Delevan National Wildlife Refuge

The Delevan National Wildlife Refuge is one of five refuges in the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge Complex located in the Sacramento Valley of north-central California.

The 5,797-acre refuge is 80 miles north of Sacramento and preserves 4,500 acres of intensively managed wetlands and 1,200 acres of uplands.

More than 300,000 ducks and 100,000 geese winter on the refuge. With 95 percent of the wetlands of California's Central Valley lost to development during the last century, waterfowl have become increasingly dependent upon the refuges of the Sacramento Valley. As a result, the marsh management program is one of the most intensive in the refuge system.

The refuge supports several threatened and endangered plants and animals, including giant garter snakes, wintering peregrine falcons and bald eagles, breeding tricolored blackbird, and a large colony of the endangered plant known as the palmate-bracted bird's beak.

Resident wildlife include grebes, herons, blackbirds, beavers, muskrats, black-tailed deer and other species typical of northern California's upland and wetland habitats.

Approximately 6,400 to 6,500 people hunt on the refuge each year for waterfowl and pheasants and an estimated 1,000 visitors observe wildlife from adjacent roads and a primitive overlook on Maxwell Road along the southern boundary of the refuge.

To reach the refuge, take Interstate 5 north about nine miles to the Maxwell Road exit. Drive east on Colusa-Maxwell Road for approximately four miles to graveled Four Mile Road, which parallels the west refuge boundary.