Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge

For thousands of years the springs of Ash Meadows sustained the Southern Paiute people, the Nuwuvi, who camped at the water, gathered mesquite and pinyon, and knew every seep by name. Their descendants, including the Timbisha Shoshone and Southern Paiute communities of the region, keep ties to this land today, and the refuge works with them to care for it.

In the twentieth century the oasis was very nearly destroyed. Ranchers and developers drained and channelized the springs for farming and, in the 1960s and 1970s, a large agricultural scheme began pumping groundwater so hard that the water level in Devils Hole dropped and the pupfish neared extinction. The fight to save them went all the way to the United States Supreme Court, which ruled in 1976 that the government's reservation of Devils Hole included the water needed to keep its fish alive, a landmark decision in Western water law.

To protect what was left, The Nature Conservancy bought the core of the oasis and, in 1984, it became a national wildlife refuge. Since then, managers have been slowly undoing the damage, filling in drainage ditches and letting the springs find their old channels again.

Devils Hole is a narrow, water-filled fault in the rock, a window into the aquifer that is more than five hundred feet deep and has never been fully explored. On a shallow rock shelf just below the surface lives the entire wild population of the Devils Hole pupfish, an inch-long, iridescent-blue fish that has lived in this one pool, cut off from all others, for tens of thousands of years.

The population is astonishingly small, often only a few dozen to a few hundred fish, which makes it one of the most vulnerable vertebrates on earth. Scientists monitor it constantly, even keeping a backup population in a purpose-built replica tank nearby. Devils Hole is a detached piece of Death Valley National Park, fenced off and viewable only from an overlook, so you cannot reach the water, but standing above that dark slot knowing what lives in it is its own kind of awe.

The heart of a visit is the string of springs reached by short boardwalks and trails from the gravel refuge roads. Crystal Spring is the showstopper, a deep, clear, turquoise pool with a boardwalk that carries you out over the water. Longstreet Spring, Point of Rocks, and Kings Pool each have their own character, some framed by rock, some feeding reedy marshes alive with birdsong.

The modern visitor center explains the geology and the endemic species and is the best place to start. Because the water is a constant warm temperature year round, the springs never freeze and never dry up, so the oasis is green in every season.

Ash Meadows is one of the best birding spots in southern Nevada. The wetlands draw herons, egrets, ibis, and clouds of migrating ducks and shorebirds, while the surrounding desert holds roadrunners, phainopeplas, and raptors hunting the open flats. More than two hundred and fifty bird species have been recorded here.

Beyond the pupfish, the endemic list runs to other pupfish and springsnails, the Ash Meadows naucorid bug, and rare plants like the Ash Meadows blazing star and gumplant that grow in the alkaline soil. It is a living laboratory of how life adapts to isolation.

The land is stark and beautiful in every direction, with the Funeral Mountains and the ranges around Death Valley rising beyond the meadows.

Spring and fall are the best times to visit, with mild temperatures and, in spring, wildflowers and busy nesting birds. Winter is cool and quiet and brings the largest numbers of waterfowl. Summer temperatures regularly climb well past one hundred degrees, so a summer visit means early mornings and plenty of water.

The refuge is remote, so come with a full tank of gas, food, and sun protection, and plan to spend a few unhurried hours moving from spring to spring.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.