South Carolina 09

This is our second year of traveling down the coast to bird South Carolina in the Myrtle Beach area. We have found two spots which are productive and are purported to be the top birding spots in the state. Murrell's Inlet serves as our home base for the first several days as it is located very close to our favorite locale...Huntington Beach State Park. The causeway by which you enter the park is most productive at low tide, but you can never tell what the area might hold regardless of the water level. This year, the Wood storks adorned the trees along the causeway entrance much the same as they had last year. This season, however, the storks were joined by a compliment of Roseate spoonbills. The spoonbills were still in their deep pink plumage and stood out from the storks without the need of the bins. The causeway naturally still produced Great blue and Tri-color herons, Great and Snowy egrets, and Dunlin and Least sandpipers as well as Willets. The other two areas of the park we concentrate on are the boardwalk adjacent to the Nature Center and the Observation tower on Sandpiper Pond. The Center has several feeders, and we managed to catch several of the last Painted buntings of the year. On the boardwalk, we found "Old reliable", the Clapper rail. Every time we have visited the site, we've found the rails calling loudly and usually poking out into the open to pose for the camera. Today was no different as the above photo shows. At the tower, we found the usual assemblage of Moorhens and Pied-billed grebes joined today by a fine Sharp-shinned hawk. Other sites to explore should you ever be in this area include Myrtle Beach State Park where this Green heron was photographed and Cherry Grove Beach's Heritage Shores Refuge which is locate just north of North Myrtle Beach. Both provide great habitat for rails, sparrows, towhees, and the usual waders and should not be passed by.