BISP is bordered on two sides by the Niagara River channel and floodplain (East and West Branches) and on two sides by light residential land use.  I-190 bi-sects the BISP into two pieces through the approximate center of the Park.  The emergent wetland in the Park has two water control structures installed in 1987.

The Niagara River corridor is essentially an ecological disaster zone when it comes to riparian wetlands due to the extremely heavy industrial manufacturing and urban development legacy associated with cheap power production at Niagara Falls over the last ~150 years (e.g., the region is home to the country's first superfund site!).  In a part of the world where reference standard wetlands are slim to none, this is one of the most intact and critical wetland ecosystems for birds and fish that we have on the Nigara River, despite its impairments (i.e., altered site hydrology and geomorphology from dam operations, invasive species etc.). 

The surficial geology of the Buckhorn Island State Park wetlands is the result glacial events during the Pleistocene epoch. Features are identified in the Niagara River region from the Wisconsin stage of the event about 12,000 years ago, prominent among these are various moraines, glacial lakes (both extant and extinct) and till deposits. The Buckhorn Island wetlands are mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) as 100% unconsolidated till deposits with variable textures from boulders to silt that is poorly sorted, sand-rich diamict deposited beneath glacial ice. Permeability of the till material is a function of the level of local compaction with thickness of the deposits varying throughout the Niagara River region from approximately 3 to 164 feet depending on location. These glacial till deposits have been re-worked by the floods of the Niagara River with sorting and stratification across Buckhorn Island wetlands typical of a large riverine floodplain geomorphic landscape position. The area is mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) as 100% unconsolidated till deposits with variable textures from boulders to silt that is poorly sorted, sand-rich diamict deposited beneath glacial ice (Cadwell 1986a, 1986b).

The Buckhorn Island State Park is mapped as relatively flat, with very little local variation (less than 6 feet) in elevation, and consists of several mapped United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Soil Survey Geographic database (SSURGO) soil unit types.  The primary soil types in BISP are ponded Haplaquolls, Raynham silt loam, 0 to 3 % slopes, Canandaigua silt loam, and open water.