Keep Your Eyes on the Prize
Fishermen were reeling in the fish on a sunny afternoon, and this Brown Pelican was getting handouts every once in a while. Couldn’t tell who was more excited, the Fishermen or Mr. Pelican ;-)
Brown Pelicans are huge, stocky seabirds. They have thin necks and very long bills with a stretchy throat pouch used for capturing fish. Their wings are very long and broad and are often noticeably bowed when the birds are gliding.
Brown Pelicans feed by plunging into the water, stunning small fish with the impact of their large bodies and scooping them up in their expandable throat pouches. In flight, lines of Pelicans glide on their broad wings, often surfing updrafts along wave faces or cliffs. Their wingbeats are slow, deep, and powerful.
Pelicans lay one to four bluish white eggs in a stick nest, and the young hatch in about a month. The young live on regurgitated food obtained by thrusting their bills down the parent’s gullet. The young mature at three to four years.
Pelicans are distinguished by their large elastic throat pouches. With some species reaching a length of 180 cm (70 inches), having a wingspan of 3 meters (10 feet), and weighing up to 13 kg (30 pounds), they are among the largest of living birds.
Pelicans eat fish, which they catch by using the extensible throat pouch as a dip-net. The pouch is not used to store the fish, which are swallowed immediately. Brown Pelicans capture fish by a spectacular plunge from the air, but other species swim in formation, driving small schools of fish into shoal water where they are scooped up by the birds.
Sony, 200-600 @ 200 mm, 1/800 @ f/8.0, ISO 250, edited to taste)
Keep Your Eyes on the Prize
Fishermen were reeling in the fish on a sunny afternoon, and this Brown Pelican was getting handouts every once in a while. Couldn’t tell who was more excited, the Fishermen or Mr. Pelican ;-)
Brown Pelicans are huge, stocky seabirds. They have thin necks and very long bills with a stretchy throat pouch used for capturing fish. Their wings are very long and broad and are often noticeably bowed when the birds are gliding.
Brown Pelicans feed by plunging into the water, stunning small fish with the impact of their large bodies and scooping them up in their expandable throat pouches. In flight, lines of Pelicans glide on their broad wings, often surfing updrafts along wave faces or cliffs. Their wingbeats are slow, deep, and powerful.
Pelicans lay one to four bluish white eggs in a stick nest, and the young hatch in about a month. The young live on regurgitated food obtained by thrusting their bills down the parent’s gullet. The young mature at three to four years.
Pelicans are distinguished by their large elastic throat pouches. With some species reaching a length of 180 cm (70 inches), having a wingspan of 3 meters (10 feet), and weighing up to 13 kg (30 pounds), they are among the largest of living birds.
Pelicans eat fish, which they catch by using the extensible throat pouch as a dip-net. The pouch is not used to store the fish, which are swallowed immediately. Brown Pelicans capture fish by a spectacular plunge from the air, but other species swim in formation, driving small schools of fish into shoal water where they are scooped up by the birds.
Sony, 200-600 @ 200 mm, 1/800 @ f/8.0, ISO 250, edited to taste)