Bosque del Apache is Bird Nerd Heaven

I recently had the great good fortune to visit Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico. It’s a special place.

The refuge is an incredible winter destination for those of you who are fellow nature addicts. The Bosque is bird nerd heaven.

You’ve probably seen the pictures. Thousands of snow geese and sandhill cranes, that’s what the Bosque is famous for.

And for good reason. The cranes are everywhere – in the marshes, in the fields, flying overhead.

The snow geese are a little more elusive.  My first day in I didn’t see any at all. But when you do find them, you find a lot! Thousands. The snow geese travel in huge flocks of hundreds, even thousands, of birds as they move from pond to pond.

When I was there, the geese were spending most of their time on the other side of the river, where they didn’t have to deal with tourists like me.

The Entrance Pond

But there is one time and place where you are very likely to find them. No guarantees. (I did get completely skunked by the geese my first day.) There is a long, shallow. marshy pond located shortly after you cross into the refuge on Old Highway 1. Flocks of geese show up just before sunrise and take off soon after the light hits the water.

You’ll find the cranes, there, too. After all, the cranes are everywhere. The shallow pond is a great roost for them at night. It’s deep enough to keep the coyotes at bay but shallow enough to sleep in.

It’s a tradition for the bird nerds who frequent the Bosque. It’s kind of like watching the sunset in Key West, a crowd gathering to applaud an everyday natural phenomenon.

Lines of photographers gather along the berm next to the pond, like combat fisherman in Alaska, tripod to tripod. Instead of salmon, they’re trying to catch that perfect shot, waiting for that sometime moment when all the geese take off at once. It doesn’t always happen, but when it does…

These are die-hard nature photographers. I was part of the maybe 3% who DIDN”T have a lense as long as your leg.

Most of these folks come from a different tax bracket than I do. I overheard a conversation -“Well, I didn’t get the upgrade to the balcony room for the Antarctica trip because they wanted another 25,000 and I thought that was a little steep.” Uh-huh. No wonder she has that big long lense and I don’t.

As a photographer, I found it a great place to practice, and learn the art of nature photography. Low light and lots of movement are difficult taskmasters, teaching new skills in the art of capturing the essential moment. Practice, practice. I could see my photos improve with every day I had to learn here.

Refuge Roads

If your lense isn’t long enough to get that National Geographic shot at the pond, head on up to the other refuge roads and trails. There are plenty of other birds to see here, too.

Nestled in farming country along the Rio Grande River, the Bosque provides a patchwork of different habitats. From grasslands to marshes to patches of woodland, it’s a peaceful, pastoral setting.

Bosque del Apache is intensively managed to recreate conditions similar to what was found along the Rio Grande before the river was dammed and tamed. Fields are flooded to create temporary marshy areas, just as if the Rio Grande had flooded its banks with summer monsoons or fast-melting snow from the mountains. These ephemeral floods create an everchanging mosaic that supports nourishing plants like chufa and millet for the birds and other wildlife to eat.

Although there are two wonderful loops you can drive and half a dozen trails, most of the 57,331-acre refuge is not easily accessible to the general public. Thirty thousand acres of Bosque del Apache are managed as wilderness.

Stressing out at work and need a little more peace in your life? Come here and slow down. It’s zen, a perfect spot for a bit of nature therapy. A dozen varieties of waterfowl feed in the ponds and flooded fields. Raptors perch on branches and songbirds flutter by or rustle through the grasses. There are always birds flying by. This land is so full of life!

It’s not all birds, either. You might see deer, javelina, even a bobcat. I watched a skunk trot down the road one afternoon.

This land has a subtle beauty. It grows on you. It’s a place you could come day after day and never tire of. It’s a place that changes with every passing day, with every passing hour, yet still remains constant. It is a place to which I know I will return again and again.

Lodging

There is no camping in the refuge. There are a couple of spots where you can camp near San Antonio, the nearest town. However, it is very cold at night, with temps in the teens, during the prime time of year for the birds at Bosque del Apache. The camping areas are a muddy mess whenever it rains, too.

San Antonio has limited lodging. There are a couple of Bed & Breakfasts, an RV park or two and a couple of trailer/camper options available through Airbnb. There are two restaurants in this tiny town vying for the title of “best green chile cheeseburger in New Mexico”, though, so you may want to stop for lunch one day.

Most visitors stay in Socorro. It’s a charming town, big enough to support a good coffee shop and a micro-brewery but with a decidedly working-class feel to it. Socorro has not been gentrified, not quite yet. It means getting up a little earlier in the morning, though, as it is a 20-25 minute drive from Socorro to the pond.

But it’s worth the drive. When the cackling of the geese rises from a murmur to a roar and you watch thousands of birds burst into flight instantaneously, you will experience that National Geographic moment. You, too, will hold a special place in your heart for Bosque del Apache.