a prescribed fire. A visitor might see gopher tortoises, fox squirrels, kestrels or turkeys. Another unique feature is Indian Lake, the deep sinkhole lake that is located east of Baseline Road and drains Indian Lake Prairie.
Scientific studies traced out the areas of water recharge that feed Silver Springs. These areas include the land now known as Indian Lake State Forest. As a result of the studies, Indian Lake State Forest was purchased under the Florida Forever springs initiative. Rolling sandhills on a sinkhole-rich karst topography dominate the property, although most of the sandhills have been converted to till agriculture or improved pasture.
The land uses prior to acquisition have allowed exotic plant invasion, and exotic plants have replaced or displaced historic vegetation in many areas. One of the main goals of the Florida Forever purchase was to restore these altered areas and eliminate any adverse impacts these alterations might have had on the Silver Springs system for water flow and water quality. Planting longleaf pine seedlings is an important step to meet this goal.