Pettigrew State Park is open for year-round recreation, including hiking, camping, fishing, boating and picnicking.

Pettigrew State Park was established during the Great Depression after the land was leased from the Farm Security Administration, a New Deal program of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Pettigrew is home to an abundance of wildlife: Lake Phelps is a primary wintering location for several types of waterfowl, including Canada geese and Tundra swans.

The park is also home to the woodland creatures, such as raccoons and white-tailed deer, that are commonly found along the east coast of the United States.

Recent work by the U.S. Geological Survey has interpreted the Carolina Bays as relict thermokarst lakes that formed several thousands of years ago when the climate was colder, drier, and windier.

[4] Thermokarst lakes develop by thawing of frozen ground (permafrost) and by subsequent modification by wind and water.

Archaeologists have found thousands of relics at the park, including pottery, arrowheads, and sunken dugout canoes.

[3] Josiah Collins was one of the first European-descended settlers to live and farm in the area of Pettigrew State Park, arriving in the 1780s.

Collins and his partners used slave labor to drain the swamps surrounding Lake Phelps and establish an extensive plantation known as Somerset Place.

[3] Somerset Place and the land that is now Pettigrew State Park passed through the hands of several owners until it was acquired by the Farm Security Administration in 1937 during the Great Depression.

Two of the most recent land acquisitions included adding the entire shoreline of Lake Phelps, and the largest expansion, which took place along the Scuppernong River in 2004.

[8] A forest of bay trees, sweetgum, pawpaw, persimmon, bald cypress and poplar are found on the northern shore of Lake Phelps.

Atamasco lily, periwinkle, buttercup, Jack-in-the-pulpit, maypops, and jewelweed are sometimes found on the banks and in the shallows of Lake Phelps.

The Scuppernong River provides a habitat for swamp dogwood, evening primrose, blue flag iris and cardinal flowers.

The waterfowl at Lake Phelps use the area primarily for roosting purpose before flying off to nearby feeding sites.

Commonly seen waterfowl are Canada geese, tundra swans, mallards, American black ducks and northern pintail.

Ospreys build their nests in the tops of the tallest trees in the park and feed on the abundant fish of Lake Phelps.

The endangered red wolf has been reintroduced to eastern North Carolina, including Pettigrew State Park.

[8] The most common species are game fish, found in Lake Phelps, are largemouth bass, chain pickerel, catfish, yellow perch and pumpkinseed.

[10] Pettigrew State Park is open for year-round recreation, including hiking, fishing, camping, boating and picnicking.

The North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC) has established fishing regulations, such as catch and length limits, that are meant to enhance sport fisheries in public waters such as Lake Phelps and the Scuppernong River.

Additionally the NCWRC stocks Lake Phelps with bluegill and they have begun a program to reintroduce alewife and blueback herring via fish ladder on Bee Tree Canal from the Scuppernong River.