Leslie Canyon National Wildlife Refuge

The 2,765-acre refuge was established in 1988 to protect two of the eight native fish species of the Río Yaqui watershed: the Yaqui chub (Gila purpurea) and the Yaqui topminnow (Poeciliopsis sonoriensis). In addition, the refuge protects a unique velvet ash-black walnut-cottonwood forest along Leslie Creek that is important for many migrating and nesting birds.  It is 17.5 miles north of the international border with Mexico in southeast Arizona's Cochise County and is one of more than 560 National Wildlife Refuges, a federal network of lands and waters set aside for the benefit of wildlife