Watching, Learning, Protecting

As for Seabrook Island, our grand total was 116 bird species and over 3,000 birds for the 24-hour period, which far exceeded the previous record of less than 90 species. Thanks to a group of SIB members, we had residents of three homes who conducted Backyard Birding and four teams of people who covered six areas of Seabrook Island.  Way to go team!!!  Here’s a summary of the results from each team.

Rob & Melanie Jerome had 22 species, Dean & Judy Morr had 14 species and  Cindy Willis with 8 species.  Since a backyard on Seabrook Island is a little different than the average American backyard, our volunteers observed everything from woodpeckers and songbirds to herons, egrets, storks and loons.  Thank you!

Aija Konrad & Justin Johnson covered 7.5 miles of ground in a 7 hour period and saw 72 species, of which 21 were only seen at this location.  And although David Gardner was under the weather, he was able to get out for short periods to assist.  They certainly had the largest challenge trying to cover a huge and diverse habitat which included beach, woodlands, marsh and more!  Highlights included seeing all three “salty” sparrows:  Saltmarsh, Seaside and Nelson’s.

Judy Morr, Flo Foley and Nancy Brown spent 5 hours walking 2 miles and driving a couple miles to spot and identify 48 species, of which 14 were unique including three Greater Yellow-legs on Jenkins Point.  A visit to the Water Treatment Plant in the afternoon with David, Justin, Ed Konrad, Aija, Judy and Nancy during 90 minutes recorded 25 species.  The 31 Wild Turkeys seen inside the water treatment plant may have been one of the highlights!