Category Archives: Birding Trips in SC

Warbler Spring migration bird watching trips in North Carolina, South Carolina and New Jersey

March 28, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

The grass is greening up and the flowers are starting to bloom. Spring is on the way and with it, new species of warblers will soon be arriving in the eastern United States.
Soon the woods and fields will be filled with chirps, buzzes, trills and tweets as the birds sing in search of a mate and to establish nesting territories.

Warbler vocalizations fall into two categories – songs and calls. In general, we define bird song as a structured, usually complex vocalization serving either or both of two purposes – to defend territories and to attract mates.
Most of the songs are sung by the males, though females do also sing territorially or for pair bonding, especially in the tropics.
Generally their calls are usually shorter and structurally simpler, serving a wider range of functions, including courtship, signaling alarm, or communicating a change in location.

Interestingly, almost no songbirds know their songs by instinct. Rather, most need to learn to sing.
Warblers begin learning songs as nestlings by hearing the songs of adults nearby. In this way, song traditions (known to biologists as “memes”) are passed down in songbird neighborhoods from year to year.
In fact many warbler species have area-specific dialects.
Makes me wonder if our warblers have a southern accent lol!

I can’t wait for spring migration to kick off! It’s so much fun to lead my birding tours, showing off these beautiful feathered gems to my guests.
I’ve got 80 new tour dates available for booking in the Carolina’s as well as in eastern New Jersey and coastal Maine.
If you’d like to join me to go birding this spring, check out the calendar shown below for location and date information.

Feel free to send me an email if ya have any questions about upcoming trips too!
Happy birding-
Sally

Photos by @sally_siko of @bestlife_birding on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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Birding tours in South Carolina

March 21, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

Really looking forward to leading more birding trips in South Carolina this year!
I love seeing the huge variety of long legged, pointed (and spoon) billed, fish slayers (both feathered and otherwise lol!) that are found along the coast.
The cool thing about spending time Herons, Spoonbills, Woodstorks, Gallinules and Egrets is that generally, these are active birds which makes them entertaining to watch.
I love trying to freeze the quick action sequences as the birds squabble for a catch.

Though it can be challenging to capture the action, photographing wading birds is an opportunity to learn something new about capturing good images.
Between adjusting ISO numbers for the light, tweaking shutter speed for action and figuring out aperture values, there’s a lot to think about before I’ve even pressed the shutter.

Luckily the birds, gators and minks tend to stick around for a long while which means there’s plenty of time to really dial in those settings.
When the day is done, I always leave SC feeling like a stronger photographer than when I arrived.
Plus I’ll have a memory card filled with beautiful birds and great memories too.
That’s the kind of experience I enjoy sharing with my guests on every trip!

Check out the links below to book your bird watching tour in South Carolina today!

Birding Tours at Huntington Beach State Park

Birding Tours at Pinckney Island NWR

Photos by Sally Siko of @bestlife_birding captured on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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Why are Painted Buntings so colorful?

March 12, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

With every color of the rainbow showing in his plumage, the Painted Bunting is truly a stunning bird to photograph and see in real life. 

But what makes the male Painted Buntings plumage so vibrant?  As it turns out, it’s a combination of feather structure and three pigments which contribute to the colorful feathers found on these handsome birds: melanin, carotenoids and porphyrins.  

*Melanin-Naturally produced by the birds displays as black, brown, red and pale yellow in feathers.  

* Carotenoids- Birds which display the reds, oranges and yellows in their plumage is attributed to carotenoids when they eat specific plants or insects, like spiders or grasshoppers, which eat the carotenoids the birds need for their feather colors.  

* Porphyrins- A modified amino acid producing pink, brown, red and green pigmentation.  

*Feather structure-That bright blue to violet head color is actually a trick of the light. When sunlight passes through certain proteins and pockets of air trapped between feather barbules — tiny filaments extending from the barbs of a feather — it refracts, just like light passing through a prism.

Unfortunately since winter is here, most of the Painted Buntings have migrated south. They will return to North & South Carolina in May and stick around through September-ish.
Look for these guys in our coastal areas in scrubby wet habitats, in the scrub brush just behind the sand dune line, at the edges of woods and flying over open tall-grass fields.

Btw, I’m planning on heading back out later this year to share these beauties with my tour guests so I’ve added new trips in 2024 to find the Painted Bunting in NC & SC. If you’d like to join me, check out the link in my bio for more info and available group tour dates or feel free to shoot me a DM anytime if ya have any questions 🙂

Photos by @sally_siko of @bestlife_birding on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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A Roseate Spoonbill encounter at Huntington Beach SP

March 10, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

One of the most unique looking birds we’ve got flying around the Carolinas is the Roseate Spoonbill.  With that long flat bill it’s easy to see how these beauties earned their name. I spotted this one last weekend while birding at the Huntington Beach State Park in Murrells Inlet, SC.

Having a “built-in” spoon on its beak can be a big help at mealtime. Spoonbills take advantage of this adaptation with a special feeding style known as “head-swinging.”  They’ll plunge their bill nearly vertically under water and swing it side to side in wide arcs. In this way, they snag a host of small animals from the lake bottom.  Their diet is made up of small fish, crustaceans (especially shrimp and crayfish), insects, molluscs (such as slugs and snails), and other small aquatic animals.

Roseate Spoonbills are an occasional, transient visitor to North Carolina during the late summer along our southeastern coast. If you’d like to have an opportunity to see them sooner rather than later, your best bet is to take a short trip down to coastal South Carolina where they are found throughout the year.

By the way, I’ve added 80 new birding tour dates to my 2024 trip schedule so if you’d like to join me out there in South Carolina to see these beautiful birds for yourself, check the link below for details & booking info!
  Photos by @sally_siko of @bestlife_birding on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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Spending time with Red-breatsed Mergansers in SC

March 4, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

One of the obvious challenges that comes with photographing a bird is of course that they move around quite a bit.  Add the Atlantic Ocean waves and a species of diving duck and now I’ve got a whole fresh set of obstacles to deal with.  In this case I was incredibly lucky to be able to catch a fair amount of shots of this male Red-breasted Merganser swimming right offshore of the rock jetty at Huntington Beach SP which was freak’n awesome!

A member of the “Sawbill” family of ocean faring ducks for its long, thin serrated bill, Red-breasted Mergansers are voracious eaters of fish.  The young ones will also eat crustaceans and insects until they learn to hunt on the open water.  These guys are strong underwater swimmers, easily able to catch a slippery fish in that serrated bill and there are even reports of flocks of RBM’s hunting for schools fish cooperatively by driving them into shallow waters. Red-breasted Mergansers aren’t just speedy underwater, they happen to be one of the fastest flyers of all the duck species in North America with speeds clocking in approaching 80mph at level flight.  Crazy!  

Red-breasted Mergansers are usually found in brackish and saltwater habitats in the eastern counties of the Carolinas. That being said, smaller numbers also frequent our fresh water impoundments, lakes, and ponds, usually for short periods of time, both inland and coastal areas.  They’ll stick around until late May before they heading north to their breeding grounds so you’ve still got plenty of time to see them.

By the way, I’ve added 80 new birding tour dates to my 2024 trip schedule so if you’d like to join me out there in South Carolina to see these beautiful ducks for yourself, check the calendar below for details & booking info!  

Photos by @sally_siko of @bestlife_birding on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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Hooded Mergansers in SC

February 27, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

Of of the most striking looking ducks we’ve got swimming around the Carolinas is the Hooded Merganser. With that huge crown of feathers at the top of their heads, these handsome birds are truly kings of the water. I spotted this small flock yesterday while birding at Huntington Beach State Park in Murrells Inlet, SC.
My guests and I were able to get relatively close to these guys from our vantage point next to the marsh which allowed some excellent photo opportunities.
The drakes were putting on a territorial display, cruising through the water upright with chests puffed out and bills pointed up to the sky in an effort to prove who’s the biggest badass in the marsh.
You can even hear them making their weird honking grunt-quacking noises while they were trying to impress the hens!

Hooded Mergansers are a species of diving duck with a somewhat unusual diet in that they do not eat much plant material. Instead they prefer to snack on small fish, crawfish, and aquatic insects.In addition, they’ve got long serrated beaks which aid in the capture and consumption of their underwater prey. The tidal marsh habitat where I photographed these birds serve as the perfect hunting grounds for the Mergansers.

Though many of us associate Mergansers as being a wintertime visitor to the Carolinas, they are known to breed in our eastern counties making them a year round resident of the Carolina’s. Like Wood Ducks, they are cavity-nesters but unlike Wood Ducks, Mergansers often lay their eggs in other females’ nests. This is behavior is similar to the practice of Brown-headed Cowbirds, except that the ducks only lay eggs in nests of their own species. Pretty neat, huh?

By the way, I’ve added 80 new birding tour dates to my schedule so if you’d like to join me out there in SC to see these beautiful ducks for yourself check the calendar below for details & booking info!

Photos by @sally_siko of @bestlife_birding on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

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Saltmarsh Sparrows in SC

February 25, 2024 admin

By Sally Siko

Here is a bird I was excited to find last year while birding Huntington Beach State Park in South Carolina, a Saltmarsh Sparrow. I’d never seen one before so it was awesome to finally see and photograph these cute little bird up close while sitting on the jetty.

One of the more interesting things I’ve learned about Saltmarsh Sparrows regards their unusual breeding system. Unlike most songbirds, the males do not defend territories, rather they move around large areas of a marsh, singing to attract females. Both sexes are promiscuous, and no pairs are formed; males take no part in caring for the eggs or young.

The range of a Saltmarsh Sparrow extends from Maine down to Florida on the east coast of the United States. Here in the Carolinas they are best found in our coastal areas during the winter months. They can be tough to spot though since they tend to hide in the tallest grass. That being said, they do respond well to pishing techniques and will occasionally pop out of the grass to offer a quick look before diving back down into the grass. The best time to try and find one of these little feathered gems is during periods of high tide, when they are forced off of the mud flats to perch on the grass itself.  

Generally I’m pleased with these first sighting photos but I’m eager to return to Huntington Beach State Park to lead my next tour tomorrow. Lol I guess I’m never satisfied so I’d like another crack at getting some better shots.

By the way, I’ve added 80 new tour dates to my 2024 birding trip schedule including locations right here in South Carolina.
Check the calendar to view all of my trips!

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Mute Swans at Huntington Beach SP in SC

February 15, 2024 admin

By-Sally Siko

While birding at Huntington Beach State Park last week I spotted a small flock of Mute Swans flying overhead.
They made two runs of an ever descending spiral formation before they dropped down.
Although they were somewhat far away from my vantage point on the dock, it was fun to try to get a few pics of the group as they glided in for a splash landing.

These impressive swans are a familiar sight to many throughout the Carolinas occurring in urban parks, wildlife refuges and in on farms in rural regions.
Though they are year-round residents,
Mute Swans are actually native to Europe and were introduced to the United States in the 1800s as an ornamental species to grace the gardens of estates and parks. As it often goes, many of them escaped and are now contributing to the growing populations of feral birds.
Today, undomesticated flocks Mute Swans are found in coastal areas from New England all the way south into the mid Atlantic States.

The bane of kayakers, fishermen, farmers and hikers alike, these guys can get quite aggressive, especially during the breeding season when encountered near their nesting sites.
Even during the winter, Mute Swans are very protective of one another and will chase away enemies or rivals at the drop of a hat.
They’ll puff their feathers out to appear larger than life, hiss loudly and then set off after the offender with neck extended, bill open ready to deliver a bite.
Perhaps they aren’t the friendliest of birds but at least they are entertaining to watch lol!

Photos by Sally Siko of @bestlife_birding captured on my mighty mirrorless monster, the @canonusa #R5

Want to go see these beauties for yourself? Book a tour below!

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Gift cards are available for Best Life Birding tours!

December 20, 2023 admin

By Sally Siko

Need to find the perfect gift for the bird lover in your life? Well look no further because gift cards are available now here at Best Life Birding!

PURCHASE YOUR GIFT CARD FOR BEST LIFE BIRDING HERE

Birders and bird loving photographers of all skill levels are invited to join me, Sally Siko as we explore the trails, woods, fields and shorelines of the United States in search of interesting birds. From North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey, Maine and beyond, there are plenty of great species to get out and enjoy throughout the year.