State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP)

The State Wildlife Grants (SWG) Program is now 12 years old and going strong. As part of the initial requirements of the Program, each state had to prepare a comprehensive plan that addressed those species that the state deemed had the greatest conservation need. Factors included rarity, threats, lack of management funding, and lack of data. Taxa teams were assembled to compile these lists, and South Carolina's resulting document was approved in 2005. As per Element 6 of the original legislation establishing the SWG program, all states made a commitment to review and revise their plans within ten years. South Carolina began the review process in September 2010. These revisions were completed in accordance with the current SWG Guidance Document Section A (July 12, 2007). The name of our document changed from SC's Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy (2005) to SC's State Wildlife Action Plan (2015 revision).

Changes to this iteration of the SWAP, as it is called, included additions and deletions to the priority species list as new data became available over the years, allowing us to better estimate populations and threats to these species. Emerging issues discussed in this iteration of the Action Plan include diseases such as white nose syndrome in bats and alterations to habitats and species assemblages due to a changing climate. Other changes to the document include the addition of "measures of success" for various action items, a major revision of the habitat chapter (Ch. 4) to include GAP analysis, and a new chapter (Ch. 9) summarizing the grant work that has resulted from the implementation of SC’s SWAP. There are two parts to the SWAP: the main document containing Chapters 1-9, and a Supplemental Volume containing all of the priority species' accounts in the form of individual reports or a guild approach. The first edition (2005) is available for comparison.

2015 South Carolina's SWAP

(Documents below are in PDF or Excel format.)

• 2015 State Wildlife Action Plan - Chapters 1-9 Only
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: SC's Priority Species
• Chapter 3: Taxonomic Groups
• Chapter 4: SC's Landscape
• Chapter 5: Statewide Conservation Strategies
• Chapter 6: SC's Comprehensive Monitoring Program
• Chapter 7: Public Input and Partnerships
• Chapter 8: Implementation and Adaptive Management
• Chapter 9: State Wildlife Grant Project Summaries
• Appendix 1-A: Terrestrial Priority Species and Their Ecosystems - Excel
• Appendix 1-B: Freshwater Priority Species and Their Habitats - Excel
• Appendix 1-C: Marine Priority Species and Their Habitats - Excel
• Appendix 1-D: Plant Priority Species and Their Habitats - Excel
• Appendix 2: Existing Conservation Plans
• Appendix 3: Existing Partnerships
• Appendix 4: Crosswalk Table for GAP
• Appendix 5: Invasive Plants by Ecoregion
• Appendix 6: Aquatic and Wetland SC Noxious Weeds
• Appendix 7: Existing Monitoring Programs
• Appendix 8: Acronyms
• Literature Cited