It was later taken over by the state's conservation agencies, which built several improved towers on the site, one of which remains, along with its accessory buildings and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places,[3] although it has not been used for fire detection since 1988.

The summit is also the site of a rare sphagnum bog that has been affected by acid rain since a mid-20th century windstorm blew down many of the trees sheltering it at the time.

Black Brook flows out of the hollow on the southeast, below a more gradual ridge descending from the summit to a low of 3,340 feet (1,020 m), where it connects to the 3,440-foot (1,050 m) and 3,480-foot (1,060 m) peaks[6] known unofficially as West and East Schoolhouse mountains between Balsam Lake and 3,868-foot (1,179 m) Graham Mountain, the High Peak two miles (3.2 km) to its east.

Mill Brook on the north slopes feeding that river's East Branch directly at Pepacton Reservoir, making it part of New York City's water supply.

Its Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) manages the land as part of the 13,500-acre (5,500 ha) Balsam Lake Mountain Wild Forest, which stretches across Mill Brook Ridge and circles back to Beaverkill Road around private lands along Beecher Lake and brook.

The hardwoods, more and more stunted by the harsher conditions at higher elevations, eventually give way to a dense, lower-canopy boreal forest dominated by those two species (primarily the firs) on the summit.

[10] It is dominated by peat mosses, mountain holly and balsam fir, with its perimeter surrounded by yellow birch.

Beavers have been common over the years, with Kudish finding more evidence of present and past dams and meadows on the slopes of Balsam Lake and its neighboring peaks.

[5]: 92 The Catskills were formed 250-350 million years ago, during the Devonian and Silurian periods, when the sands and silt that had eroded from the Acadian Mountains to the northeast collected in a river delta at the mouth of the shallow inland sea that is now the Allegheny Plateau.

The delta uplifted as a single unit, and gradually streams eroded valleys, creating a dissected plateau.

[11] Catskill forest historian Michael Kudish says the Mill Brook Ridge range, including Balsam Lake, is one of the areas in the region showing the fewest signs of human disturbance.

[13] At some point before the United States Geological Survey resurveyed the area for its 1901 maps, the Turner Hollow Road, an old, rough turnpike connecting Seager and Quaker Clearing, often used by members of the Balsam Lake Club to get to the train station at Arkville, was rerouted from the col between East and West Schoolhouse mountains to the one between West Schoolhouse and Balsam Lake.

[5] It has since recovered, but the bog has become vulnerable to the effects of acid rain in the meantime, possibly changing its growth patterns.

Staffed fire towers became less essential; the state began closing them down and dismantling them in favor of more cost-effective aerial surveillance.

Three years later, the Catskill Center in turn sold the land to the state, putting most of the mountain in public ownership.

All approaches eventually put the hiker on the Balsam Lake Mountain Trail (BLMT), the 1.6-mile (2.6 km) loop route over the summit, which follows the jeep road to the north but is a footpath to its south.

[23] Hikers often combine a climb of Balsam Lake with neighboring Graham, reachable by an old road that branches to the west off the DBRT 750 feet (230 m) north of the northern BLMT junction.