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Red River Wildlife Management Area provides a wide variety of wildlife resources. White-tailed deer and moose graze in the meadow and utilize adjacent timbered edges for calving and fawning areas. From late March to late May 100-200 elk can be seen in the meadow on the WMA. Late May and early June is the time when you will see as many as 20-50 40 elk cows using the meadow and surrounding timber for calving.
Numerous old oxbows and wet meadows on Red River as it flows through the WMA attract resident and migratory birds. Canada geese and mallards nest in the meadow and a variety of birds such as blue herons, shorebirds, sandhill cranes and osprey migrate through the area. Red-tailed hawks nest in lodgepole pine stands in the area. Northern goshawks have been sighted along the timbered edges of the WMA. Northern goshawks are listed as a federal sensitive species.
The Red River flowing through the center of the property was once prime spawning habitat for spring Chinook salmon and today provides habitat for steelhead, cutthroat and bull trout. The WMA is currently critical habitat for reintroduced spring Chinook salmon and recovery efforts improve habitat conditions for Chinook salmon, steelhead trout, and cutthroat trout in the WMA stream reach and Pacific lamprey downstream of the property. Mountain whitefish, rainbow and nonnative brook trout are abundant in the river. Both wild steelhead and bull trout are threatened species and must be immediately released if caught, however, harvest of brook trout is encouraged.
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