Cedar Island National Wildlife Refuge

Mailing Address: Cedar Island NWR c/o Mattamuskeet NWR
Route 1, Box N-2
Swan Quarter, NC 27885
Phone: (919) 225-2511
Fax: (919) 926-1743

Cedar Island National Wildlife Refuge, located in Carteret County, North Carolina, is on the end of a peninsula marking the southern end of Pamlico Sound. The refuge lies five miles northeast of the Atlantic ocean and about 40 miles northeast of Beaufort, North Carolina. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service purchased the first portion of the island (7,830 acres) in 1964. Additional acres were acquired through 1967. In 1970, an abandoned U.S. Navy radar station was obtained and converted into the refuge field office. A 1,955-acre tract was donated to the refuge in 1990. Today the 14,480-acre refuge consists of approximately 11,000 acres of irregularly-flooded, brackish marsh and 3,480 acres of pocosin and woodland habitat. The dominant marsh plants include black needlerush, saltmarsh cordgrass, saltmeadow hay, and saltgrass. The woodland areas are dominated by loblolly pine, longleaf and pond pine. Live oak is also abundant on some upland sites. The marsh and surrounding waters provide wintering habitat for thousands of ducks and nesting habitat for colonial waterbirds.