December 1, 2019: Hungry Birds in South Carolina

We spent the past week in South Carolina, enjoying a wonderful visit with family in the Charleston area, adding in a few days in Beaufort, South Carolina, and Hunting Island State Park on Fripp Island.  Being migration season I kept my eye for our New Hampshire summer birds that have made their way this far south and I saw quite a few including these three, though there's no way of knowing whether they are migrating or permanent SC residents.

Bald Eagle at Palmetto Island County Park

Great Blue Heron at Hunting Island

Osprey at Hunting Island

Other birds I found were local to the South Carolina shore or its maritime forest including these two along the barrier islands.

Semipalmated Plover on Little Hunting Island

Semipalmated Sandpiper on Isle of Palms

After identifying my second shore bird with the term "semipalmated" in its name I figured I better find out what that means:  a semipalmated bird has webbing half way down its feet (semi and palm) - it seems obvious now.  At first I thought the plovers might be piping plovers, but they are clearly the semipalmated plover based on their coloring and location - piping plovers mostly stay on dry sand in the dunes.

I saw quite a few snowy egrets and great egrets which are common in the lowcountry.  One of the great egrets posed quite nicely and gave us all a good show.

Great egret on Hunting Island

The snowy egret on the other hand was more focused on catching food and didn't seem to pay any attention to us.  It would walk quietly along through the shallow water looking for a school of fish.

A Snowy Egret hunting on Hunting Island

When it saw a school it flew up and over them which caused the fish to thrash around wildly, churning the water up into a froth under the bird.

On the approach

On the attack

It then stabbed down into the water with it's beak, more often than not coming up with a little fish.

Success!

All the while these birds are fishing they must keep an eye out for predators, including these guys:

An alligator looking for its own meal

Tic-toc, tic-toc   (or was that a crocodile?)

We had a great visit as always with our wonderful hostess (thank you LG!) providing more great memories, including my favorite nature-moment of the trip:  As I was watching the sun rise over Fripp Island, a long line of brown pelicans flew low over the water in front of the emerging day - another uplifting moment courtesy of mother nature.