The City of Yuma, Yuma Audubon, and the Arizona Game and Fish Department each run their own West Wetlands Park schedule. None of them refers to the other two. Lay the three side by side for this cool season, though, and they cover the same months, and two of them share the same weekend mornings.
On paper, West Wetlands is a 110-acre riverfront park, with a 30-acre lower bench restored with native trees and grasses and a 30-acre upper bench built out with a lake, ramadas, parking, and lighting. In practice, the scheduled part of its year runs from October to April. The planned events in that window cluster around a handful of spots, on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
The three calendars, side by side
Here is what the three organizations have posted for the months ahead, as of October 10, 2026.
| Month | City run season at Playa Linda Beach | Yuma Audubon Sunday walk | AZGFD stocking at West Wetlands Pond |
|---|---|---|---|
| October | Glow Up October 5K is Oct. 17, at Ray Kroc Exhibition Stadium | Walks resume | Catfish week of Sept. 28 to Oct. 2, already past |
| November | TURKEY TROT, Sat. Nov. 14 | Weekly | Catfish, week of Nov. 2 to 6 |
| December | Reindeer Run, Sat. Dec. 12 | Weekly | Trout, week of Dec. 14 to 18 |
| January | Rock the Jukebox, Sat. Jan. 9 | Weekly | Not yet posted |
| February | Fiesta de 5K (and 10K too!), Sat. Feb. 20 | Weekly | Not yet posted |
| March to April | Season over | Weekly through April | Not yet posted |
The race dates come from the City's 2026/2027 Run Season listing, which calls them expected dates. The walk comes from the Yuma Audubon events page. The stocking weeks come from AZGFD's community fishing calendar, revised September 30, 2026. That calendar warns that stocking dates are not guaranteed and can shift with weather, water quality, golden algae, or fish availability.
The October race is the one exception. The Glow Up October 5K is an evening run at 6 p.m. at Ray Kroc Exhibition Stadium. After that, the series moves to the river, and every remaining race starts at 8:15 a.m. at Playa Linda Beach.
Sunday belongs to the birders
Yuma Audubon's Sunday Morning Bird Walk meets at the Butterfly Garden in West Wetlands Park. The group says the walk takes place only between October and April. The start time moves between 6 and 8 a.m. with the season, and the group posts the current time on its live calendar. The walk covers about a mile on mostly flat dirt trails at a relaxed pace. Restrooms are near the boat ramp and fishing pond area. If you need binoculars, the group will bring a spare pair when asked by the Monday before.
The same group runs a Wednesday morning walk across town at the East Wetlands parking lot. The West Wetlands walk is the one that stops when the weather turns hot. Its season runs nearly identical to the City's run season and then keeps going for two more months.
The Butterfly and Hummingbird Garden where the walk starts is one of several habitat areas the City lists in the park. Others include burrowing owl habitat and the Arizona Public Service Solar Demonstration Garden.
Saturday belongs to the runners, four times
Once the run season reaches the river, the four Playa Linda races fall on Saturdays roughly a month apart: November 14, December 12, January 9, and February 20. The City's "Screaming Deal" enters one runner in all five races of the season. Runners in kindergarten through 12th grade race free. There is no day-of registration, so every runner has to sign up before each race's deadline or hold the season pass.
The City describes most courses as paved or groomed trail, with some rugged, graveled stretches. It asks runners to choose their shoes and strollers with that in mind. That is useful to know even if you skip the races. These are the same paths a regular walk would use.
On race mornings, the activity is on the lower bench. The Yuma Crossing National Heritage Area describes Playa Linda as the park's second beach. Centennial Beach, the other one, is where the City lists boat-trailer parking and river launch access.
The pond runs on its own schedule
West Wetlands Pond is the one calendar not tied to a set day. AZGFD describes it as a 1.3-acre community fishing pond up to 14 feet deep. According to the AZGFD stocking schedule page, fish are stocked on a random day, Monday through Saturday, during the scheduled week.
The current calendar puts catfish into the pond the week of November 2 to 6. It switches to trout the week of December 14 to 18. Fortuna Lake and the PAAC Pond, the other two Yuma waters on that schedule, follow nearly the same pattern. The same calendar also notes that one scheduled stocking for Alamar Park Pond in Avondale was sent to West Wetlands because of golden algae.
The timing ties back to the weekend calendars. A catfish stocking in the first week of November comes just before the first Playa Linda race. A mid-December trout stocking comes the week after the Reindeer Run. Families who show up for a race or a bird walk will be at a pond that was stocked recently.
Next door, a wetland that isn't connected yet
The biggest change near the park this year is just past its edge. In March 2026, KAWC reported that the Cocopah Indian Tribe's Environmental Protection Office had finished its first ecological restoration project, restoring 40 acres at the Cocopah North Reservation. The work included a three-day workshop led by Fred Phillips of Fred Phillips Consulting. More than 30 participants and volunteers took part, and the group planted dozens of willows and other native plants.
In the KAWC story, Phillips explained the purpose. City effluent that once went straight into the river will now flow through a 40-acre wetland with beaver ponds, cleaning the water, creating habitat, and adding a recreation area like the Yuma East Wetlands. He said the idea came from the tribe about four years earlier.
According to KAWC, the site is just west of the tribe's golf resort along the Colorado River. Plans call for it to eventually connect to West Wetlands by pedestrian-accessible trails. The report gives no timeline for that connection, and the trail isn't built. For this season, the restored acreage is a neighbor you can't yet reach on foot from the park. If the link opens, though, Sunday walkers starting at the Butterfly Garden would have a much longer stretch of river habitat to cover.
Where everything sits on a cool-season visit
Once you know which calendar you're following, the layout makes sense. The City's facility listing names these features:
- Butterfly and Hummingbird Garden, where the Sunday bird walk meets
- Playa Linda Beach, on the lower bench, where the November through February races start
- Centennial Beach, with the boat ramp, trailer parking, and river launch access
- West Wetlands Pond, the stocked community fishing pond near the restrooms the walk group mentions
- Stewart Vincent Wolfe Creative Playground, known as Castle Park, with a two-bay zipline and an almost 18-foot TriNet climbing structure
- Disc golf course, equestrian trail, and the QR-code video trail, spread across the rest of the grounds
West of the playground, the City added two ramadas, 2,050 feet of connecting trails, 65 parking spaces, and nearly 1,000 trees and shrubs. The City credited an Arizona Office of Tourism grant of about $250,000 with helping make those improvements possible. The City dedicated the additions in December 2024, along with inclusive play pieces including the We-Go-Round and a Sway Fun glider. Those trails were in place before this run season, so this will be at least their second cool season of use.
You can also reach the park by water. Visit Yuma describes a self-guided float from the Gateway Park beach down to Centennial Beach or Playa Linda. It takes about 45 minutes to an hour, and you have to arrange your own ride back upstream.
If you want to fit in all three calendars, the first chance comes in mid-November. Catfish go into the pond the week of November 2. The TURKEY TROT starts at Playa Linda at 8:15 a.m. on Saturday, November 14. The next morning, the Audubon walk meets at the Butterfly Garden at whatever time the group's live calendar lists.
At ABC Group, Aracely and Wally keep track of the places that make Yuma home, from the walk times at the Butterfly Garden to the stocking weeks at the pond. Whenever you'd like to know how your own place fits into the neighborhood around it, we're happy to talk it through, in English or Spanish. Just ask for a free home valuation.
