Voyage To Beaufort

   We got up this morning and had a pair of omelets for breakfast at the local IHOP. We headed out southwest to the ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge. The ACE Basin represents one of the largest undeveloped wetland ecosystems remaining on the Atlantic Coast. ACE Basin stands for the Ashepoo River, the Combahee River, and the Edisto River, which form the estuary and parts of this large Refuge boundary. We drove through hundreds of salt marshes full of marsh grass and thick forests with Spanish moss growing on most the trees. South Carolina has more swamps than the upper peninsula of Michigan. We elected to drive south to Edisto Beach.

   On the first turnoff from the highway, we spotted a flock of Wood Storks (Mycteria Americana) in a small marsh.

   The Wood Stork is a large wading bird that stands about 33 to 45 inches tall. It’s face only a mother could love. It is the only bird in the Stork family that breeds in North America. In June 2014, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service upgraded the status of the Wood Stork from endangered to threatened, which is a very positive development. This bird has been leaving their historic south Florida home due to loss of habitat and have moved north to places like the ACE Basin in South Carolina to nest. We have seen a lot of Wood Storks so far on this trip.

   Right at the end of a long bridge across the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, there was a paved pull-off with a pier. There Robert took a work conference call and Berry used the spotting scope to investigate the Waterway. On the bridge abutments were lots of Double Crested Cormorants (Phalacrocorax Auritus) holding their wings open to dry them. In the tall reeds were Great Egrets (Ardea Alba) and a Great Blue Heron (Ardea Herodias). These are majestic birds and we enjoy watching them wade in the shallow water.

   As we continued down the peninsula, we came to what we call a “honeypot” of Yellow Rumped Warblers (Setophaga Coronata). Yellow Rumped Warblers are one of North America's most abundant neotropical migrants. They primarily eat insects. They are perhaps the most versatile foragers of all warblers. Beyond gleaning bugs from under the leaves like other warblers, they often flit, flycatcher-like, out from their perches in short loops, to catch flying insects. We see them quite often, wherever we bird. We sas them in Mexico. They are especially cute and easily identifiable by the yellow spots on their rump and their sides.

   We had lunch in Edisto Beach at a little hole in the wall called the Dockside Grill. The food was pretty good. We sat outside on a covered porch. Gulls and egrets perched on the piles in the water. Robert had some fish soup, which he is now going to try to make at home. Garlic laden tomato base, a piece of white fish, onions and celery and some special South Carolina seasoning mix. Berry had a shrimp wrap. By the time we finished with lunch and Robert got off of his computer, it was around 3:30pm. We drove back across the top of the Ace Basin to Beaufort, SC.

   Beaufort is where the US Marines are based. Our hotel room is just across the street from the ocean. We ate at the Plums Restaurant. Robert had a nice dinner of stuffed flounder and Berry had on the Mahi Mahi. We held hands and walked along the pretty ocean promenade back to our hotel. Even a bad day birding is better than a good day working.

   Berry kept spotting Belted Kingfishers (Megaceryle Alcyon) one after another perched on anything and everything hanging above a marsh. We picked up the Eastern Phoebe (Sayornis Phoebe) on several stops along the road. There was a pair of American Kestrel (Falco Sparverius), one male and one female, balancing on a power line. We noticed a kettle of Black Vulture (Coragyps Atratus) circling over a road in the morning and then we noticed that in the afternoon, all the Black Vultures were roosting quietly on a transmission tower.

Berry and Robert

Photos courtesy of Wikipedia