Birding Hot Spots & Festivals

This gem of a refuge offers hiking and walking trails, bird hides, seasonally protected areas, historic buildings, a Ranger office with clean restrooms and a gift shop, and a long winding driving area. Elk, geese, migratory song and water birds, and many more animals can be seen throughout the park. Some trails are bordered with wild blackberries, pears, apples and plums, which attract many birds and are heavenly to walk through when ripe and fragrant.

The refuge is accessible only by boat. However, the refuge is administered as part of the National Key Deer Refuge headquartered on Big Pine Key, which is 100- miles south of Miami. The visitor center is located 1/4-mile north of the traffic light on Key Deer Boulevard in the Big Pine Key Shopping Plaza. The visitor center can be reached at +13058720774

This is a great place. The scrub jays will come and sit on your head.

Situated on a high desert plain this Refuge is home to countless migrating and resident birds. We where not there at the height of the migrations but we managed to see large numbers of birds. The Refuge itself is well laid out with roads to most areas of the park.