Join us for our Earth Day Beach Sweep and Social

Kids of all ages are welcome!

Help Our Shorebirds
and Have Double the Fun on Earth Day!

Earth Day Celebrations start with a Beach Sweep at Fish Haul Beach to pick up trash
and later in the day come to our Earth Day Social at the Lucky Rooster!!

The Hilton Head Island Beach Sweep

For 23 years, the Outside Foundation has held its popular Earth Day Beach Sweep along the Island’s 12 miles of beach. In our first collaboration, HHA and ΔΔΔ are teaming up to encourage kids and adults of ALL AGES to get involved in this exciting event!

When we think about cleaning up our beaches, we usually think that it’ll make it nicer for us – be us visitors or residents. But it also helps protect our shorebirds. Plastic and all types of trash are a huge problem on beaches and pose dangers to wildlife and birds who could ingest, get injured by, or become entangled in it. This Earth Day let’s join together to help clean up our beaches and help our shorebirds.

Why Fish Haul Beach?

Fish Haul Beach is our most important shorebird area on Hilton Head Island, filled with hundreds of shorebirds this time of year. Gulls, Terns, Black Skimmers, Oyster Catchers, Willets, Plovers, Sanderlings, Pelicans, and so many more call Fish Haul Beach home. Many shorebirds migrate here from thousands of miles away—either arriving here for the winter, like our endangered Piping Plovers, or stopping here to rest and refuel on their 3,000-mile journey from South America to northern Canada, like endangered Red Knots. This beach in particular needs special protection from all disturbances—from trash to dogs running off-leash. To find out more about how dogs chasing birds severely harm shorebirds, check out our conservation tab on our website: hiltonheadaudubon.org.

Join us on Earth Day and Kick-Off the summer beach season by participating in our Beach Sweep and get energized to keep our beaches trash-free all year round—our birds will thank you!

Hilton Head Island beaches now have trash baskets you can take with you to the beach to pick up trash all summer long. Next time you’re at the beach, take a container for your trash or one of these baskets to help keep our beaches clean for our birds!

Sign up for the Beach Sweep here.

Sign up for the Earth Day Social here.

You can also register through our Event Calendar. Click on April 22’s description for Earth Day.

Earth Day 2023  •  Saturday, April 22

9:30 AM – 11:30 AM, Fish Haul Beach Sweep
4:00 PM – 6:00 PM, Social at Lucky Rooster
All ages welcome – see you there!

For the Beach Sweep, gather at our table set up in the parking lot at Fish Haul Beach at 9:30AM for coffee and donuts, registration and supplies. Wear sturdy shoes or water boots if you have them; it will be high tide. Bring a hat, your water bottle, and sunscreen.

 A short introduction to the sweep will be given at 9:45AM and followed by the sweep!

After the Sweep, ΔΔΔ Alum and Street Meet restaurant owner Shelby Basciano has graciously offered a free drink to all HHA and ΔΔΔ  Beach Sweep participants! Beer, wine, soft drinks, iced tea can be had!

For the Earth Day Social, meet at the Lucky Rooster from 4-6PM. Have some drinks and food and enjoy conversations with Hilton Head Audubon members, Conservation Voters of South Carolina President John Tynan, and Tri Delta Alums! The Lucky Rooster is located at 841 William Hilton Parkway in the South Island Shopping Center (where Island Bagel is).

For questions contact hhiaudubon@hiltonheadaudubon.org 

To Fish Haul Beach:

• Go to Fish Haul Road:
  • From Dillon Rd, continue straight at Beach City Rd intersection.
  • From Beach City Rd to Fish Haul Rd: turn left at intersection.
• On Fish Haul Rd:
  • The first right is Mitchelville Rd – which is a dirt road that leads directly to Fish Haul Beach Park.  
  • If you’d rather take a paved road, continue to Baygall Rd and turn rt. Go past the fields to the end of Baygall Rd and turn Right onto Mitchelville Rd, which here is paved and also leads to the entrance of Fish Haul Beach Park.
• Turn into the park area and find a park. Our check-in table will be by the entrance to the beach.