Enjoy the refuge auto tour route for spectacular wildlife observation and photography experiences! All refuge complex auto tour routes are one-way unless marked otherwise. Please stay in your vehicle on auto tour routes, except at designated areas where signage indicates getting out is allowed. Many wildlife species are accustomed to slow-moving vehicles, so your automobile is often your best “blind.” No foot traffic, bicycles, or horses are allowed on the auto tour routes. The all-weather roads are constructed of compacted gravel and remain firm even during wet weather.
Merced NWR auto tour route
Length: 5 miles
Season: Open year-round
Access: Main entrance off Sandy Mush Rd
Road Surface: All-weather compacted gravel
The Merced auto tour route is a 5-mile loop that surrounds seasonal wetlands before heading across native uplands, refuge farm fields, and irrigated pastures. Visitors can access two elevated wildlife observation platforms along the tour route. One at the entrance parking lot provides a permanently-mounted spotting scope and a series of interpretive panels. The entrance parking lot also provides an information kiosk to orient visitors and access to a vault restroom facility.
The second observation deck is at the southeast corner of the route along with a picnic table. It also has a spotting scope. Visitors can leave their vehicles in the parking lot provided there and proceed to the observation deck or to the Bittern Marsh nature trail.
The Merced NWR provides seasonal spectacles of tens of thousands of snow and Ross’ geese in the winter and upwards of 20,000 lesser sandhill cranes roosting in the ponds or feeding in uplands. Visitors during the winter are also almost guaranteed to see large numbers of various waterfowl species like northern pintail, green-winged teal, and northern shoveler, among others, as well as numbers of shorebirds like black-necked stilt, American avocet, and white-faced ibis.
In the spring, the ponds in the southeast corner reliably host large numbers of black-bellied plover and dunlin. Keep your eyes peeled for surprises like a migrating snowy plover or stilt sandpiper. In the spring and early summer large flocks of tri-colored blackbird frequently nest and forage on the refuge. The wide-open landscape surrounding the auto tour route often encourages the presence of a variety of raptors. Bald eagles are often spotted in the winter and burrowing owls in the grasslands.
