Attwater Prairie Chicken
Plan Your Visit
What To Do
Visit at the Visitor Center
Come stop by our new visitor center to learn more about the refuge. Elements of the old visitor center, such as our beloved Thomas Waddell collection, live on with new, modern interpretative signs and displays. Interact one-on-one with our refuge staff, interns, and volunteers during our visiting hours.
Wildlife Watching and Nature Trails
A 4-mile auto tour loop takes visitors through the prairie and along Coushatta creek. All motor vehicles must stay on the designated auto tour route. The auto tour loop can also serve as a hiking or biking trail.
The Horseshoe Lake Trail (0.85 miles) and Sycamore Trail (1.2 miles) provide excellent opportunities to enjoy the native coastal prairie and riparian areas.
Wildlife Photography
Wildlife, wildflowers and amazing sunrises and sunsets make for spectacular photography subjects on the refuge. Photographers will find that using their vehicles as a slow-moving blind on the auto tour will allow them to get close to many refuge birds.
First Saturday Tours
The first Saturday of each month, a guided van tour of the refuge will take visitors on a 1½ hour trip through the prairie.
Know Before You Go
If you are visiting on a weekend day or federal holiday, the visitor center will be closed. However, maps and fact sheets are available at the kiosk by the parking lot. The auto tour and trails are still available to enjoy every day from sunrise to sunset.
There is no charge to visit.
Activities
Featured Species
Get Involved
National wildlife refuges provide many opportunities for you to help your community by doing what you love. National wildlife refuges partner with volunteers, youth groups, landowners, neighbors and residents of urban and rural communities to make a lasting difference. Find out how you can help make American lands healthier.
Services
The refuge manages habitat through conservation practices to ensure the survival of native species. Key management tools include prescribed burns (2,000 to 3,000 acres annually), cattle grazing to create pathways for chicks, and invasive species control (McCartney rose, Chinese tallow). Restoration efforts include harvesting and planting native grass seeds in former cultivated fields and managing food plots for prairie-chickens. Biologists also conduct population monitoring using radio telemetry and maintain a predator management program during nesting season.
About
Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1972 to provide habitat for the critically endangered Attwater’s Prairie-Chicken. The 10,541-acre refuge is home to one of the largest remnants of native coastal prairie remaining in southeast Texas. It is managed to maintain or improve native coastal prairie communities for the species' reintroduction and survival, offering a glimpse into the landscape's historic past.