The Lower Suwannee National Wildlife Refuge is part of the United States National Wildlife Refuge System. It is located in southeastern Dixie and northwestern Levy counties on the western coast of Florida, approximately fifty miles southwest of the city of Gainesville. The 53,000-acre wildlife refuge was established in 1979 to protect one of the largest undeveloped river delta systems in the United States. It includes twenty miles of the Suwannee River estuary and twenty miles of coastline.