Los Banos is a city located in Merced County, California, United States. It is situated in the San Joaquin Valley, approximately 85 miles southeast of San Francisco and 35 miles west of Merced. As of the 2020 census, the population of Los Banos was 39,123.
The San Luis National Wildlife Refuge in the San Joaquin Valley of central California is one of the great remnants of a historically bountiful wintering grounds for migratory waterfowl on the Pacific Flyway. Located in the Bear Creek, Salt Slough, and San Joaquin River floodplain, it hosts a myriad of tree-lined channels and oxbows, wetlands and native grasslands.