Educational Field Trips
Field Trips are typically 60 minutes long (not including travel time). We have binoculars for students (and chaperones!) to borrow. Transportation is the responsibility of your group.
We want to work with as many students as possible and fees allow us to bring birding into more classrooms. However, we don’t want fees to be an undue burden on anyone. If you represent a designated Title I school or if fees would prevent you from working with us, please email us at education@tucsonaudubon.org and we’ll work with you to find a path forward.
All trips are rain or shine. Please dress accordingly, and be prepared for wet weather. Trips will be cancelled only under the circumstances that weather events have made conditions unsafe.
There’s no need to leave school grounds to enjoy birds. We’ll learn how to be observers of our natural world and see that any space is for the birds!
We’ll learn how to be observers of our natural world at a park or green space near you.
Location options are: Sweetwater Wetlands, Fort Lowell Park, the Cooper Center for Environmental Learning, the Desert Research Learning Center, Brandi Fenton Memorial Park, or Tucson Audubon’s Mason Center. See below to learn more about what each location has to offer. Please check in with us (education@tucsonaudubon.org) if you’d like more information about the accessibility of each location!
Sweetwater Wetlands: Located in west Tucson, this created wetland attracts birds with not-so-sweet urban effluent water. The 60-acre treatment and recharge project was designed to provide wildlife habitat and nature viewing, with open-water ponds, cattail and bulrush marshes, and cottonwood and willow habitat.
Fort Lowell Park: Fort Lowell Park, an urban park located in central Tucson, draws a wide variety of bird species with its habitat mix of open fields, desert scrub, and trees as well as a pond.
The Cooper Center for Environmental Learning: The Cooper Center site is situated on 10 acres of pristine Sonoran desert land, 7 miles west of downtown Tucson. The twelve buildings on the site include an office, kitchen, classroom, two materials storage buildings, six sleeping cabins, and a bathroom. The camp hosts field trips and outdoor classroom programs offering unforgettable nature experiences for students.
Desert Research Learning Center: The Desert Research Learning Center (DRLC) promotes the scientific understanding, protection, and conservation of Sonoran Desert Network parks. Located adjacent to Saguaro National Park East, the DRLC is an ideal space for connecting people, resources, and science. It boasts an artificial tinaja and flowing stream, a heritage orchard, native foods garden, examples of rainwater harvesting techniques, and a short nature trail winds through the landscape.
Brandi Fenton Memorial Park: Brandi Fenton Memorial Park is a wonderful spot for urban birding along the Rillito River.
Tucson Audubon’s Mason Center: Tucson Audubon’s Mason Center is a sanctuary where youth, families, educators, and others can appreciate the beauty of our local landscape, enjoy native wildlife, and learn about sustainable living in the Sonoran Desert. Donated to Tucson Audubon in 1998, the 20-acre Mason Center is a richly vegetated parcel of nearly pristine saguaro-ironwood habitat visited by over 80 species of birds as well as many iconic desert mammals and reptiles. Feeding and water stations, as well as pollinator and habitat gardens surrounding the facilities support seasonal and year-round populations of wildlife. Solar cells, composting toilets, and water harvesting structures model the best of Sonoran Desert sustainable living.