History
1986
David J. Wielicki founds SCWA on December 16, 1986. Wielicki is currently SCWA’s Chief Executive Officer.
SCWA initiates the wood duck nest box program to increase South Carolina’s wood duck population. Since the program’s inception, SCWA biologists have distributed and installed over 24,300 wood duck nest boxes. SCWA biologists have worked with public and private landowners across South Carolina to enhance thousands of acres of wood duck breeding and brood rearing habitat. Wood duck production from these nest boxes exceeds 1,240,000 ducklings. More than 230,000 songbirds have hatched from the nest boxes.
SCWA waterfowl and wetland biologists begin working with hundreds of South Carolina landowners to create and enhance thousands of acres of waterfowl habitats which provide critical breeding, brood rearing and wintering grounds.
SCWA begins construction of the 390-acre Wildlife Education Center. Each year, SCWA’s Wildlife Education Center summer and school year camps (Camp Woodie and Camp Leopold) teach thousands of youth about wildlife ecology, hunting and fishing skills and natural resource conservation.
SCWA initiates the mallard restoration and research program. The program featured the banding of 350,000 released mallards and the analysis of band recovery data. SCWA developed a release program that encouraged waterfowl habitat development and increased waterfowl hunting opportunity for private and public land duck hunters in South Carolina. SCWA discontinued this program in 2024.
SCWA launches the Camp Woodie summer camp program. Camp Woodie’s mission is to pass on the legacy our outdoor heritage to the next generation. This summer, more than 1,400 youth between the ages of 7 to 16 years will attend Camp Woodie. Facility expansions in 2024 have increase weekly attendance capacity to 240 youth per week for a total summer camp capacity of 2,160. Camp Woodie is the nation’s leading summer wildlife conservation camp program.
SCWA launches the Camp Leopold school year program. The mission of Camp Leopold is to create an ecologically literate citizenry by heightening student awareness of the natural world, fine-tuning the skills necessary to read the landscape, and instilling a love, respect, and admiration for the land so that each individual might develop a personal land ethic. Camp Leopold teaches youth, teachers and adults how properly managed land can provide food, fiber, recreation, fish and wildlife habitat to mankind on a sustainable basis. Camp Leopold plans to host more than 3,000 youth, parent chaperones and teachers during the 2025 school year while reaching over 25,000 youth with in school Leopold Plus natural resource conservation education programs.
2018
SCWA launched the Gary Dietrich Wildlife Management Apprentice Program. The program was launched due to a tremendous shortage of land management professionals who possess practical land management experience. This has resulted in a decrease in the overall quality of wildlife habitat on private and public lands. The days of old when a farm boy went off to college to get his wildlife management degree are long gone. The vast majority of today's college graduates have the book knowledge but lack the practical experience to become effective land managers.
In an effort to address this need, the South Carolina Waterfowl Association (SCWA) enhanced our 20-year old wildlife management intern program to establish the Gary Dietrich Wildlife Management Apprentice Program at our 1,334-acre Wildlife Education Center campus. Apprentices come from a variety of educational backgrounds with Associate, Bachelor and Master degrees in wildlife and natural resource management. Apprentice graduates with a natural resource associate degree are well equipped to become private land wildlife managers or wildlife technicians on state and federal lands. Graduates with a Bachelor degree are qualified to become wildlife managers on both private and state owned wildlife management areas. Master Degree apprentice graduates are well qualified to run National Wildlife Refuges, State WMA's or large private land holdings. In 2025, SCWA and our program partners will fund 7 apprentice positions.
2020
SCWA developed the Outdoor Heritage Events program in an effort to provide opportunities for parents and youth to enjoy multiple quality outdoor experiences. The program includes adult and parent/child duck, dove and deer hunts, fishing tournaments, rifle and wing shooting clinics, outdoor skills weekends for men and women, family camp and outdoor festivals including the BirdFest Bluegrass Festival, DuckFest and the upcoming Outdoor Heritage Exposition scheduled for October 2026. Annual attendance is expected to exceed 10,000 people by 2026.
