News
The National Wildlife Refuge Association’s 2021 Annual Report is here, download the full report.
For 46 years, the National Wildlife Refuge Association has worked to support the National Wildlife Refuge System (, our country’s extraordinary network of over 850 million acres of lands and waters set aside for wildlife and their habitats. After nearly 2 years, the pandemic continues to disrupt normal operations everywhere and national wildlife refuges across the country are no exception. Even so, with the help of our incredible supporters and dynamic board and staff, the National Wildlife Refuge Association has adapted to meet these challenges, and we are stronger and more resilient than ever. None of our successes would be possible without our donors and supporters.
The National Wildlife Refuge Association is partnering with Coalition of Refuge Friends and Advocates to host a monthly photo contest for Refuge and Hatchery Friends groups across the country. The Friends Photo Contest started as an idea by the Coalition of Refuge Friends and Advocates Facebook group last year and has quickly grown in engagement, you can read more about the contest here.
You may have heard about the first winner of the Friends Photo Contest and the refuge’s fantastic fungi in the Winter 2022 Edition of The Link. Nicole Souza’s stunning photos of fungi at Assabet River National Wildlife Refuge caught our attention, so Assabet River NWR was featured for the month of December.
The 2021 recipient of the O’Brien Prize is the Friends of the Willamette Valley National Wildlife Refuge Complex (FWVNWRC), Oregon for their Bilingual Trail Video Project. They are producing a series of 14 short trail videos in English and Spanish showcasing the plants, animals, and habitats found within the William L. Finley National Wildlife Refuge, the Ankeny National Wildlife Refuge, and the Baskett Slough National Wildlife Refuge. Each of the national wildlife refuges that the Refuge Friends group support are a part of the Willamette Valley National Wildlife Refuge Complex in Oregon. They have created a YouTube channel, posted videos of the first three trails, photographed and taken video footage for four additional trails, and identified seven additional trails for future videos. You can view all of the Friends Trail Videos on their YouTube Channel and one video of the series is shown below in both English and Spanish.
For the Friends of the St. Marks Wildlife Refuge located on the Gulf Coast in north Florida, the challenge became, “How do we bridge these obstacles? How can we get out of the ‘idle’ mode and move forward?” The task, coincidentally, meshed well with some musical research I was doing at the time. In a short video, guitarist Mark Knopfler was patiently describing playing a basic guitar chord.
The National Wildlife Refuge Association has an opportunity for you!! Through the generosity of some of our great Board Members, we are announcing our 2021 O’Brien Prize, an annual award for Refuge Friends groups. The prize is named after Donal O’Brien III, a past Board Chair and longtime enthusiast of the National Wildlife Refuge System. Don is a generous supporter of the great work we do for national wildlife refuges and is very impressed by the dedication and effectiveness of Refuge Friends groups.
The Interior Department’s Office of the Inspector General has completed its audit of the Refuge Friends program and released its final report. The Refuge Association and the Coalition of Refuge Friends and Advocates have responded to this report with a letter to Interior Secretary Bernhardt expresses our dismay at the report.
