Sipe White Mountain WA

Sipe White Mountain WA

Springerville, Arizona 85938

Official Website
Sipe White Mountain Wildlife Area map

About this Location

Sipe White Mountain Wildlife Area (SWMWA) offers opportunities for wildlife viewing, hunting, and hiking. Four hiking trails provide foot access through a variety of habitat types. There is also a visitor center and a day-use picnic area. Several wildlife viewing points are located on the trails, including one with a spotting scope on the High Point Trail overlook. Habitats include several reservoirs, a stream, wetlands, irrigated meadows and pastures, upland grasslands, and pinyon-juniper woodlands. SWMWA is open to the public from sunrise to sunset. The visitor center is open from mid-May through early October; hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Parking is available at designated sites only.

The best birding location at Sipe is along Rudd Creek and in the orchard and tall trees around the visitor center. Songbirds include mountain and western bluebirds, spotted towhee, as well as northern flicker, western wood-peewee, Say’s phoebe, white-breasted nuthatch, American robin, Virginia’s warbler, black-headed grosbeak, and Bullock’s oriole. Waterbirds include northern pintail, cinnamon teal, green-winged teal, redhead, bufflehead, common merganser, mallard, American coot, American wigeon, gadwall, Canada goose, white-faced ibis, great blue heron, and pied-billed and eared grebes. Merriam’s turkey, Montezuma quail, and band-tailed pigeon can also be found in the area. Rufous, broad-tailed, and calliope hummingbirds are common in July and August. The visitor center has hummingbird feeders, and numerous hummingbirds can be seen at close range.

From the Town of Eagar, take US-180/US-191 southeast toward Alpine for about 2 miles. Look for turnoff signs immediately at the top of the first mesa at milepost 404.7 (Forest Road 57). Drive about 5 miles on Forest Road 57, which is a dirt road suitable for passenger cars, to the Sipe property.

Notable Trails

Four hiking trails of easy to moderate difficulty, each with interpretive signs. Trailheads for 3 of the 4 trails are adjacent to the parking areas.

  • Trinity Trail: 350 yards, universally accessible, leads to a wildlife-viewing point adjacent to Trinity Reservoir
  • High Point Loop Trail: 1 mile, moderate difficulty, viewing points with benches, spotting scope for observing large mammals in the meadows below
  • Rudd Creek Loop Trail: 3 miles, mostly flat terrain, several wildlife viewing points, and benches
  • Homestead Trail: 1.5-mile spur trail (3 total) over flat terrain to the Nelson cabin homestead, which sustained substantial damage in the Wallow Fire

Content from Official Website