We also found quite a few shot gun shells on a small beach like area, which we picked up and discarded later. (We found out later the flash flood had come through two days before.) With the earth being still damp, we saw all kinds of animal tracks-especially deer and fox. We saw some coots, and there was big evidence of a recent flash flood that had washed the land and toppled a wooden structure that had a map of the refuge on it. It is 1.75 miles long, and we did not want to do the whole thing, but we were game for some of it. Halfway through the drive is a trail called the Oxbow Trail. We looked through the binoculars, and it was an interesting sight with his red epaulets flying around. Along the way, we saw three red winged blackbirds two females and a male that was trying to get the females interested. The road went in a circle, so we knew we would see everything before it was over. Upon leaving the visitor center, we looked at the map and decided to turn left on the road instead of going straight the reasoning being that the road to the left went past some water that came to the roadside rather than having vegetation between us and the water. Unfortunately, the tree had grown and was being scraped/inhibited by the now too small hole in the deck one of my few criticisms of the place. When we went on the small deck overlooking the water, we noticed that a cottonwood tree had been planted to come up through the deck and provide shade. We did the short trail (called the butterfly trail) right near the visitor's center and saw some dragonflies and a couple more gray lizards. While there, we saw a lizard, who stopped to get a drink from the trickle of water going down to the pond (and also ate ants off the sidewalk), a small jack rabbit, and some hummingbirds. The pond has a partial water supply from the building air conditioning, which drains out of a pipe to a concrete trough which drains down to the pond. Before going out, we went outside by a pond, near the building to put on sunscreen. We got a map and also borrowed one of the pairs of binoculars that they have on hand to loan out. When we got there, we went to the visitor's center, and were greeted by a woman who seemed to be a very knowledgeable and helpful volunteer. Like most NWRs, it is sort of in an isolated area.
We read up on it and discovered it had a year-round water source, which is different from most of the NWRs in our home state, and it was free! We went in the morning so that it would not be as hot. We stopped in Roswell (at a family member's request) while looking at the Atlas, we noticed the Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge.
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