The beauty of the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge is not something you expect from Oklahoma. Nestled in the Wichita Mountain range, you can find herds of bison, Texas Longhorns, elk and deer freely roaming the Refuge. In fact, I would say you can find an abundance of wildlife there.
This is 60,000 acres prestige land. Your kids can be as dumbstruck by the buffalo and amused by the prairie dog heads popping up as the children of pioneers as they traveled westward. As you drive along the roads you can imagine what this landscape looked like when men lived in harmony with the environment instead of bending it to suit their will. The buffalo here were descendants of the Goodnight Buffalo Herd now at Caprock Canyons State Park, by way of the New York Zoological Society, and were reintroduced in 1907.
There are quite a few lakes here with charming names like Caddo and Lost Lake. Hiking trails both short and long are here, including a 5.7-mile trail called Bison Trail. If you are the sporting type, you can fish and camp near them as generations have before. This is the oldest wildlife refuge in America, set aside in 1901. As we were surveying the spring flowers across the gorgeous land, my Grandmother told of camping the area in her youth – once waking up to Longhorn cattle in her campsite.
Resources : US Fish and Wildlife Department website – Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge