Coastal Carolina Hotspots
Huntington Beach State Park
Coastal South Carolina
November 10-14, 2021
Your place on this Venture is reserved when your completed registration form and deposit of $300/person has been received. Deposit may be made via the ‘book now’ button above, or by contacting the Ventures office. We accept credit cards for an additional fee (2.9% for MC, Visa, Discover; 3.9% for AmEx), but you may also pay by bank transfer, cash, check, or money order (payable to ‘VENTURES BIRDING’) sent to PO Box 1095, Skyland, NC 28776. This Venture is limited to 8 participants.
Cost of the SC Venture $1395 per person from Asheville, NC based on double occupancy ($300 single supplement) Price includes: All accommodations, van transportation from the Murrell’s Inlet area, breakfasts, lunches & dinners, entry fees, taxes, gratuities (except tour guides), trip information packets, bird list & guide/leader service throughout. Not included: transportation to Murrell’s Inlet area, alcoholic beverages & drinks, laundry and other personal items.
A long weekend visiting the best shorebird habitat on the South Carolina Coast.
Join Craig for a long weekend of birding at Huntington Beach State Park and other eBird hotspots on the South Carolina coast! With its sandy beaches, salt and freshwater marshes and extensive maritime forest, this Park has the highest number of species of any eBird hotspot in South Carolina. Over 300 species have been observed here, including many rarities. We’ll also explore Murrell’s Inlet where we should see loons and gannets as well as plenty of shorebirds and sea ducks. Tom Yawkey Wildlife Center is another nearby top hotspot in the state with 255 species observed. Shorebirds, waterfowl, wading birds, and marsh birds and rails thrive here, as well as Red-cockaded Woodpecker. The area is best known for attracting rare shorebirds such as American Golden Plover and Ruff. The Santee Coastal Reserve Wildlife Management Area, with its thousands of acres of impoundments is the #8 hotspot in the state with 271 species observed. If we are lucky we could see Hudsonian Godwit or Wilson’s Phalarope here. Finally we will complete our tour with visits to a couple of local waste water treatment plants in search of American White Pelican, waterfowl, and shorebirds.
Some of the Birds We Hope to See
Common Loon, Horned and possibly Eared Grebes; Black, Surf and White-winged Scoters; Bufflehead, Common Gallinule, Semipalmated and Black-bellied Plovers; Sanderling, Willet, Dunlin, and other shorebirds; Forster’s Tern, Northern Gannett, Wood Stork, Brown and American White Pelicans, White Ibis, most of the herons and egrets, Eagle, Northern Harrier, Osprey, Peregrine Falcon, Merlin, Red-cockaded Woodpecker, over-wintering warblers such as Black-and-white, and Yellow-throated; many wintering sparrows; Purple Finch, Pine Siskin and a lot more!