The Nature Center 

The Balsam Mountain Trust website is on-line and waiting for your discovery at www.bmtrust.org.  No other community in the mountains of North Carolina offers its owners and the surrounding community such a life enriching resource.  Check it out to see what we mean!!

Click here to view the Balsam Mountain Trust summary, a wonderful brochure that outlines the extraordinary contributions the Trust makes to the community and to Balsam's members.  No other master-planned community in the North Carolina mountains has an organization that contributes so much to the experience of living in this remarkable part of the world.

Many communities claim to have an on-site Nature Center, but you'll be hard pressed to find one like this anywhere in the North Carolina mountains.  The Balsam Mountain Trust operates the Nature Center, and it serves as one of the social and educational heartbeats of the community.

Three full time, on-site naturalists are based at the Center, and together they develop a staggering collection of year round multi-generational programming for members of ages.  The variety of activities include guided nature hikes, bird watching classes, botanical walks, family focused programs led by a full-time Activities Director, a nature and cultural arts program, and several weeks of outdoor summer kids camps.

Unique to Balsam Mountain Preserve is the birds of prey program.  Several species - including a bald eagle, a red tail hawk, a falcon, and a screech owl - call the Nature Center home.  Take a journey to learn more about the birds of prey program.

The Nature Center is but one component of the Balsam Mountain Trust, a 501 (c) (3) nonprofit organization funded, in perpetuity, by real estate transfer fees as well as donations and grants.  The Trust provides stewardship and management of the 3,000 acre conservation easement.  The Trust also participates in educational outreach and scientific research, partnering with area colleges and universities on a variety of research projects.

"One of the main reasons Julie and I chose Balsam Mountain Preserve as the place to build our retirement home was our intense interest in nature.  We were striving to find a place where we could live in, learn about, and participate in the beauty of our surroundings.  The Trust helps provide us with all of that, as well as the ongoing oversight needed to protect this natural setting.  Additionally, we respect the Trust's efforts to share its programs and knowledge with our neighbors outside the Preserve".

- Sam Belfore, Ormond Beach, Florida and Sylva, North Carolina

"Balsam gets me closer to the woods to walk through, the fish to go after, and the big night sky to gaze at, a wonderful combination that renews my sense of awe at the wonder of it all."

- David Kitchens, Atlanta, Georgia