SWAP Overview

State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) serve as the nation's framework for proactively conserving fish and wildlife to prevent species from precipitous declines. As the State of South Carolina’s wildlife agency, the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) is the entity charged with creating and updating the State’s SWAP. Led by a SWAP Coordinator and through rigorous taxa review by teams of scientists and other experts familiar with the State’s wildlife and plants, South Carolina’s latest iteration of the SWAP contains 1,773 Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN), including federal and state threatened and endangered species and other rare or declining species. Plans must address Eight Required Elements, including a public review process. Revisions are required at least every ten years. In 2005 and 2015, each state, territory, and the District of Columbia completed SWAPs for approval by the US Fish and Wildlife Service as a condition for receiving federal funding through the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants Program used to implement those Plans. South Carolina, along with most other states and territories, are finalizing their 2025 Plans. The SWAPs describe the states’ landscapes, habitats important to SGCN, key threats, needed conservation actions, and research and monitoring plans. South Carolina’s 2025 SWAP can be found here.

Additionally, the Supplemental Volume: Species and Guild Accounts, contains a compilation of written accounts, each following a standardized format where the authors describe the species, their status, population size and distribution, habitat requirements, challenges faced, conservation accomplishments thus far, conservation recommendations for future action, and how to measure success. These accounts are arranged by single species or as guilds if several species share a common habitat. The Supplemental Volume can be found here.

As part of our public review process, we encourage you to read the SWAP, or portions thereof that interest you, and to then access a short survey so that the SCDNR can receive valuable public feedback. This survey will be open for 30 days, August 8th - September 8th, 2025 and can be found at the link at the bottom of this page.

To prepare you for the content and flow of the SWAP, the chapters are summarized as follows:

• Chapter 1: A discussion of the need for the SWAP, timeline of its creation, and the legislative mandate that allows SCDNR to develop and implement such a strategy is presented.This chapter also emphasizes the role of public participation in both the creation and implementation of the SWAP. The SCDNR formed extensive partnerships during the initial development of the SWAP and has retained them through past and current revision processes. The organizational layout and roadmap to the Eight Required Elements are defined. Also, changes to this edition of the SWAP are identified.
• Chapter 2: A picture of South Carolina’s landscape is presented through descriptions of the basic ecoregions found therein, aquatic resources, soils composition, geology, typical climate, ecosystem functionality (connectivity, resiliency, carbon sequestration, natural fire return intervals), land ownership patterns (public vs. private), demographics, economics, urbanization trends, and miliary presence. The State’s conservation portfolio is explained through the conservation biology principles of resiliency, redundancy, and representation (collectively known as the “3 Rs”). Carbon sequestration and fire return intervals further define the landscape of the State and the resulting habitats.
• Chapter 3: The various habitat types found in the State are defined by ecoregion with priority habitats emphasized. These habitats have various scales from course to fine, but all help determine the Conservation Opportunity Areas (COAs) summarized in a map representation (in Chapter 8) that focuses research/survey efforts, land acquisition, and restoration projects.
• Chapter 4: The reader is introduced to the state of the 16 taxa groups covered in this SWAP, threats facing them from a whole taxa perspective, and opportunities available to mitigate for these threats.
• Chapter 5: Following the taxa group descriptions and threats specific to these groups, this chapter takes a wider view of 19 threat categories and their secondary impacts common to most of the species identified as SGCN in the South Carolina SWAP.
• Chapter 6: The methodology used to identify South Carolina’s priority wildlife species that appear as SGCN in this SWAP is discussed and a spreadsheet listing the 1,773 SGCN are the main substance of this chapter.
• Chapter 7: Some of South Carolina’s SGCN and priority habitats are also of cultural significance, and this chapter emphasizes the connection between these and cultural groups. These include the Indigenous Peoples (Tribes) with ancestral ties to the State and the Gullah-Geechee Nation of African descent residing in the Lowcountry of South Carolina.
• Chapter 8: The Conservation Opportunity Areas map provided in this chapter visually represents focus areas for land acquisition. Also, actions proposed to mitigate threats and stressors identified in both Chapter 5 and in individual species/guild accounts are outlined by seven broad topic groups known as Conservation Action Areas (CCAs): Land Management, Invasive and Non-native Species Control, Habitat Protection and Restoration, Education and Outreach, Partnerships and Collaborations, Research and Survey, and Regulatory Actions. These actions are more comprehensive in their approaches and are both habitat-based and species based. Also, effectiveness monitoring of these actions is addressed. A list of ongoing monitoring programs and projects in South Carolina is provided.
• Chapter 9: SWAP Implementation comes in the form of technical research and survey work done by conservation partners and academia, land acquisition and habitat restoration by state agencies and partners, and through the conservation efforts of the general public. The Plan review and revision process is explained as well as hopes for future improvements as science and technology provide new mechanisms for tracking and managing species and habitats. The grant funding mechanisms associated with implementing the SWAP—State Wildlife Grants and Competitive State Wildlife Grants—are explained and summaries/abstracts of completed projects are provided, representing successes in implementation.
• Chapter 10: South Carolina’s role in the landscape continuum of the Southeast is addressed. Topics shared with other Southeastern states include Regional Species of Greatest Conservation Need (RSGCN), fire return intervals, and climate change impacts. Species vulnerability and resilience are addressed.
• Chapter 11: As some species do not complete their entire life cycles within the United States, a final chapter on International Conservation is included to draw attention to these species and the fact that management of them is made more difficult by their trans-national migrations.
• Appendices associated with the SWAP include a list of conservation partners; a list of conservation plans and initiatives; lists of non-native invasive plants and animals; and a more detailed explanation of the selection process for Freshwater Fish SGCN.
• Supplemental Volume – Priority Species and Guild Accounts: document is a compilation of written accounts, each following a standardized format to make sure Required Elements 1-6 are included. Authors describe the species, their status, population size and distribution, habitat requirements, challenges faced, conservation accomplishments thus far, conservation recommendations for future action, and how to measure success. Insects and plants do not have species accounts as they are currently too data deficient.