Nature Getaway
About 9,000 years ago the first nomadic Indians came to the Lowcountry to live around our nearby three fresh water rivers, the Tullifinny, the Coosawhatchie and the Pocotaligo. These freshwater rivers flow under today’s Highway17 to turn into brackish rivers flowing continuously until terminating to help make up the "Head of the Salt Water Broad River”. This area of the tidal Broad River is over a half mile wide, up to 23 feet deep, about 17 miles from the Ocean with a tidal rise and fall of 6 to 11 feet bringing our area the sea life of the Atlantic Ocean.
The Palm Key area is located within a series of Keys and is a part of a 350 acre island (historically called Big Knowles Island) which is the largest of the area’s Keys with views of the sunrise and sunset. The sunrise side of the Island has 2.25 miles of Marsh Frontage with views across the 750 acres of tidal salt marshes off the Broad River producing over a ton of food per acre of marsh per year. The sunset side of the Island is often aglow in blues, pinks and reds giving us a different sky scene to enjoy each day on the Boyd Creek side of the Key.
The tidal creeks in our marshes allow us to kayak to the Broad River and enjoy hours of paddling in the surrounding salt and fresh water rivers, creeks and even a tidal lake. Everything is planned with the tide.
At Palm Key, you can see wood storks, white ibis, great blue herons, yellow and black crowned night herons, snowy egrets, great egrets, little blue herons, green-backed herons, marsh hens and many more species of birds living and nesting in and around the marsh island. The woodlands are as diversified. To name a few, there are numerous magnolias, myrtles, hickories, walnuts, pecans, willows, pines, a wide variety of oaks including live oaks, sweet and black gums, maples, dogwood and all three indigenous varieties of palmettos. These woodlands are full of wild flowers , mushrooms, ferns and over 250 species of birds that either live at Palm key or migrate through during fall and spring. Our pond is stocked with bass and bream and has a population of indigenous alligators, turtles, frogs, etc. In the area's tidal creeks and rivers there is an array of salt water fish, crabs, shrimp and even dolphin. The area is a nature wonderland.
