The wildlife of Mecklenburg County

A county with a million people still has bald eagles, and that’s the story of Mecklenburg’s wildlife: the animals adapted faster than the developers built. This guide is what lives here, where to see it, and what to do when it moves into your attic. Facts about the animals come from the agencies and the sources linked; businesses link to the directory.

The eagles

Bald eagles nest around Mountain Island Lake, the protected reservoir that supplies Charlotte’s water, and Latta Nature Preserve in Huntersville is the public way to see them. The Carolina Raptor Center inside the preserve rehabilitates injured raptors and keeps its Raptor Trail open seven days from 10 to 4, with daily nose-to-beak programs, per its site. An eagle rehabilitated there and released over the lake is the county’s best wildlife story, and it happens more than once a year. Catawba Lands Conservancy began in 1991 when a school teacher set out to protect Mountain Island Lake, according to its own history, which is why the eagles have somewhere to nest.

The turtle in the creek

The Little Sugar Creek Greenway’s NoDa section, between Cordelia Park and 12th Street, runs along a stretch of creek where Gulf Coast spiny softshell turtles can be seen basking (Wikipedia). A softshell in the middle of a city of a million is the kind of thing that only happens because the greenway restored the creek bank. Look from the bridges on a sunny morning in May.

The suburbs: coyotes, deer, foxes

Coyotes live in every neighborhood in the county now, Uptown included; they follow the creek corridors and eat what the suburbs leave out. White-tailed deer are so common in Ballantyne and Lake Norman that the county’s gardeners have given up on hostas. Red and gray foxes den under decks. Raccoons, opossums and skunks run the alleys. None of this is dangerous to people who don’t feed them, and all of it is dangerous to a cat left out at night. The state’s rule for a coyote in the yard is to make noise and stand tall; it works.

The mountain: peregrines, bears, rattlesnakes

Crowders Mountain State Park, 32 miles west, is where the county’s edge meets real wildlife. Its cliffs, forest and streams support peregrine falcons, timber rattlesnakes and black bears (America’s State Parks), and the state parks system lists it as a birding site for everything from songbirds to birds of prey (NC State Parks). Bears are rare and shy and a hiker will almost never see one; the rattlesnakes are on the rocks in summer and a hiker should watch where the hands go. The peregrines are the reason to sit at the overlook.

The water

The lakes hold ospreys in summer, loons and diving ducks in winter, great blue herons year-round and, at the Ramsey Creek pier and the state park’s inner lake, the bass and catfish in our fishing guide. Beavers have returned to the creeks and the greenway maintenance crews have the chewed trees to prove it. Catawba Riverkeeper monitors the whole system, and the Lake Norman Marine Commission handles the human side of the lake. Carolina Waterfowl Rescue in Indian Trail takes the injured ducks, geese and swans that the lakes produce.

The insects, honestly

Mosquitoes from April to October, ticks in the tall grass, fire ants in every sunny lawn south of the city, and the joro spider, the big yellow orb-weaver that arrived from Georgia a few years ago and is now in every ring-town yard by September. The joro is harmless and eats the mosquitoes. The ticks aren’t; check after the greenway.

When it’s in your house

The wildlife guide every homeowner eventually needs. Freedom Wildlife Experts removes bats, raccoons and other wildlife from homes across Charlotte, Gastonia, Mount Holly and Belmont. Action Pest Exterminating, at it since 1983, lists wildlife removal alongside termites and rodents and describes its treatments as humane. Carolina Pest has been the Charlotte name since 1939. Economy Exterminators, Queen Bee’s Pest Solutions in Monroe and Tactical Pest in Mint Hill cover the rest. The rules: bats in the attic are a licensed-removal job with a season (they can’t be excluded while the pups can’t fly), a raccoon in the chimney has babies until July, and a snake in the garage is almost always a harmless rat snake that wants out more than you want it out.

Where to learn it

The Schiele Museum in Gastonia is the natural history museum with the Piedmont’s animals on display and a nature trail with the live ones. The county’s nature centers at Latta, Reedy Creek and McDowell run programs every weekend. Wild Birds Unlimited of Concord sets up the yard. HAWKs Lake Norman takes kids into the woods to find it. And Victory Farm in Gastonia and Wings of Eagles Ranch in Concord put people with disabilities on horses, which is the domestic end of the same idea.

The seasons of it

Spring brings the hawk migration and the fawns, and the coyote pups that make the yipping at dusk louder in May. Summer is the herons, the ospreys and the joro spiders. Fall is the second raptor push over Crowders and the deer rut, which is when the county’s car-deer collisions spike; slow down on Providence Road and Highway 73 at dusk in November. Winter is the eagles nesting and the ducks on the lakes. The animals keep a calendar; the county’s nature centers post it.

Living with it

Bring the cat in, lock the trash, don’t feed the deer, keep the dog leashed at Latta, and treat every snake as a rat snake until a professional says otherwise. The county’s wildlife is a feature; a coyote at dusk on the greenway is the reason to live here, not a reason to call someone. Seen something worth reporting? Tell us.