Just in time for beach season, Audubon North Carolina along with The Orton Foundation invites you to experience waterbird nesting from a safe distance (behind your computer or smart phone screen) with these 360 videos!

These are sights most bird watchers never get to experience up-close, if they follow best practices to keep a safe distance from nesting waterbirds like Brown Pelicans, Royal and Sandwich Tern, and White Ibis. 

Get as down-on-the-ground, up-close-and-personal, round-and-about as your computer and smart phone screens will allow! (If you have Safari, try using a different browser.)

On a low, marshy island on the Cape Fear River, Brown Pelicans sail down from the sky, expansive wings held aloft for a breathtaking moment as they settle in to incubate their nests.
 

Thanks to funding from The Orton Foundation, Audubon North Carolina is helping to manage eight sanctuary islands on the Lower Cape Fear River. Visitors are invited to experience a literal bird’s eye view of nesting on these islands in our new series of interactive 360-degree videos.

The fun doesn’t stop with Brown Pelicans—on Battery Island, the sound of White Ibis chicks begging for food is almost indistinguishable from cicadas on a summer night! This colony tallied over 10,000 pairs of nesting White Ibis in 2017, truly a sight to behold.
 

When you experience the amazing sights, sounds and magic of Audubon North Carolina’s bird sanctuaries in these 360 videos, you save birds and their chicks from human disturbance during nesting season. Your video views will benefit over 20,000 breeding adult birds and thousands more chicks!

From the top of South Pelican Island, watch as members of a colony of Royal and Sandwich Terns fly within inches of the camera’s lens, to and from their nesting sites. There are over a thousand nests in the visible colony, but you may not realize this as each bird’s territory extends just as far as they can stick their bill out of their nest!

Hold your mouse down and give the video screen a spin so you don’t miss any of the action! 
 

Want to watch these videos on-the-go? Access them on your phone! 

Experience virtual reality, birder-style, by playing our 360 videos on your YouTube app. If you’ve got the app, you can move your phone around and our birds will move with you! Try giving it a whirl in your desk chair for an authentic virtual reality experience.