On Rio Grande Boulevard there is a gravel lot at 3301 Rio Grande Blvd NW that wasn't open to the public a year ago. A short accessible trail leads from it, past a demonstration grove of young Netleaf hackberry, Chinquapin oak and New Mexico olive, to a pedestrian bridge over the Duranes Lateral. On the far side of the bridge is a wildlife viewing platform that looks out over the fields of the Candelaria Nature Preserve.
That access opened on April 14, 2026, which makes this the preserve's first sandhill crane season with a public entrance on the Rio Grande Boulevard side. The fields beyond the platform are also changing, gradually. Under a plan the City Council approved in 2021, Candelaria is moving out of farming and toward native habitat. So the new gate opens onto a place partway between a crane field and a restored bosque, and you can watch the change happen one season at a time.
What the April opening built
The City put the cost of Phase 1 at $1,245,000, paid for with state capital outlay and City general obligation bonds. That bought a parking area, the accessible trail, seating and picnic areas, educational signs, the bridge, and a rehabilitated acequia channel. Before the project, the tract mostly served as a small City tree nursery and a storage yard for materials used in parks across Albuquerque.
At the dedication, the City named the east viewing platform on the Duranes Lateral for the late State Senator Bill O'Neill, crediting his part in securing funding for the preserve since 2020. KRQE and KOB both covered the opening the next day.
The site is still basic. Shade structures, plant propagation facilities, more landscaping and a restroom belong to Phase 2, which the City lists as pending funding, with no construction date announced. Hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, and the City offers guided tours, volunteer events and education programs by special arrangement. A 5 p.m. close is early for an evening walk in high summer, but in November and December it lands around dusk, the hour many birders come out for.
Why there are crane fields here at all
The City bought about 167 acres in the North Valley in 1977 using Land and Water Conservation Fund money, and the property has been managed since then by the Open Space Division together with Rio Grande Nature Center State Park. Its first farmland purchase was the 97-acre Candelaria Farm, on the north side of the Nature Center.
The City's 2021 Resource Management Plan lays out where the farm is headed. It describes a shift from mostly alfalfa, first to wildlife forage and cover crops, and eventually to a mosaic of native habitats. It names corn rotation specifically as a forage strategy for migratory waterfowl. The City's farmland page now says plainly that Candelaria is "transitioning out of agricultural use." The restoration partner is Rio Grande Return, a nonprofit that restores Southwest riverscapes with low-tech, process-based methods.
The transition has been slow, and that is why the cranes still have a reason to come. In its report on 2024 work, released in January 2025, the City counted 19 acres of active restoration since 2021, seven of them added that year, along with 680 native perennials planted. It also counted 50 acres still managed for wildlife crops. So the restored ground made up a little over a third of the area still farmed for wildlife. The same report lists sandhill cranes in Field 1E, which is one of the crop fields.
What the 2025 field plan put in the ground
The City's posted 2025 crop plan for Candelaria still schedules food for wildlife. Field 1E was planned with spring millet, oats and dryland corn, followed by late-season barley, rye and wheat. Field 2D was planned with warm-season crops and then autumn cereals, irrigated as water allows. In Fields 2B and 2C the plan calls for flood irrigation to soak a sandbar channel next to new native plantings. That is restoration work, and the City's 2024 report describes those fields being rebuilt with water-conveyance slopes and arroyo-like channels.
The newest crop plan the City has posted is the 2025 plan, so it describes what was scheduled, not a confirmed planting for this season. Still, it shows how the preserve is laid out. Cereal fields are kept for birds, and restored strips are slowly widening around them. From the O'Neill platform you're looking at both kinds of ground at once.
The North Valley crane map, one stop at a time
Candelaria is one stop on a short loop of public land along the river, and each stop shows a different stage of the same story.
- Rio Grande Nature Center State Park, 2901 Candelaria Rd NW. The park is open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and the visitor center 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The City lists sandhill cranes among the wildlife at the Nature Center pond, which has blinds for viewing. From there it points visitors north to the Candelaria Farm Wetland Preserve.
- Candelaria Nature Preserve, 3301 Rio Grande Blvd NW. The new entrance, the trail and bridge, and the O'Neill platform looking over the fields in transition.
- Los Poblanos Fields Open Space. A 138-acre City farm open to the public for wildlife viewing, walking, bicycling, picnicking and horseback riding. Unlike Candelaria, it is meant to stay a working farm.
That last point shows up in who farms it. Los Poblanos Fields is worked by Rio Grande Community Farm, a nonprofit that has been in the community for nearly 25 years, along with Jacobo Sanchez of Southwest Soil Health and Scott Rasband of the Rasband Dairy family. Rasband has farmed for the Open Space Division for more than 10 years and helps host Rio Grande Community Farm's corn maze every fall. Their 2025 plans describe about 12 acres of wildlife cropping and two pollinator gardens from Rio Grande Community Farm, six acres of buckwheat and yellow pea next to alfalfa and tall fescue from Southwest Soil Health, and alfalfa plus sorghum-Sudan grass from Rasband. None of the three plans calls its crops crane-specific. The City's stated goals for all its open space farms do include forage and habitat for wildlife.
Taken together, Candelaria is the river valley being turned back toward native habitat, and Los Poblanos Fields is farmland the City intends to keep farming. Both are a short drive from most North Valley homes.
On the calendar after Thursday
Most of the scheduled crane and bird outings this season are at or near these three properties.
- Weekends, 8:30 a.m. Friends of the Rio Grande Nature Center lists free bird walks led by volunteer naturalists every Saturday and Sunday. They meet at the Candelaria Wetland wildlife viewing blind, and no signup is required.
- Saturday, Nov. 7. A Bosque Wild Guided Hike at the Open Space Visitor Center.
- Saturday, Nov. 21, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. The City's free Annual Crane Festival at the Open Space Visitor Center, 6500 Coors Blvd NW, across the river, with live birds, presentations, crafts and a crane dance.
- Dec. 2 to 5. The 37th annual Festival of the Cranes at Bosque del Apache, near Socorro, for anyone who wants a day trip to see the birds in much larger numbers.
- Saturday, Dec. 12, 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. "Intro to the Outdoors: Learn to Birdwatch" at Los Poblanos Open Space.
The weekend walks start right at the edge of the preserve, so you can do one and then walk up to the new platform on the same morning. You get one stop where restoration is underway and another where it's starting to show.
The City lists several partners still working on Candelaria: Ciudad Soil and Water Conservation District, Rio Grande Return, Friends of the Candelaria Nature Preserve, and Rio Grande Nature Center State Park. Open Space Superintendent Colleen Langan-McRoberts said in the City's opening announcement that the project will "improve public access and become a center for plant and tree propagation to help restore the Preserve and the bosque." In other words, the native plants that will slowly replace Candelaria's crop rows are meant to be grown at the same tract where the new parking lot sits.
Kenny Perez grew up in New Mexico and spends a lot of time in the Valley, and he's always happy to talk about the acequias, open space farms and bosque access points that shape day-to-day life near the river. If you or someone you know wants a local's read on that part of the North Valley, Ultra Real Estate is one call away. Schedule a free consultation.
