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ents email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels nature ohio photography parks birding birds ornithology ornithology class tuesday october 6 2015 south carolina pt 2 part 1 can be found here south carolina pt 1 this is the second post covering the second day of my trip down to south carolina two weeks ago i am currently taking ornithology the study of birds at ohio university this class is one of the required classes for my wildlife and conservation biology major and also one of my most anticipated classes of my college career we go on weekly field labs you can read about each one at this link but we also get to go on two big trips one of these trips is to lake erie which is coming up in november while the other trip is coastal south carolina the point of this trip was to expose us to birds we would normally never see in ohio we awoke before sunrise to get a start on the day while everyone got dressed and ate breakfast i had some time to sneak off to watch the sunrise on the beach and snap a photo or two daylight wasting we quickly loaded the vans and left hunting island state park our goal for the day was to head a tiny bit farther south and closer to the south carolina georgia border the first stop of the day was at pinckney island national wildlife refuge located near the tourist town of hilton head pinckney island national wildlife refuge is a collection of islands and tiny hammocks the main pinckney and surrounding islands have a very extensive history archaeological sites have shown native american activity going back all the way to 7000 bce with intensive use from 1000 1500 ad temporary settlements built by the french and spanish dot the 1500 s and 1600 s the first permanent settlement was in 1708 and this began a period of intensive change in 1804 charles cotesworth pinckney who had been an officer in the revolutionary war and a founding father moved to the islands and began a cotton plantation there the land was cleared drained and worked by 200 300 slaves leaving a natural and humanitarian scar on the islands after the civil war the islands changed hands multiple times and experienced periods of continued agriculture and management as a game preserve 1975 saw the land and surrounding waters become a dedicated national wildlife refuge nowadays several miles of gravel pathways are used extensively by the residents of hilton head tourists and nature watchers a variety of habitats can be found throughout the preserve making for great birding salt marshes held birds like the white ibis pictured above willets greater yellowlegs tricolored herons and others made appearances too the island also features several small freshwater ponds which held the likes of more white ibises common gallinules black crowned night herons anhingas green herons pied billed grebes and more pine forests and scruffy secondary growth held songbirds like the boat tailed grackle various warblers brown headed nuthatches fish crows and more of course birds weren t the only creatures out and about one of the many eye catching insects of the day was the gulf fritillary agraulis vanillae we saw dozens and dozens of these incredible butterflies i have never seen such a vibrant butterfly in person the gulf fritillary has a wide range that extends from southern south america through central america and into the southern portions of the united states although this species is found primarily in the south central and southeastern portions of the us the gulf fritillary is a species that will often wander northward ohio pretty much has a one state buffer zone around it from this species normal range but these can be occasionally found in ohio most recently 2008 proved to be a very large invasion year of gulf fritillaries in ohio as jim mccormac covered in his blog as he points out global warming coupled with the fact we are seeing more and more individuals farther north suggests that the gulf fritillary might possibly be a new ohio resident in the future six or so miles of walking and several hours later we left pinckney island nwr and headed inland to savannah national wildlife refuge savannah nwr lies several miles away from the atlantic coast which is just enough for a whole new set of habitats and animals to come into play the refuge straddles the georgia south carolina border with half the park being in one state and the other half being in the other we stayed in the south carolina section the entire time choosing to drive the length of the 4 mile laurel hill wildlife drive a one way gravel road which winds through portions of the park this road passes mostly through freshwater wetlands but also passes through hardwood hammocks like the one pictured above a hardwood hammock is essentially an island of trees which can persist in a marsh due to the ground being only a few inches higher than the surrounding marshland notice in the case pictured above click to enlarge the hammock consists primarily of southern live oak quercus virginiana also notice the distinctive and characteristic spanish moss tillandsia usneoides hanging from the live oaks spanish moss is a species of flowering plant that is actually an epiphyte meaning it grows harmlessly on trees and absorbs water and nutrients from the air rain and debris that collects around it as a result spanish moss only uses the tree for support instead of parasitizing it one of the main features in the freshwater marshes at savannah nwr were dikes dikes are man made levees that help control water levels and flow in marshes back in the 1700 s much of the land in the refuge was managed rice fields these altered marshes remained and natural vegetation came back now there s a whole range of birds that make this refuge home at some point of the year a few shorebirds were present when we went including this solitary sandpiper pictured above other birds present included 3 species of rails rails are a cryptic and elusive bunch with most species preferring dense marsh grasses and reeds the species ohioans are most familiar with is the american coot we saw several of the coot s cousin the common gallinule pictured above the common gallinule can be found in ohio especially along lake erie but it is definitely a more uncommon species there the common gallinule is much more common down along the southern coasts the most exciting bird of the day was a purple gallinule that i spotted along the banks of a ditch like the common gallinule the purple gallinule is also a rail but an incredibly colorful one this truly tropical looking rail can be found extensively throughout the tropics but is restricted to the southern atlantic and gulf coast here in the us in fact savannah nwr is even approaching its northern limits another species of rail we observed here was the sora sadly we only heard them instead of seeing them another strange southern specialty in the us is the anhinga although it superficially resembles cormorants the exact relationship between the darters which includes the anhinga and the cormorants is uncertain they are certainly related but how closely is still up in the air the anhinga is a freshwater loving species and prefers the marshes and swamps of the southern us they can often be seen drying their wings on the banks of waterways like the one above other interesting birds we observed at savannah nwr included cattle egrets northern harrier great horned owl peregrine falcons and various migrating warblers of course it wouldn t be a trip down to the south without one of these guys this is the american alligator alligator mississippiensis savannah nwr is known for its alligator population and we saw over 12 individuals during our time there a large crocodilian reptile that reaches lengths of 9 15 feet on average the american alligator can be found throughout freshwater marshes lakes and swamps in the southeastern us the american alligator was once very endangered but has staged an incredible comeback in the past few decades part of the class on the beach at hunting island i am the one in the green hat and shirt looking through the spotting scope photo credit michelle ward we left savannah nwr at sunset and made the hour and a half van ride back to hunting island where we camped for a final night it was an incredible trip and i added 19 bird lifers in the end i personally finished with 75 species of birds over the two days in south carolina but i know i missed a few species that others on the trip saw or heard here s my complete ebird lists for the two locations of the day for those interested 1 pinckney island nwr 2 savannah nwr i have to admit i fell in love with the southern maritime forests and the salt marshes over the course of the trip i am planning on going back to this region on a birding trip over christmas break and if that happens then i ll have many more in depth posts on this amazing region thanks for reading posted by kyle brooks at 11 42 pm no comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels nature ohio photography parks birding birds marshes south carolina location south carolina usa sunday october 4 2015 south carolina pt 1 as you might know i am currently taking ornithology the study of birds at ohio university this is one of the required classes for my wildlife and conservation biology major and also one of my most anticipated classes of my college career we go on weekly field labs you can read about each one at this link but we also get to go on two big trips one of these trips is to lake erie which is coming up in november but the other trip was last week as you might guess by the title it was a trip down to south carolina the point of this trip was to expose us to birds we would normally never see in ohio and so we were doing some relatively intense birding to find all those special species if you ve ever went birding to that degree you probably know that taking photos is pretty difficult as you simply don t have the time for it so sadly i don t have a bunch of photos but i ll try to make do with the ones i did take we left athens ohio at 8 am on thursday september 24th eleven hours and a slight detour later we arrived at our destination hunting island state park hunting island state park is located in extreme southern south carolina the entire park is located on an island in the atlantic ocean this island is one of the few remaining undeveloped barrier islands located within the so named sea islands which is a chain of tidal and barrier islands ranging from mid south carolina to extreme northern florida hunting island has a subtropical climate and consists of several different ecosystems on the eastern side of the island is the atlantic ocean shown above the western side consists of extensive salt marsh habitat the island itself consists mainly of maritime forest in this part of the world maritime forests are dominated by evergreen trees with the majority of those trees being pine trees in this case loblolly pine was the dominant tree with slash pine southern live oak and other trees mixed in the iconic cabbage palm occupied the mid story which you can see in the photo above those tall pines pictured are the loblolly pine the understory was occupied primarily by saw palmetto serenoa repens an interesting and well recognized species of fern like palm saw palmetto is restricted to the southern atlantic coast and eastern gulf coast it can be found in only one county in south carolina beaufort which is where hunting island is located there are other similar looking palm species found in the understory here though as well such as needle palm we arrived near sunset ate in the city of beaufort and then headed toward the park in the dark it had began to rain by the time we arrived which added a whole new dimension of fun as we frantically tried setting up our tents before they got too wet inside that rain turned into a storm with incredible lightning earth shaking thunder and torrential rain it turns out that storm system also spawned an ef 2 tornado in johns island which was only a mere 35 miles away from us thankfully we just received heavy downpours a tornado might have put a slight damper on the trip to say the least when morning came the rain had stopped but the skies were still pretty overcast we ventured out to the beach to look for shorebirds and other related birds laughing gulls brown pelicans and various terns quickly greeted us a few shorebirds were out and about including a ruddy turnstone multiple willets and some peeps we couldn t identify a lagoon on the other side of the dunes held a bald eagle osprey little blue herons great egrets great blue herons and snowy egrets many warbler species flitted about the trees and brown headed nuthatches squeaked like a dog toy from the canopy after a few hours we moved to the western side of the island this side of the island has an extensive salt marsh a salt marsh is essentially the area between open salt water and dry land this area gets routinely flooded with salt water every day due to the tides which in turn creates a soggy and salty salt marsh i took this photo during low tide and you can see how the salt water is restricted to a shallow river named johnson creek once the high tide comes in the water level will rise in the case of the day this was taken it rose 7 feet and most of the smooth cordgrass spartina alterniflora that you see will be nearly covered the saltmarsh produced more herons including our first tricolored heron of the day four wood storks a federally listed endangered species flew over us drawing ooh s from the class several willets a species of sandpiper foraged along the exposed mud bank of johnson creek for several minutes a clapper rail ventured out into the open along the bank to forage next to a sleeping laughing gull to our surprise a dolphin also made an appearance due to the location i m nearly certain that it was a common bottlenose dolphin tursiops truncatus there are other species of dolphin near south carolina but most of these are more open ocean species the common bottlenose dolphin is the only species which commonly swims to the shore into lagoons and marshes and up estuaries it was amazing to see one so close we then went to paradise pier a 1 120 foot pier that juts out into fripp inlet here we had 30 brown pelicans dozens of laughing gulls 2 herring gulls another bald eagle more heron species and the birds on the sandbar in the photo above this sandbar which was just off the pier was a very productive piece of land about 20 sanderlings a species of sandpiper and 3 willets foraged by the water s edge a group of terns flew in a few minutes later there were caspian royal and sandwich terns in the group then the most exciting species of the pier flew in 3 black skimmers the black birds on the center left we also got to see two cool fish species one fisherman pulled up a large red drum sciaenops ocellatus which was probably around 2 and a...