Winter in the
Green River Gamelands

Brown-headed Nuthatch by Alan Lenk

Polk County, NC
November 21, 2020

Song Sparrow by Simon Thompson

Register by clicking the ‘book now’ button above, or by contacting the Ventures office. We accept credit cards for an additional fee (2.9% for MC, Visa, Discover; 3.9% for AmEx), but you may also pay by bank transfer, cash, check, or money order. This Venture is limited to 12 participants

Meeting Place: We will meet and carpool from the Cracker Barrel parking lot at the Upward Road exit (from Interstate 26) in East Flat Rock Time: 8:00 AM Cost: $55 Unfortunately, our picnic lunches are not currently included in our day trips (until further notice)

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Venture Description: An easy walk through a wide range of habitats- woodland, pond and meadows. Please remember to wear comfortable shoes such as sneakers or other walking shoes.

The Green River Gamelands sit on the Blue Ridge Escarpment and contain quite the variety of managed habitats, from mixed hardwood to pine forest, and early successional to floodplain forest. As such it holds a fantastic mix of both mountain and lower elevation species. We will start in Saluda and drive down the steep winding road listening for flocks of wintering birds. This is one of our favorite birding roads in the spring, and only recently have we decided to branch out to explore the area at different seasons. Some late migrants, such as Blue-headed Vireo could still be moving through and the first wintering birds will certainly have arrived. We will walk the very pleasant Walcott Tract, where Brown-headed Nuthatches, Common Raven, and Pine Warbler are resident in the pines and adjacent rocky cliffs.

We will make our way all the way to Lake Adger, where we will look for any wintering waterfowl, Wood Duck and other newly-arriving waterfowl. We will also keep our eyes out for a Bald Eagle around the lake as well as the usual species of Belted Kingfisher, Great Blue Heron, Fish Crow, Red-shouldered Hawk and others. We may even get lucky and see one of the few Common Mergansers that have bred in this area the past few years.