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The brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis) is a bird of the pelican family, Pelecanidae, one of three species found in the Americas and one of two that feed by diving into water. It is found on the Atlantic Coast from New Jersey to the mouth of the Amazon River, and along the Pacific Coast from British Columbia to Peru, including the Galapagos Islands. The nominate subspecies in its breeding plumage has a white head with a yellowish wash on the crown. The nape and neck are dark maroon–brown. The upper sides of the neck have white lines along the base of the gular pouch, and the lower fore neck has a pale yellowish patch. The male and female are similar, but the female is slightly smaller. The nonbreeding adult has a white head and neck. The pink skin around the eyes becomes dull and gray in the nonbreeding season. It lacks any red hue, and the pouch is strongly olivaceous ochre-tinged and the legs are olivaceous gray to blackish-gray.
The brown pelican mainly feeds on fish, but occasionally eats amphibians, crustaceans, and the eggs and nestlings of birds. It nests in colonies in secluded areas, often on islands, vegetated land among sand dunes, thickets of shrubs and trees, and mangroves. Females lay two or three oval, chalky white eggs. Incubation takes 28 to 30 days with both sexes sharing duties. The newly hatched chicks are pink, turning gray or black within 4 to 14 days. About 63 days are needed for chicks to fledge. Six to 9 weeks after hatching, the juveniles leave the nest, and gather into small groups known as pods.
The brown pelican is the national bird of Saint Martin, Barbados, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the Turks and Caicos Islands, and the official state bird of Louisiana, appearing on the flag, seal, or coat of arms of each. It has been rated as a species of least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. It was listed under the United States Endangered Species Act from 1970 to 2009, as pesticides such as dieldrin and DDT threatened its future in the Southeastern United States and California. In 1972, the use of DDT was banned in Florida, followed by the rest of the United States. Since then, the brown pelican's population has increased. In 1903, Theodore Roosevelt set aside the first National Wildlife Refuge, Florida's Pelican Island, to protect the species from hunters.
Taxonomy
The brown pelican was described by Swedish zoologist Carl Linnaeus in the 1766 12th edition of his Systema Naturae, where it was given the binomial name of Pelecanus occidentalis. It belongs to the New World clade of the genus Pelecanus.
Five subspecies of the brown pelican are recognized. At least some of these subspecies are genetically distinct despite similar phenotypes. The subspecies differ from one another in size, coloration of the throat pouch (among other bare parts) in breeding condition, and/or certain breeding plumage details, as well as geographic range.
The brown pelican is part of a clade that includes the Peruvian pelican (P. thagus) and American white pelican (P. erythrorhynchos); brown and Peruvian pelicans are sister taxa, with American white pelican a more distant relative. The Peruvian pelican was previously considered a subspecies of the brown pelican, but is now considered a separate species on the basis of its much greater size (around double the weight of the brown pelican), differences in bill color and plumage, and a lack of evidence of hybridization between the forms where their ranges approach and overlap. (In captivity, the brown pelican is known to have hybridized with both the American white pelican and the more distantly related great white pelican.)
In 1932, James L. Peters divided Pelecanus into three subgenera, placing brown pelican (including Peruvian pelican) in a monospecific Leptopelicanus, American white pelican in a monospecific Cyrtopelicanus, and all the rest in the subgenus Pelecanus, a treatment which was also followed by Jean Dorst and Raoul J. Mougin in 1979. Andrew Elliott in 1992, and Joseph B. Nelson in 2005, considered the deepest division among pelicans to lie between brown (plus Peruvian) pelican on the one hand, and the white-plumaged pelicans on the other (among which the large ground-nesting American white, Australian, great white, and Dalmatian pelicans were thought to form a clade, and the smaller tree-nesting pink-backed and spot-billed pelicans were likewise considered sister taxa). In 1993, Paul Johnsgard hypothesized that the Americas were colonized relatively late in pelican evolution, with the family originating in Africa or South Asia; however, he later supported the prevailing view that brown (with Peruvian) was the most divergent pelican (and considered American white and great white pelicans to be close relatives, implying two independent dispersals of pelicans into the Americas, with that of the ancestor of brown and Peruvian pelicans occurring early on). Sibley and Ahlquist's DNA-DNA hybridization studies and UPGMA tree published in 1990 supported brown pelican as sister to a clade comprising all the white-plumaged pelicans analyzed, including American white pelican (although the relationships among the latter group differed).
With better genetic data and more modern methods, a new phylogenetic hypothesis of pelican relationships has arisen, which contrasts with the traditional view of brown and Peruvian being the most divergent pelicans based on their distinctive plumage and behavior (and early molecular data). Rather than the brown-plumaged pelicans and white-plumaged pelicans forming two reciprocally monophyletic groups, the American white pelican is sister to brown and Peruvian pelicans, the three together forming an exclusively New World pelican clade. (Among the other pelicans, pink-backed, Dalmatian, and spot-billed pelicans are close relatives, together sister to Australian pelican. Great white pelican has no particularly close relatives; while it may be sister to the previous four, this relationship had low statistical support.)
The brown pelican is the smallest of the eight extant pelican species, but is often one of the larger seabirds in their range nonetheless. It measures 1 to 1.52 m (3 ft 3 in to 5 ft 0 in) in length and has a wingspan of 2.03 to 2.28 m (6 ft 8 in to 7 ft 6 in). The weight of adults can range from 2 to 5 kg (4.4 to 11.0 lb), about half the weight of the other pelicans found in the Americas, the Peruvian and American white pelicans. The average weight in Florida of 47 females was 3.17 kg (7.0 lb), while that of 56 males was 3.7 kg (8.2 lb). Like all pelicans, it has a very long bill, measuring 280 to 348 mm (11.0 to 13.7 in) in length.
The nominate subspecies in its breeding plumage has a white head with a yellowish wash on the crown. The nape and neck are dark maroon–brown. The upper sides of the neck have white lines along the base of the gular pouch, and the lower foreneck has a pale yellowish patch. The feathers at the center of the nape are elongated, forming short, deep chestnut crest feathers. It has a silvery gray mantle, scapulars, and upperwing coverts (feathers on the upper side of the wings), with a brownish tinge. The lesser coverts have dark bases, which gives the leading edge of the wing a streaky appearance. The uppertail coverts (feathers above the tail) are silvery white at the center, forming pale streaks. The median (between the greater and the lesser coverts), primary (connected to the distal forelimb), secondary (connected to the ulna), and greater coverts (feathers of the outermost, largest, row of upperwing coverts) are blackish, with the primaries having white shafts and the secondaries having variable silver-gray fringes. The tertials (feathers arising in the brachial region) are silver-gray with a brownish tinge. The underwing has grayish-brown remiges with white shafts to the outer primary feathers. The axillaries and covert feathers are dark, with a broad, silver–gray central area. The tail is dark gray with a variable silvery cast. The lower mandible is blackish, with a greenish-black gular pouch at the bottom for draining water when it scoops out prey. The breast and belly are dark, and the legs and feet black. It has a grayish white bill tinged with brown and intermixed with pale carmine spots. The crest is short and pale reddish-brown in color. The back, rump, and tail are streaked with gray and dark brown, sometimes with a rusty hue. The male and female are similar, but the female is slightly smaller. It is exceptionally buoyant due to the internal air sacks beneath its skin and in its bones. It is as graceful in the air as it is clumsy on land.
The nonbreeding adult has a white head and neck, and the pre-breeding adult has a creamy yellow head. The pink skin around the eyes becomes dull and gray in the non-breeding season. It lacks any red hue, and the pouch is strongly olivaceous ochre tinged and the legs are olivaceous gray to blackish-gray. It has pale blue to yellowish white irides which become brown during the breeding season. During courtship, the bill becomes pinkish red to pale orange, redder at the tip, and the pouch is blackish. Later in the breeding season the bill becomes pale ash-gray over most of the upper jaw and the basal third of the mandible.
The juvenile is similar, but is grayish-brown overall and has paler underparts. The head, neck, and thighs are dusky-brown, and the abdomen is dull white. The plumage of the male is similar to a fully adult female, although the male's head feathers are rather rigid. The tail and flight feathers are browner than those of the adult. It has short, brown upperwing coverts, which are often darker on greater coverts, and dull brownish-gray underwing coverts with a whitish band at the center. The irides are dark brown and the facial skin is bluish. It has a gray bill which is horn-yellow to orange near the tip, with a dark gray to pinkish-gray pouch. It acquires adult plumage at over 3 years of age, when the feathers on the neck become paler, the upperparts become striped, the greater upperwing and median coverts become grayer, and the belly acquires dark spots.
The brown pelican is readily distinguished from the American white pelican by its nonwhite plumage, smaller size, and habit of diving for fish from the air, as opposed to co-operative fishing from the surface. It and the Peruvian pelican are the only true marine pelican species.
The brown pelican produces a wide variety of harsh, grunting sounds, such as a low-pitched hrrraa-hrra, during displays. The adult also rarely emits a low croak, while young frequently squeal.
The brown pelican lives on the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific Coasts in the Americas. On the Atlantic Coast, it is found from the New Jersey coast to the mouth of the Amazon River. Along the Pacific Coast, it is found from British Columbia to northern Peru, including the Galapagos Islands. After nesting, North American birds move in flocks further north along the coasts, returning to warmer waters for winter. In the non-breeding season, it is found as far north as Canada. It is a rare and irregular visitor south of Piura in Peru, where generally it is replaced by the Peruvian pelican, and can occur as a non-breeding visitor south at least to Ica during El Niño years. Small numbers of brown pelicans have been recorded from Arica in far northern Chile. It is fairly common along the coast of California, South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, the West Indies, and many Caribbean islands as far south as Guyana. Along the Gulf Coast, it inhabits Alabama, Texas, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Mexico.
The brown pelican is a strictly marine species, primarily inhabiting marine subtidal, warm estuarine, and marine pelagic waters. It is also found in mangrove swamps, and prefers shallow waters, especially near salty bays and beaches. It avoids the open sea, seldom venturing more than 20 miles from the coast. Some immature birds may stray to inland freshwater lakes. Its range may also overlap with the Peruvian pelican in some areas along the Pacific coast of South America. It roosts on rocks, water, rocky cliffs, piers, jetties, sand beaches, and mudflats.
Most brown pelican populations are resident (nonmigratory) and dispersive (species moving from its birth site to its breeding site, or its breeding site to another breeding site). Some migration is observed, especially in the northern parts of the species's range, but these movements are often erratic, depending on local conditions.
While usually restricted to coastal regions, brown pelicans occasionally wander inland, and there are records of vagrant individuals across much of the interior of North America. The species also occasionally wanders along the coasts of the Americas outside its normal range, with vagrants reported as far north as Southeast Alaska and Newfoundland, as far south as central Chile (well into the range of the closely related Peruvian pelican), and as far east in South America as Alagoas. Rare inland vagrants, generally caused by hurricanes or El Niño phenomena, have been reported from the Colombian Andes. They were first recorded in July 2009 in the Interandean Valley, where they remained for at least 161 days. There are four records far inland in Amazônia Legal, along the Amazon River and its tributaries.
The brown pelican is a very gregarious bird; it lives in flocks of both sexes throughout the year. In level flight, brown pelicans fly in groups, with their heads held back on their shoulders and their bills resting on their folded necks. They may fly in a V formation, but usually in regular lines or single file, often low over the water's surface. To exclude water from the nasal passage, they have narrower internal regions of the nostrils.
The brown pelican is a piscivore, primarily feeding on fish. Menhaden may account for 90% of its diet, and the anchovy supply is particularly important to the brown pelican's nesting success. Other fish preyed on with some regularity includes pigfish, pinfish, herring, sheepshead, silversides, mullets, sardines, minnows, and topminnows. Brown pelicans residing in Southern California rely especially heavily on pacific sardine as a major food source which can compose up to 26% of their diet, making them one of the top three predators of sardines in the area. Non-fish prey includes crustaceans, especially prawns, and it occasionally feeds on amphibians and the eggs and nestlings of birds (egrets, common murres and its own species).
As the brown pelican flies at a maximum height of 18 to 21 m (60 to 70 ft) above the ocean, it can spot schools of fish while flying. When foraging, it dives bill-first like a kingfisher, often submerging completely below the surface momentarily as it snaps up prey. Besides its sister species, the Peruvian pelican, this is the only pelican to primarily forage via diving, all other extant pelican merely float on the waters' surface when foraging. Upon surfacing, it spills the water from its throat pouch before swallowing its catch. Only the Peruvian pelican shares this active foraging style (although that species never dives from such a great height), while other pelicans forage more inactively by scooping up corralled fish while swimming on the water surface. It is an occasional target of kleptoparasitism by other fish-eating birds such as gulls, skuas, and frigatebirds. They are capable of drinking saline water due to the high capacity of their salt glands to excrete salt.
The brown pelican is a monogamous breeder within a breeding season, but does not pair for life. Nesting season peaks during March and April. The male chooses a nesting site and performs a display of head movements to attract a female. At the proposed nest site, major courtship displays such as head swaying, bowing, turning, and upright (standing on its legs without any support) are performed by both the sexes. They may also be accompanied by low raaa calls.
Once a pair forms a bond, overt communication between them is minimal. It is a colonial species, with some colonies maintained for many years. Probably owing to disturbance, tick infestation, or alteration in food supply, colonies frequently shift. It nests in secluded area, often on islands, vegetated spots among sand dunes, thickets of shrubs and trees, and in mangroves, although sometimes on cliffs, and less often in bushes or small trees. Nesting territories are clumped, as individual territories may be at a distance of just 1 m (3.3 ft) from each other. They are usually built by the female from reeds, leaves, pebbles, and sticks, and consist of feather-lined impressions protected with a 10 to 25 cm (3.9 to 9.8 in) rim of soil and debris. They are usually found 0.9 to 3 m (3 to 10 ft) above the ground. Renesting may occur if eggs are lost from the nest early in the breeding season.
There are usually two to three, or sometimes even four, oval eggs in a clutch, and only one brood is raised per year. The egg is chalky white, and can measure about 76 mm (3.0 in) in length and 51 mm (2.0 in) in width. Incubation takes 28 to 30 days with both sexes sharing duties, keeping the eggs warm by holding them on or under their webbed feet. It takes 28 to 30 days for the eggs to hatch, and about 63 days to fledge. After that, the juvenile leave the nest and gather into small groups known as pods. The newly hatched chicks are pink and weigh about 60 g (0.13 lb). Within 4 to 14 days, they turn gray or black. After that, they develop a coat of white, black or grayish down. Fledging success may be as high as 100% for the first hatched chick, 60% for the second chick, and just 6% for the third chick.
The parents regurgitate predigested food for the young to feed upon until they reach their fledging stage. After about 35 days, the young venture out of the nest by walking. The young start flying about 71 to 88 days after hatching. The adults remain with them until some time afterwards and continue to feed them. In the 8- to 10-month period during which they are cared for, the nestling pelicans are fed by regurgitated, partially digested food of around 70 kg (150 lb) of fish. The young reach sexual maturity (and full adult plumage) at anywhere from three to five years of age. A brown pelican has been recorded to have lived for over 31 years in captivity.
Predation is occasional at colonies, and predators of eggs and young (usually small nestlings are threatened but also occasionally up to fledgling size depending on the size of the predator) can include gulls, raptors (especially bald eagles), spiny-tailed iguanas, alligators, vultures, feral cats, feral dogs, raccoons, fish crows, and corvids. Predation is likely reduced if the colony is on an island. Although it is rare, bobcats have been documented eating both the offspring and injured adults. Predation on adult brown pelicans is rarely reported, but cases where they have fallen prey to bald eagles have been reported. Also, South American sea lions and unidentified large sharks have been observed to prey on adult brown pelicans by seizing them from beneath while the birds are sitting on ocean waters. The invasive red imported fire ant is known to prey on hatchlings. Like all pelicans, brown pelicans are highly sensitive to disturbances by humans (including tourists or fishermen) at their nests, and may even abandon their nests. Due to their size, non-nesting adults are rarely predated. Brown pelicans have several parasitic worms such as Petagiger, Echinochasmus, Phagicola longus, Mesostephanus appendiculatoides, Contracaecum multipapillatum, and Contracaecum bioccai, from its prey diet of black mullets, white mullets, and other fish species.
The brown pelican is now a staple of crowded coastal regions and is at some risk by fishermen (monofilament fishing line and hooks) and boaters. In the early twentieth century, hunting was a major cause of its death, and people still hunt adults for their feathers and collect eggs on the Caribbean coasts, in Latin America, and occasionally in the United States, even though it is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918.
Distribution
The brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis) is a bird of the pelican family, Pelecanidae, one of three species found in the Americas and one of two that feed by diving into water. It is found on the Atlantic Coast from New Jersey to the mouth of the Amazon River, and along the Pacific Coast from British Columbia to Peru, including the Galapagos Islands. The nominate subspecies in its breeding plumage has a white head with a yellowish wash on the crown. The nape and neck are dark maroon–brown. The upper sides of the neck have white lines along the base of the gular pouch, and the lower fore neck has a pale yellowish patch. The male and female are similar, but the female is slightly smaller. The nonbreeding adult has a white head and neck. The pink skin around the eyes becomes dull and gray in the nonbreeding season. It lacks any red hue, and the pouch is strongly olivaceous ochre-tinged and the legs are olivaceous gray to blackish-gray.
The brown pelican mainly feeds on fish, but occasionally eats amphibians, crustaceans, and the eggs and nestlings of birds. It nests in colonies in secluded areas, often on islands, vegetated land among sand dunes, thickets of shrubs and trees, and mangroves. Females lay two or three oval, chalky white eggs. Incubation takes 28 to 30 days with both sexes sharing duties. The newly hatched chicks are pink, turning gray or black within 4 to 14 days. About 63 days are needed for chicks to fledge. Six to 9 weeks after hatching, the juveniles leave the nest, and gather into small groups known as pods.
The brown pelican is the national bird of Saint Martin, Barbados, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the Turks and Caicos Islands, and the official state bird of Louisiana, appearing on the flag, seal, or coat of arms of each. It has been rated as a species of least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. It was listed under the United States Endangered Species Act from 1970 to 2009, as pesticides such as dieldrin and DDT threatened its future in the Southeastern United States and California. In 1972, the use of DDT was banned in Florida, followed by the rest of the United States. Since then, the brown pelican's population has increased. In 1903, Theodore Roosevelt set aside the first National Wildlife Refuge, Florida's Pelican Island, to protect the species from hunters.
Taxonomy
The brown pelican was described by Swedish zoologist Carl Linnaeus in the 1766 12th edition of his Systema Naturae, where it was given the binomial name of Pelecanus occidentalis. It belongs to the New World clade of the genus Pelecanus.
Five subspecies of the brown pelican are recognized. At least some of these subspecies are genetically distinct despite similar phenotypes. The subspecies differ from one another in size, coloration of the throat pouch (among other bare parts) in breeding condition, and/or certain breeding plumage details, as well as geographic range.
ImageSubspeciesDistribution
P. o. californicus (Ridgway, 1884)This subspecies breeds on the Pacific coast of California and Baja California, and south to Jalisco. Its non-breeding range extends north along the Pacific coast to British Columbia, and south to Guatemala. It is rarely found in El Salvador.
P. o. carolinensis (Gmelin, 1789)This subspecies breeds in the eastern United States from Maryland south along the Atlantic, Gulf, and Caribbean coasts and south to Honduras and its Pacific coasts, Costa Rica, and Panama. Its non-breeding range is from southern New York to Venezuela.
P. o. occidentalis (Linnaeus, 1766)This subspecies breeds in the Greater and Lesser Antilles, the Bahamas, and along the Caribbean coast of the West Indies, Colombia, and Venezuela, up to Trinidad and Tobago.
P. o. murphyi (Wetmore, 1945)This subspecies is found from western Colombia to Ecuador, and is a non-breeding visitor to northern Peru.
P. o. urinator (Wetmore, 1945)This subspecies is found on the Galapagos Islands.
The brown pelican is part of a clade that includes the Peruvian pelican (P. thagus) and American white pelican (P. erythrorhynchos); brown and Peruvian pelicans are sister taxa, with American white pelican a more distant relative. The Peruvian pelican was previously considered a subspecies of the brown pelican, but is now considered a separate species on the basis of its much greater size (around double the weight of the brown pelican), differences in bill color and plumage, and a lack of evidence of hybridization between the forms where their ranges approach and overlap. (In captivity, the brown pelican is known to have hybridized with both the American white pelican and the more distantly related great white pelican.)
In 1932, James L. Peters divided Pelecanus into three subgenera, placing brown pelican (including Peruvian pelican) in a monospecific Leptopelicanus, American white pelican in a monospecific Cyrtopelicanus, and all the rest in the subgenus Pelecanus, a treatment which was also followed by Jean Dorst and Raoul J. Mougin in 1979. Andrew Elliott in 1992, and Joseph B. Nelson in 2005, considered the deepest division among pelicans to lie between brown (plus Peruvian) pelican on the one hand, and the white-plumaged pelicans on the other (among which the large ground-nesting American white, Australian, great white, and Dalmatian pelicans were thought to form a clade, and the smaller tree-nesting pink-backed and spot-billed pelicans were likewise considered sister taxa). In 1993, Paul Johnsgard hypothesized that the Americas were colonized relatively late in pelican evolution, with the family originating in Africa or South Asia; however, he later supported the prevailing view that brown (with Peruvian) was the most divergent pelican (and considered American white and great white pelicans to be close relatives, implying two independent dispersals of pelicans into the Americas, with that of the ancestor of brown and Peruvian pelicans occurring early on). Sibley and Ahlquist's DNA-DNA hybridization studies and UPGMA tree published in 1990 supported brown pelican as sister to a clade comprising all the white-plumaged pelicans analyzed, including American white pelican (although the relationships among the latter group differed).
With better genetic data and more modern methods, a new phylogenetic hypothesis of pelican relationships has arisen, which contrasts with the traditional view of brown and Peruvian being the most divergent pelicans based on their distinctive plumage and behavior (and early molecular data). Rather than the brown-plumaged pelicans and white-plumaged pelicans forming two reciprocally monophyletic groups, the American white pelican is sister to brown and Peruvian pelicans, the three together forming an exclusively New World pelican clade. (Among the other pelicans, pink-backed, Dalmatian, and spot-billed pelicans are close relatives, together sister to Australian pelican. Great white pelican has no particularly close relatives; while it may be sister to the previous four, this relationship had low statistical support.)
Description
The brown pelican is the smallest of the eight extant pelican species, but is often one of the larger seabirds in their range nonetheless. It measures 1 to 1.52 m (3 ft 3 in to 5 ft 0 in) in length and has a wingspan of 2.03 to 2.28 m (6 ft 8 in to 7 ft 6 in). The weight of adults can range from 2 to 5 kg (4.4 to 11.0 lb), about half the weight of the other pelicans found in the Americas, the Peruvian and American white pelicans. The average weight in Florida of 47 females was 3.17 kg (7.0 lb), while that of 56 males was 3.7 kg (8.2 lb). Like all pelicans, it has a very long bill, measuring 280 to 348 mm (11.0 to 13.7 in) in length.
The nominate subspecies in its breeding plumage has a white head with a yellowish wash on the crown. The nape and neck are dark maroon–brown. The upper sides of the neck have white lines along the base of the gular pouch, and the lower foreneck has a pale yellowish patch. The feathers at the center of the nape are elongated, forming short, deep chestnut crest feathers. It has a silvery gray mantle, scapulars, and upperwing coverts (feathers on the upper side of the wings), with a brownish tinge. The lesser coverts have dark bases, which gives the leading edge of the wing a streaky appearance. The uppertail coverts (feathers above the tail) are silvery white at the center, forming pale streaks. The median (between the greater and the lesser coverts), primary (connected to the distal forelimb), secondary (connected to the ulna), and greater coverts (feathers of the outermost, largest, row of upperwing coverts) are blackish, with the primaries having white shafts and the secondaries having variable silver-gray fringes. The tertials (feathers arising in the brachial region) are silver-gray with a brownish tinge. The underwing has grayish-brown remiges with white shafts to the outer primary feathers. The axillaries and covert feathers are dark, with a broad, silver–gray central area. The tail is dark gray with a variable silvery cast. The lower mandible is blackish, with a greenish-black gular pouch at the bottom for draining water when it scoops out prey. The breast and belly are dark, and the legs and feet black. It has a grayish white bill tinged with brown and intermixed with pale carmine spots. The crest is short and pale reddish-brown in color. The back, rump, and tail are streaked with gray and dark brown, sometimes with a rusty hue. The male and female are similar, but the female is slightly smaller. It is exceptionally buoyant due to the internal air sacks beneath its skin and in its bones. It is as graceful in the air as it is clumsy on land.
The nonbreeding adult has a white head and neck, and the pre-breeding adult has a creamy yellow head. The pink skin around the eyes becomes dull and gray in the non-breeding season. It lacks any red hue, and the pouch is strongly olivaceous ochre tinged and the legs are olivaceous gray to blackish-gray. It has pale blue to yellowish white irides which become brown during the breeding season. During courtship, the bill becomes pinkish red to pale orange, redder at the tip, and the pouch is blackish. Later in the breeding season the bill becomes pale ash-gray over most of the upper jaw and the basal third of the mandible.
The juvenile is similar, but is grayish-brown overall and has paler underparts. The head, neck, and thighs are dusky-brown, and the abdomen is dull white. The plumage of the male is similar to a fully adult female, although the male's head feathers are rather rigid. The tail and flight feathers are browner than those of the adult. It has short, brown upperwing coverts, which are often darker on greater coverts, and dull brownish-gray underwing coverts with a whitish band at the center. The irides are dark brown and the facial skin is bluish. It has a gray bill which is horn-yellow to orange near the tip, with a dark gray to pinkish-gray pouch. It acquires adult plumage at over 3 years of age, when the feathers on the neck become paler, the upperparts become striped, the greater upperwing and median coverts become grayer, and the belly acquires dark spots.
The brown pelican is readily distinguished from the American white pelican by its nonwhite plumage, smaller size, and habit of diving for fish from the air, as opposed to co-operative fishing from the surface. It and the Peruvian pelican are the only true marine pelican species.
The brown pelican produces a wide variety of harsh, grunting sounds, such as a low-pitched hrrraa-hrra, during displays. The adult also rarely emits a low croak, while young frequently squeal.
Distribution and habitat
The brown pelican lives on the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific Coasts in the Americas. On the Atlantic Coast, it is found from the New Jersey coast to the mouth of the Amazon River. Along the Pacific Coast, it is found from British Columbia to northern Peru, including the Galapagos Islands. After nesting, North American birds move in flocks further north along the coasts, returning to warmer waters for winter. In the non-breeding season, it is found as far north as Canada. It is a rare and irregular visitor south of Piura in Peru, where generally it is replaced by the Peruvian pelican, and can occur as a non-breeding visitor south at least to Ica during El Niño years. Small numbers of brown pelicans have been recorded from Arica in far northern Chile. It is fairly common along the coast of California, South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, the West Indies, and many Caribbean islands as far south as Guyana. Along the Gulf Coast, it inhabits Alabama, Texas, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Mexico.
The brown pelican is a strictly marine species, primarily inhabiting marine subtidal, warm estuarine, and marine pelagic waters. It is also found in mangrove swamps, and prefers shallow waters, especially near salty bays and beaches. It avoids the open sea, seldom venturing more than 20 miles from the coast. Some immature birds may stray to inland freshwater lakes. Its range may also overlap with the Peruvian pelican in some areas along the Pacific coast of South America. It roosts on rocks, water, rocky cliffs, piers, jetties, sand beaches, and mudflats.
Migration
Most brown pelican populations are resident (nonmigratory) and dispersive (species moving from its birth site to its breeding site, or its breeding site to another breeding site). Some migration is observed, especially in the northern parts of the species's range, but these movements are often erratic, depending on local conditions.
While usually restricted to coastal regions, brown pelicans occasionally wander inland, and there are records of vagrant individuals across much of the interior of North America. The species also occasionally wanders along the coasts of the Americas outside its normal range, with vagrants reported as far north as Southeast Alaska and Newfoundland, as far south as central Chile (well into the range of the closely related Peruvian pelican), and as far east in South America as Alagoas. Rare inland vagrants, generally caused by hurricanes or El Niño phenomena, have been reported from the Colombian Andes. They were first recorded in July 2009 in the Interandean Valley, where they remained for at least 161 days. There are four records far inland in Amazônia Legal, along the Amazon River and its tributaries.
Behavior
The brown pelican is a very gregarious bird; it lives in flocks of both sexes throughout the year. In level flight, brown pelicans fly in groups, with their heads held back on their shoulders and their bills resting on their folded necks. They may fly in a V formation, but usually in regular lines or single file, often low over the water's surface. To exclude water from the nasal passage, they have narrower internal regions of the nostrils.
Feeding
The brown pelican is a piscivore, primarily feeding on fish. Menhaden may account for 90% of its diet, and the anchovy supply is particularly important to the brown pelican's nesting success. Other fish preyed on with some regularity includes pigfish, pinfish, herring, sheepshead, silversides, mullets, sardines, minnows, and topminnows. Brown pelicans residing in Southern California rely especially heavily on pacific sardine as a major food source which can compose up to 26% of their diet, making them one of the top three predators of sardines in the area. Non-fish prey includes crustaceans, especially prawns, and it occasionally feeds on amphibians and the eggs and nestlings of birds (egrets, common murres and its own species).
As the brown pelican flies at a maximum height of 18 to 21 m (60 to 70 ft) above the ocean, it can spot schools of fish while flying. When foraging, it dives bill-first like a kingfisher, often submerging completely below the surface momentarily as it snaps up prey. Besides its sister species, the Peruvian pelican, this is the only pelican to primarily forage via diving, all other extant pelican merely float on the waters' surface when foraging. Upon surfacing, it spills the water from its throat pouch before swallowing its catch. Only the Peruvian pelican shares this active foraging style (although that species never dives from such a great height), while other pelicans forage more inactively by scooping up corralled fish while swimming on the water surface. It is an occasional target of kleptoparasitism by other fish-eating birds such as gulls, skuas, and frigatebirds. They are capable of drinking saline water due to the high capacity of their salt glands to excrete salt.
Breeding
The brown pelican is a monogamous breeder within a breeding season, but does not pair for life. Nesting season peaks during March and April. The male chooses a nesting site and performs a display of head movements to attract a female. At the proposed nest site, major courtship displays such as head swaying, bowing, turning, and upright (standing on its legs without any support) are performed by both the sexes. They may also be accompanied by low raaa calls.
Once a pair forms a bond, overt communication between them is minimal. It is a colonial species, with some colonies maintained for many years. Probably owing to disturbance, tick infestation, or alteration in food supply, colonies frequently shift. It nests in secluded area, often on islands, vegetated spots among sand dunes, thickets of shrubs and trees, and in mangroves, although sometimes on cliffs, and less often in bushes or small trees. Nesting territories are clumped, as individual territories may be at a distance of just 1 m (3.3 ft) from each other. They are usually built by the female from reeds, leaves, pebbles, and sticks, and consist of feather-lined impressions protected with a 10 to 25 cm (3.9 to 9.8 in) rim of soil and debris. They are usually found 0.9 to 3 m (3 to 10 ft) above the ground. Renesting may occur if eggs are lost from the nest early in the breeding season.
There are usually two to three, or sometimes even four, oval eggs in a clutch, and only one brood is raised per year. The egg is chalky white, and can measure about 76 mm (3.0 in) in length and 51 mm (2.0 in) in width. Incubation takes 28 to 30 days with both sexes sharing duties, keeping the eggs warm by holding them on or under their webbed feet. It takes 28 to 30 days for the eggs to hatch, and about 63 days to fledge. After that, the juvenile leave the nest and gather into small groups known as pods. The newly hatched chicks are pink and weigh about 60 g (0.13 lb). Within 4 to 14 days, they turn gray or black. After that, they develop a coat of white, black or grayish down. Fledging success may be as high as 100% for the first hatched chick, 60% for the second chick, and just 6% for the third chick.
The parents regurgitate predigested food for the young to feed upon until they reach their fledging stage. After about 35 days, the young venture out of the nest by walking. The young start flying about 71 to 88 days after hatching. The adults remain with them until some time afterwards and continue to feed them. In the 8- to 10-month period during which they are cared for, the nestling pelicans are fed by regurgitated, partially digested food of around 70 kg (150 lb) of fish. The young reach sexual maturity (and full adult plumage) at anywhere from three to five years of age. A brown pelican has been recorded to have lived for over 31 years in captivity.
Predation is occasional at colonies, and predators of eggs and young (usually small nestlings are threatened but also occasionally up to fledgling size depending on the size of the predator) can include gulls, raptors (especially bald eagles), spiny-tailed iguanas, alligators, vultures, feral cats, feral dogs, raccoons, fish crows, and corvids. Predation is likely reduced if the colony is on an island. Although it is rare, bobcats have been documented eating both the offspring and injured adults. Predation on adult brown pelicans is rarely reported, but cases where they have fallen prey to bald eagles have been reported. Also, South American sea lions and unidentified large sharks have been observed to prey on adult brown pelicans by seizing them from beneath while the birds are sitting on ocean waters. The invasive red imported fire ant is known to prey on hatchlings. Like all pelicans, brown pelicans are highly sensitive to disturbances by humans (including tourists or fishermen) at their nests, and may even abandon their nests. Due to their size, non-nesting adults are rarely predated. Brown pelicans have several parasitic worms such as Petagiger, Echinochasmus, Phagicola longus, Mesostephanus appendiculatoides, Contracaecum multipapillatum, and Contracaecum bioccai, from its prey diet of black mullets, white mullets, and other fish species.
Relationship with humans
The brown pelican is now a staple of crowded coastal regions and is at some risk by fishermen (monofilament fishing line and hooks) and boaters. In the early twentieth century, hunting was a major cause of its death, and people still hunt adults for their feathers and collect eggs on the Caribbean coasts, in Latin America, and occasionally in the United States, even though it is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918.
Depictions in culture
The brown pelican is the national bird of Saint Martin, Barbados, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the Turks and Caicos Islands. In 1902, it was made a part of the official Louisiana seal and, in 1912, a pelican and her young became part of the Flag of Louisiana as well. One of Louisiana's state nicknames is "The Pelican State", and the brown pelican is the official state bird of Louisiana. It is one of the mascots of Tulane University, present on its seal, and is also present on the crest of the University of the West Indies. The National Basketball Association (NBA)'s New Orleans Pelicans are named in the honor of the brown pelican.
In the 1993 film The Pelican Brief, based on the novel of the same name by John Grisham, a legal brief speculates that the assassins of two supreme court justices were motivated by a desire to drill for oil on a Louisiana marshland that was a habitat of the endangered brown pelican. In the same year, Jurassic Park showed a pod of brown pelicans at the end of the film. In 1998, American conductor David Woodard performed a requiem for a California brown pelican on the seaward limit of the berm of a beach where the animal had fallen: 152–153 In the 2003 Disney/Pixar film Finding Nemo, a brown pelican (voiced by Geoffrey Rush in an Australian accent) was illustrated as a friendly, virtuous talking character named Nigel.
Since 1988, the brown pelican has been rated as least concern on the IUCN Red List of Endangered species based on its large range—greater than 20,000 km2 (7700 mi2)—and an increasing population trend. The population size is also well beyond the threshold for vulnerable species. The nominate race population is thought to number at least 290,000 in the West Indies, and 650,000 globally. In 1903, Theodore Roosevelt set aside Pelican Island, now known as Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge, to solely protect the brown pelican from hunters.
Starting in the 1940s with the invention and extensive use of pesticides such as DDT, the brown pelican population had drastically declined due to a lack of breeding success. By the 1960s, it had almost disappeared along the Gulf Coast and, in southern California, it had suffered almost total reproductive failure, due to DDT usage in the United States. The brown pelican was listed under the United States Endangered Species Act from 1970 to 2009. A research group from the University of Tampa, headed by Ralph Schreiber, conducted research in Tampa Bay, and found that DDT caused the pelican eggshells to be too thin to support the embryo to maturity. In 1972, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) banned DDT usage in the United States and limited the use of other pesticides. There has been a decline in chemical contaminant levels in brown pelican eggs since then, and a corresponding increase in its nesting success. It became extinct in 1963 in Louisiana. Between 1968 and 1980, the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries' reintroduction program re-established the brown pelican, and its population numbers in California and Texas were restored due to improved reproduction and natural recolonization of the species. By 1985, its population in the eastern United States, including Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, and northward along the Atlantic Coast, had recovered and the species was removed from the Endangered Species List. Its population has grown by about 68% per decade over a period of 40 years in North America, and this trend appears to be continuing. It is still listed as endangered in the Pacific Coast region of its range and in the southern and central United States. Although the United States Gulf Coast populations in Louisiana and Texas are still listed as endangered, they were recently estimated in 2009 about 12,000 breeding pairs. Since that time the Deepwater Horizon oil spill has adversely affected populations, and current population figures are not available.
The brown pelican abundance has steadily recovered from the drastic population decreases in the 1940s, however bottom up control threatens the Southern California populations as food sources become diminished. It is common for forage fish populations to experience regular fluctuations, however there has been a consistent decrease in the Pacific sardine population beginning as early as 2014. In 2019 these declines were found to have reached levels which were a mere 10% of the highest reported abundances. Fluctuations in sardine populations have largely been attributed to bottom-up control, primarily including climate variability and ocean temperature. The significant decrease in pacific sardine population can be linked to the levels of nitrogen within their habitat, a limiting factor in plankton production. Pacific sardines in the California current system rely on wind driven upwelling to push cooler, nitrogen rich waters towards the surface, maintaining a sustainable, nutrient abundant environment. Continued environmental disruptions, such as El Niño, rising ocean temperatures, and increased commercial fishing, have drastic effects on nutrient cycling within the California current system, leading to lasting impacts on Pacific sardine productivity and reproductive success.
The brown pelican has been predicted to have high vulnerability to declining sardine populations . At the lowest levels of sardine abundance, the brown pelican population has been predicted to decline up to 50%. Even with a more moderate decline in sardine abundance (50% relative abundance), brown pelicans have been predicted to decrease by up to 27%. A recent decline in brown pelican breeding success coincides with the population decline of the Pacific sardine. Between 2014 and 2016, brown pelicans experienced a continuous breeding failure. These breeding failures have been characterized by decreased numbers of pelicans arriving at nesting colonies, large scale abandonment and early migration due to an inability to feed hatchlings, and sub-optimal breeding by those who do attempt to breed. Breeding success is greatly reduced by oceanic anomalies, specifically warm-phase anomalies that increase the intensity of upwellings. Increased upwellings disrupt marine productivity and forage fish availability. These trends have important implications for the health and conservation of brown pelicans, as well as other seabirds.
Seabirds have become increasingly important as an indicator species. They are often used in order to indirectly track changes in fish stocks, ecosystem health, and climate change. Environmental changes tend to have fast acting impacts on marine bird populations due to the simplicity of their trophic cascade, allowing for complex, long term trends in ecosystem health and resources to be easily realized and tracked. Brown pelicans have proven to be a useful indicator in determining the effects of the well-established fishing industry in Southern California. Sardine fishery in the Gulf of California has been showing signs of overfishing since the early 1990s. Sardine population and abundance, however, is difficult to monitor and obtain indicators for. Since lacking food availability has negative implications for breeding success in seabirds, seabird diet, and breeding success have been used to indirectly measure the population status of the fish they feed on. This model has been shown to work using brown pelicans as an indicator species. As the proportion of sardines in the brown pelican's diet decreases, the success of fisheries declines to a lesser extent. When eventually the sardine abundance has declined enough for brown pelicans to move away and begin feeding on other forage fish, commercial fishing still would be fishing in significant numbers. This indicates that even when fisheries are not seeing signs of declining sardine abundance, brown pelicans may have already been affected to the point of locating other food sources. This availability of sardines may decline even further during El Niño anomalies, when thermoclines prevent brown pelicans from reaching their prey. Brown pelican diet will mostly indicate declines in sardine abundance for fisheries during the same season, as brown pelicans feed mostly on the same adult fish that are commercially fished. Although brown pelicans serve as an important indicator species for fisheries, declining sardine abundance due to both climate changes and overfishing have huge implications on overall ecosystem health, within or outside the individual trophic cascade.
Nominated by Leslie (bogostick) to play the Black and White Challenge. The Challenge is to take a Black and White picture for the next 5 days. For each of the black and white pictures you have a chance to nominate someone else to also do the challenge.
I nominate Ingrid and Foxy Belle ( when you are not busy of course)!
Happy Thanksgiving!!
Nominated for designation as a UNESCO World Heritage site, Jatiluwih offers a beautiful view of contoured rice terraces irrigated using an impressive communal water system developed by Balinese farmers. The scenic drive through the quaint villages and verdant slopes of the central coastal regency of Tabanan adds to the experience.
A drawing of Hollywood legend, Judy Garland (1922-1969); inspired by a publicity still from the film 'A Star Is Born' (US 1954), for which the talented actress and singer was Oscar-nominated.
The life of Judy Garland is one of Hollywood's great tragedies. In films from 1929 to 1963, her talent was so great, her commercial value recognised as so exploitable, that by the time she starred in one of her most famous and enduring films, The Wizard of Oz (US 1939), she was being prescribed diet pills by the studio to reduce her weight; together with a cocktail of sleeping pills and amphetamines to keep her working abnormally long schedules. Five years later her acting and singing were undimmed in the colourful period drama 'Meet Me In St Louis' (US 1944)- but the drug taking and stress was evident from her drastic weight loss.
The overwhelming quality that shines through all of Judy Garland's performances - and indeed most photographic records - is her vulnerability, her depth of sensitivity; and along the way, many of her contempraries felt a protective affection for the fragile star. Lana Turner (1921-1995) was a lifelong friend and a one-time neighbour in Beverly Hills, CA, USA; and as her daughter Cheryl Crane (1943-) recorded in her powerful 1988 autobiography Detour, she and Judy's elder daughter Liza Minnelli (1946-) would play together; looked after by whichever Hollywood mother was not otherwise engaged at the studio.
Judy Garland was a genius and her talent is preserved forever through her films and recordings - but this world can often break those of great talent and sensitivity.
June was the month of both her birth (10th) and death (22nd) - an accidental overdose of barbituates releasing this great lady from personal torment; forever leaving her legacy of glory on celluloid ,vinyl and tape.
Charcoal on paper, 16 x 11in
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a yellow bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a yellow bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
I got tagged by ♥♦ Psycho ♠♣!
You will have to upload one B/W photo for 5 days! Each day you will have to nominate 1 or more flickr friends!
I nominate Type 01! ^_^
... was nominated to do a Nature Photography Challenge by Lake Sturgeon. day 5 / 7. be like water… 如水... @ Nova Scotia
LOS ANGELES - Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council President Nury Martinez announced on January 18, 2022 that Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas will retire after nearly 40 years of distinguished service to the Los Angeles Fire Department — and that Kristin Crowley, a top deputy with a stellar 25-year track record at the Department, has been nominated as its next Chief.
If confirmed by the City Council, Crowley, currently Acting Administrative Operations Chief Deputy and Fire Marshal, will be the 19th Fire Chief, and the first woman to ever lead the LAFD.
“We’re living through an unprecedented moment that has called on our Fire Department not just to protect us – but to lead us in the fight to overcome public safety challenges we’ve never faced before. At the same time, the LAFD is leading a transformative national discussion about strengthening equity and inclusion within the firefighting ranks, and we must overcome those internal challenges too,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti. “Throughout her distinguished career, Kristin Crowley has proven her brilliance, determination and bravery on the job again and again. She’s also shown this city her heart, with her tireless commitment to helping students access life-changing educational opportunities. There is no one better equipped to lead the LAFD at this moment than Kristin. She’s ready to make history, and I’m proud to nominate her as the Department’s next Chief.”
“Today is a big moment in this City. For the first time in its history the Los Angeles Fire Department will be led by a woman,” said Council President Martinez. “Chief Kristin Crowley is known by her colleagues and by this city as someone who is dedicated, hard working, and goes above and beyond what is expected of her. This announcement is not just important for the City of Los Angeles, but for girls across LA who never imagined they could one day serve as Chief of the Los Angeles Fire Department.”
Crowley is a 22-year veteran of the Fire Department who has moved seamlessly through the ranks, proving her credibility and character along the way. She made history as the Department’s first female Fire Marshal and is the second woman to earn the rank of Chief Deputy.
Chief Deputy Crowley, who serves as program director for the LAFD’s youth development program, has played a key role in ensuring that over 1,000 LAUSD high school students continue in their education.
In her current role, she helped to develop a five-year strategic plan to identify areas of growth within the Department and foster culture more open to change. As Chief, she plans to work to both deepen existing efforts and create new mechanisms to foster equity and inclusion in the Department.
"I am honored and humbled by the opportunity to be the next Fire Chief of the Los Angeles City Fire Department and to lead the Department into the future," Crowley said. "As the Fire Chief, if confirmed, I vow to take a strategic and balanced approach to ensure we meet the needs of the community we serve. We will focus our efforts on increasing our operational effectiveness, enhancing firefighter safety and well-being, and fully commit to fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive culture within the LAFD. Thank you, Mayor Garcetti, Council President Martinez, and Chief Terrazas for entrusting me to lead and to work with the dedicated women and men of the finest department in the world."
Chief Terrazas, who was sworn in as L.A.’s Fire Chief in 2014, was the first Latino to serve in that role. A 39-year veteran of the Department, Chief Terrazas helped steer the City through some of its greatest challenges, and brought about meaningful advancements and innovations within the Fire Department.
Under his leadership, LAFD supervised the City’s free public COVID-19 testing and vaccination programs, which has administered nearly 4.86 million tests and approximately 1.43 million vaccinations to date. The City of L.A.’s testing effort was the nation’s largest municipal testing program and tested over 40,000 Angelenos per day at its peak.
“Ralph Terrazas has dedicated his life to keeping the people of Los Angeles safe. For nearly 40 years, he has served our Fire Department with bravery, determination and compassion for the Angelenos he’s sworn to protect,” said Mayor Garcetti. “I couldn’t imagine having anyone else as Fire Chief, through some of the most difficult fire and public safety challenges L.A. has ever faced. And when a once-in-a-century pandemic hit, Ralph’s leadership and bold action helped us save countless lives. I am honored to have served alongside him, and I know the mark he’s left on this city will never be forgotten.”
Early in his time leading LAFD, Chief Terrazas oversaw the rebuilding of the Department, which had stopped hiring new firefighters for five years as a result of the Great Recession. In 2015, he successfully reorganized the Department into four bureaus – the first restructuring of LAFD in 50 years, which helped to enhance accountability and improve service delivery.
Chief Terrazas also launched and implemented a variety of innovative initiatives, including Advanced Provider Response Units, Alternate Destination Response Units, and Fast Response Vehicles, efforts that enable firefighters to go beyond simply bringing patients to emergency rooms. Chief Terrazas has also made diversity a top priority – for the first time in department history, 51.4% firefighters are now people of color. Since 2014, the Department has maintained a steady increase in the number of hired sworn women at LAFD. Of the current sworn force, more than half of those who are currently employed were hired on in the last 8 years, and nearly 10% were brought on in 2021.
"It was a privilege to serve as the Fire Chief of this world-class Department," said Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas. "For nearly eight years, we made considerable strides in technology, implemented innovative ways to respond to emergencies, and became a model for other agencies. Chief Crowley is an exemplary leader and has a broad base of experience that will serve the Department well. She has risen through the ranks over the past 26 years and I proudly promoted her three times during my tenure because she demonstrated a commitment to advancing the Department. Chief Crowley has been successful at every position and I expect her success to continue as the next Fire Chief."
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Secretary of Defense Ash Carter briefs the official announcement of Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein, who was nominated to become the 21st Air Force chief of staff, in the Pentagon on April 29, 2016. With them is Secretary of the Air Force Deborah Lee James. (U.S. Air Force photo/Scott M. Ash)
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a yellow bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
Nominated for BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A TELEVISION SERIES – COMEDY OR MUSICAL for her role in "GLOW," actress Alison Brie arrives at the 75th Annual Golden Globes Awards at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, CA on Sunday, January 7, 2018.
The nominate subspecies of the common potoo is found in Trinidad & Tobago and every mainland South American country except Chile, though it has been recorded in that country as a vagrant. There it ranges from the Andes to the Atlantic Ocean.
The common potoo seeks to mimic the perch on which it rests, using a technique called masquerading. Adult and juvenile potoos alike choose perches that are similar in diameter to their own bodies, so that they can better blend in with the stump. These birds adjust their perching angle to best mimic the stump where they are. The potoo sits with its eyes open and its bill horizontal while awake, but if disturbed, assumes an alert “freezing” posture (flexibility). This entails sticking its beak vertically up in the air, closing its eyelids (through which it can still see via slits), and remaining still.
Perched in a tree near Argyle Waterfall on the island of Tobago.
Trinidad and Tobago, W.I.
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a yellow bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
The Southeast African cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus jubatus) is the nominate cheetah subspecies native to East and Southern Africa. The Southern African cheetah lives mainly in the lowland areas and deserts of the Kalahari, the savannahs of Okavango Delta, and the grasslands of the Transvaal region in South Africa. In Namibia, cheetahs are mostly found in farmlands.
The cheetah is a medium-sized cat. An adult male cheetah's total size can measure from 168 to 200 cm (66 to 79 in) and 162 to 213 cm (64 to 84 in) for females. Adult cheetahs are 70 to 90 cm (28 to 35 in) tall at the shoulder. Males are slightly taller than females and have slightly bigger heads with wider incisors and longer mandibles.
The cheetah has a bright yellow or sometimes a golden coat, and its fur is slightly thicker than that of other subspecies. The white underside is very distinct, especially on the neck and breast, and it has less spotting on its belly. The spots on the face are more pronounced, and as a whole its spots seem more dense than those of most other subspecies. The tear marks are notably thicker at the corners of the mouth, and almost all of them have distinct brown mustache markings. Like the Asiatic cheetah, it is known to have fur behind its tail and have both white and black tips at the end of its tail. However, the cheetah may also have only a black tip at the end of its tail.
LOS ANGELES - Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council President Nury Martinez announced on January 18, 2022 that Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas will retire after nearly 40 years of distinguished service to the Los Angeles Fire Department — and that Kristin Crowley, a top deputy with a stellar 25-year track record at the Department, has been nominated as its next Chief.
If confirmed by the City Council, Crowley, currently Acting Administrative Operations Chief Deputy and Fire Marshal, will be the 19th Fire Chief, and the first woman to ever lead the LAFD.
“We’re living through an unprecedented moment that has called on our Fire Department not just to protect us – but to lead us in the fight to overcome public safety challenges we’ve never faced before. At the same time, the LAFD is leading a transformative national discussion about strengthening equity and inclusion within the firefighting ranks, and we must overcome those internal challenges too,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti. “Throughout her distinguished career, Kristin Crowley has proven her brilliance, determination and bravery on the job again and again. She’s also shown this city her heart, with her tireless commitment to helping students access life-changing educational opportunities. There is no one better equipped to lead the LAFD at this moment than Kristin. She’s ready to make history, and I’m proud to nominate her as the Department’s next Chief.”
“Today is a big moment in this City. For the first time in its history the Los Angeles Fire Department will be led by a woman,” said Council President Martinez. “Chief Kristin Crowley is known by her colleagues and by this city as someone who is dedicated, hard working, and goes above and beyond what is expected of her. This announcement is not just important for the City of Los Angeles, but for girls across LA who never imagined they could one day serve as Chief of the Los Angeles Fire Department.”
Crowley is a 22-year veteran of the Fire Department who has moved seamlessly through the ranks, proving her credibility and character along the way. She made history as the Department’s first female Fire Marshal and is the second woman to earn the rank of Chief Deputy.
Chief Deputy Crowley, who serves as program director for the LAFD’s youth development program, has played a key role in ensuring that over 1,000 LAUSD high school students continue in their education.
In her current role, she helped to develop a five-year strategic plan to identify areas of growth within the Department and foster culture more open to change. As Chief, she plans to work to both deepen existing efforts and create new mechanisms to foster equity and inclusion in the Department.
"I am honored and humbled by the opportunity to be the next Fire Chief of the Los Angeles City Fire Department and to lead the Department into the future," Crowley said. "As the Fire Chief, if confirmed, I vow to take a strategic and balanced approach to ensure we meet the needs of the community we serve. We will focus our efforts on increasing our operational effectiveness, enhancing firefighter safety and well-being, and fully commit to fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive culture within the LAFD. Thank you, Mayor Garcetti, Council President Martinez, and Chief Terrazas for entrusting me to lead and to work with the dedicated women and men of the finest department in the world."
Chief Terrazas, who was sworn in as L.A.’s Fire Chief in 2014, was the first Latino to serve in that role. A 39-year veteran of the Department, Chief Terrazas helped steer the City through some of its greatest challenges, and brought about meaningful advancements and innovations within the Fire Department.
Under his leadership, LAFD supervised the City’s free public COVID-19 testing and vaccination programs, which has administered nearly 4.86 million tests and approximately 1.43 million vaccinations to date. The City of L.A.’s testing effort was the nation’s largest municipal testing program and tested over 40,000 Angelenos per day at its peak.
“Ralph Terrazas has dedicated his life to keeping the people of Los Angeles safe. For nearly 40 years, he has served our Fire Department with bravery, determination and compassion for the Angelenos he’s sworn to protect,” said Mayor Garcetti. “I couldn’t imagine having anyone else as Fire Chief, through some of the most difficult fire and public safety challenges L.A. has ever faced. And when a once-in-a-century pandemic hit, Ralph’s leadership and bold action helped us save countless lives. I am honored to have served alongside him, and I know the mark he’s left on this city will never be forgotten.”
Early in his time leading LAFD, Chief Terrazas oversaw the rebuilding of the Department, which had stopped hiring new firefighters for five years as a result of the Great Recession. In 2015, he successfully reorganized the Department into four bureaus – the first restructuring of LAFD in 50 years, which helped to enhance accountability and improve service delivery.
Chief Terrazas also launched and implemented a variety of innovative initiatives, including Advanced Provider Response Units, Alternate Destination Response Units, and Fast Response Vehicles, efforts that enable firefighters to go beyond simply bringing patients to emergency rooms. Chief Terrazas has also made diversity a top priority – for the first time in department history, 51.4% firefighters are now people of color. Since 2014, the Department has maintained a steady increase in the number of hired sworn women at LAFD. Of the current sworn force, more than half of those who are currently employed were hired on in the last 8 years, and nearly 10% were brought on in 2021.
"It was a privilege to serve as the Fire Chief of this world-class Department," said Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas. "For nearly eight years, we made considerable strides in technology, implemented innovative ways to respond to emergencies, and became a model for other agencies. Chief Crowley is an exemplary leader and has a broad base of experience that will serve the Department well. She has risen through the ranks over the past 26 years and I proudly promoted her three times during my tenure because she demonstrated a commitment to advancing the Department. Chief Crowley has been successful at every position and I expect her success to continue as the next Fire Chief."
# # #
Connect with us: LAFD.ORG | News | Facebook | Instagram | Reddit | Twitter: @LAFD @LAFDtalk
Nominate subspecies clamator.
Near San Hilarion [230m], Tarapoto - Bellavista Road, San Martin, Peru
Nominated in the Pic of the Week #82 in the DFW Metro Group
One of those busy but a good week. What more can one ask, when all is well.
One just says "Thank you"
Nominator people of 2008 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC global photography competition/2008 《国家地理》全球摄影大赛中国区人物类入围作品
This little rarity is still attracting several twitchers. I left it a while before visiting expecting the odd person on a dull windy day so surprised, I did manage a few reasonable shots through the hedge on the opposite field but the light was always a problem, worth seeing all the same.
... was nominated to do a Nature Photography Challenge by Lake Sturgeon. day 6 / 7. still … 靜如止水... @ Blue Mountain, Collingwood, Ontario
Day 5/7. I've been nominated by @smithgaltney for a nature photography challenge. For seven days, I'll post a picture each day and nominate a new photographer. Today I nominate @fh3rny. This is a self portrait from Olympic National Park, on the Hall of Mosses trail in 2010.
104 Likes on Instagram
21 Comments on Instagram:
lilylandes: Thank you @sturley ✨🌿
lilylandes: Thanks @mikeybellis 🌲💗🌲
assolmorskaya: Magic place
travelessentialslife: Wonderful :)
Day 6 - Gardens By the Bay Dec 2013
Nominated by Michelle Mak to post a photo of nature a day for 7 days and nominate a person to do the same each day.
About the Picture:
I had a itch to take some pictures and at that time, GBTB was having this "Christmas Sugar Mountain Theme (CSM)" and the flower dome was arranged with a Christmas and sugar floral theme (see my FB album for more Christmassy pictures).
I spotted this .. this.. I think it is the onset of a pineapple.. I don't know.. it is so tiny and cute and yet I am not sure if this will end up as the eventual pineapple that we are used to eat. I guess I never did eat a budding pineapple before and so, this is quite interesting for me.. so tiny. — at Gardens by the Bay.
LOS ANGELES - Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council President Nury Martinez announced on January 18, 2022 that Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas will retire after nearly 40 years of distinguished service to the Los Angeles Fire Department — and that Kristin Crowley, a top deputy with a stellar 25-year track record at the Department, has been nominated as its next Chief.
If confirmed by the City Council, Crowley, currently Acting Administrative Operations Chief Deputy and Fire Marshal, will be the 19th Fire Chief, and the first woman to ever lead the LAFD.
“We’re living through an unprecedented moment that has called on our Fire Department not just to protect us – but to lead us in the fight to overcome public safety challenges we’ve never faced before. At the same time, the LAFD is leading a transformative national discussion about strengthening equity and inclusion within the firefighting ranks, and we must overcome those internal challenges too,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti. “Throughout her distinguished career, Kristin Crowley has proven her brilliance, determination and bravery on the job again and again. She’s also shown this city her heart, with her tireless commitment to helping students access life-changing educational opportunities. There is no one better equipped to lead the LAFD at this moment than Kristin. She’s ready to make history, and I’m proud to nominate her as the Department’s next Chief.”
“Today is a big moment in this City. For the first time in its history the Los Angeles Fire Department will be led by a woman,” said Council President Martinez. “Chief Kristin Crowley is known by her colleagues and by this city as someone who is dedicated, hard working, and goes above and beyond what is expected of her. This announcement is not just important for the City of Los Angeles, but for girls across LA who never imagined they could one day serve as Chief of the Los Angeles Fire Department.”
Crowley is a 22-year veteran of the Fire Department who has moved seamlessly through the ranks, proving her credibility and character along the way. She made history as the Department’s first female Fire Marshal and is the second woman to earn the rank of Chief Deputy.
Chief Deputy Crowley, who serves as program director for the LAFD’s youth development program, has played a key role in ensuring that over 1,000 LAUSD high school students continue in their education.
In her current role, she helped to develop a five-year strategic plan to identify areas of growth within the Department and foster culture more open to change. As Chief, she plans to work to both deepen existing efforts and create new mechanisms to foster equity and inclusion in the Department.
"I am honored and humbled by the opportunity to be the next Fire Chief of the Los Angeles City Fire Department and to lead the Department into the future," Crowley said. "As the Fire Chief, if confirmed, I vow to take a strategic and balanced approach to ensure we meet the needs of the community we serve. We will focus our efforts on increasing our operational effectiveness, enhancing firefighter safety and well-being, and fully commit to fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive culture within the LAFD. Thank you, Mayor Garcetti, Council President Martinez, and Chief Terrazas for entrusting me to lead and to work with the dedicated women and men of the finest department in the world."
Chief Terrazas, who was sworn in as L.A.’s Fire Chief in 2014, was the first Latino to serve in that role. A 39-year veteran of the Department, Chief Terrazas helped steer the City through some of its greatest challenges, and brought about meaningful advancements and innovations within the Fire Department.
Under his leadership, LAFD supervised the City’s free public COVID-19 testing and vaccination programs, which has administered nearly 4.86 million tests and approximately 1.43 million vaccinations to date. The City of L.A.’s testing effort was the nation’s largest municipal testing program and tested over 40,000 Angelenos per day at its peak.
“Ralph Terrazas has dedicated his life to keeping the people of Los Angeles safe. For nearly 40 years, he has served our Fire Department with bravery, determination and compassion for the Angelenos he’s sworn to protect,” said Mayor Garcetti. “I couldn’t imagine having anyone else as Fire Chief, through some of the most difficult fire and public safety challenges L.A. has ever faced. And when a once-in-a-century pandemic hit, Ralph’s leadership and bold action helped us save countless lives. I am honored to have served alongside him, and I know the mark he’s left on this city will never be forgotten.”
Early in his time leading LAFD, Chief Terrazas oversaw the rebuilding of the Department, which had stopped hiring new firefighters for five years as a result of the Great Recession. In 2015, he successfully reorganized the Department into four bureaus – the first restructuring of LAFD in 50 years, which helped to enhance accountability and improve service delivery.
Chief Terrazas also launched and implemented a variety of innovative initiatives, including Advanced Provider Response Units, Alternate Destination Response Units, and Fast Response Vehicles, efforts that enable firefighters to go beyond simply bringing patients to emergency rooms. Chief Terrazas has also made diversity a top priority – for the first time in department history, 51.4% firefighters are now people of color. Since 2014, the Department has maintained a steady increase in the number of hired sworn women at LAFD. Of the current sworn force, more than half of those who are currently employed were hired on in the last 8 years, and nearly 10% were brought on in 2021.
"It was a privilege to serve as the Fire Chief of this world-class Department," said Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas. "For nearly eight years, we made considerable strides in technology, implemented innovative ways to respond to emergencies, and became a model for other agencies. Chief Crowley is an exemplary leader and has a broad base of experience that will serve the Department well. She has risen through the ranks over the past 26 years and I proudly promoted her three times during my tenure because she demonstrated a commitment to advancing the Department. Chief Crowley has been successful at every position and I expect her success to continue as the next Fire Chief."
# # #
Connect with us: LAFD.ORG | News | Facebook | Instagram | Reddit | Twitter: @LAFD @LAFDtalk
Female Common Goldeneye (nominate) (Kvinand / Bucephala clangula clangula) with ducklings in Numedalslågen, Kongsberg (Norway).
Canon EOS 550D, Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6.
The photo is part of a Female Common Goldeneye album.
For male birds, see my Male Common Goldeneye (nominate) set.
Rev. Channing E. Phillips is shown in a photograph published November 30, 1978 upon his appointment as congressional liaison officer for the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Phillips gained national prominence when he became the first black person nominated by a major party at the Democratic National Convention in 1968.
Phillips, who was the District of Columbia national committeeman for the party, was nominated as its favorite son after Sen Robert F. Kennedy was slain. Phillips received 67 ½ votes from 18 states.
Phillips also ran in the District’s first election for non-voting Delegate to Congress in 1971. He was an early favorite, but was criticized for being aloof and finished a distant third to winner Rev. Walter Fauntroy and behind appointed city council member Joseph Yeldell.
He was born in Brooklyn, N.Y. and grew up in New York and Pittsburgh, serving in the U.S. Army in the late 1940s. He graduated from Virginia Union where he was the center on the basketball team. He received a divinity degree from Colgate-Rochester Divinity School and did postgraduate work at Drew University in New Jersey.
He came to Washington in 1956 as a lecturer at Howard and American Universities and later taught at Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria.
He pastored at two churches in New York before returning to Washington D.C., accepting a position as minister of the Lincoln Temple United Church of Christ.
During his time at Lincoln Temple he moved into the forefront of the local civil rights movement advocating for Home Rule, affordable housing and against police brutality.
He resigned his position as senior minister at Lincoln Temple in 1970 after some members charged he was neglecting the congregation for his involvement in social issues.
During his time at Lincoln Temple, he accepted a job as head of the District’s Housing Development Corporation where he led the building of over a 1,000 new units of affordable housing ranging from efficiency to five-bedroom houses.
He also had failures at the HDC—particularly at the Clifton Terrace apartments on 14th Street NW where the renovation project went bankrupt. He was criticized for not ensuring that the low income housing he built remained in low income residents hands. Many units were later sold by the initial residents to wealthier buyers.
He resigned from HDC in 1974 and accepted at job as vice president of Virginia Union University but was quickly fired on charges of nonperformance and attempting to “undermine the university’s administration.” Phillips filed a lawsuit and negotiated a substantial out-of-court settlement.
He returned to Washington, D.C. as director of congressional relations for the National Endowment for the Humanities, a position he held until 1982 when he moved to New York accepting a job as minister of planning and coordination for the Riverside Church there.
He sharply disagreed with senior minister William Sloane Coffin over gay parishioners and gave a sermon in Coffin’s absence called homosexuality a “sin” and opposed a church task force report that recommended upholding gay rights.
He did not prevail at the church in his views and the Riverside congregation adopted the task force report.
Phillips was on medical leave from Riverside in 1987 when he succumbed to lung cancer at age 59.
For other random radicals, see flic.kr/s/aHske413N1
The photographer is unknown. The image is courtesy of the D.C. Public Library Washington Star Collection © Washington Post.
Nominate / Vote for @jordynjones for the Kids' Choice Awards 2016! 🌟 Tweet at @ KCANominees on Twitter suggesting Jordyn Jones! (@ jjjordynjones on Twitter / Hashtag: #KCA2016) The Kids Choice Awards 2016 is LIVE Saturday March 12th 🌟 #KCA #Nickelodeon #KidsChoiceAwards #KidsChoiceAwards2016 🌟 Jordyn Jones @JordynOnline Photo www.instagram.com/p/BALdOljwJKZ/ #Jordyn #Jones #Actress #Model #Modeling #Singer #Dancer #Dancing #Dance #Star #Instagram #Photography #Jordyn Jones #JordynOnline www.jordynonline.com #JordynJones
via Instagram ift.tt/1lw7vNN lgbt, Instagram,lesbian,gay,lesbian wedding,gay wedding,gay couples,lesbian couples,#teamlesbian
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a black bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
Since President Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor to replace Justice Souter on the Supreme Court, there has been much discussion of whether she would sail through the Senate confirmation process, or whether the Republican opposition would attempt to delay hearings or even mount a filibuster to prevent a vote. Despite all the gnashing of teeth, a look at the history of Supreme Court nominees finds that everything will probably proceed as normal. A vast majority of the nominees have been easily confirmed, and even those that have been rejected have been so by the slimmest of margins. Read all about in our latest original Transparency here.
A collaboration between GOOD and Always With Honor.
Herman School was built in 1944 to educate children of the area, including those from the then-new Herman Gardens housing project (torn down in the late 1990s). New housing is currently going up on the old Herman Gardens site.
The Herman School was nominated for listing on the National Register as a contributing property to the Detroit Public Schools MPS. Ater the public school closed, the building housed a charter school. It is now a church.
Was nominated to do a 5 day B&W image challenge by MsFoo
I am meant to nominate another contact but I won\'t nominate anyone unless I\'ve had the chance to contact them first and I really don\'t have the time to do that at the moment, so, if anyone wants to partake please feel free and lets see if we can get a few B&W images up over the next few days.
So kicking things off today with another Lego Minifugre shot I took earlier in the week. This is my Lego Spooky Girl.
The nominated Bryce Canyon National Park Scenic Trails District consists of five structures including the Navajo Loop Trail, the Queen's Garden Trail, the Peekaboo Loop Trail, the Fairyland Trail, and the Rim Trail. All of these structures are located within the scenic heartland of the park-between Fairyland Point to the north and Bryce Point to the south. Although the trails have individual names, they do intersect with one another, forming a contiguous series of paths that provide visual and physical access to the erosional features that characterize Bryce Canyon National Park (BRCA).
The Queen's Garden Trail (an unpaved graded trail between three and five feet in width) accesses the area below the plateau rim between Sunrise and Sunset points. The length of the Queen's Garden Trail is listed in various documents as .8 or 1.8 miles in length, depending upon whether or not one includes both the canyon bottom and switchback segments under the designation. This trail provides access to the rock formation known as Queen Victoria. The upper portion of the trail is cut through bare sandstone with little or no vegetation. However, vegetation increases as one descends into the bottom of Bryce Canyon. Scattered stands of ponderosa pine, bristlecone pine, and brushy understory vegetation occur adjacent to the trail. Notable features of the trail include two tunnels cut through a sandstone ridge.
A comparison of historic and modern maps indicates that the current alignment of the Queen's Garden Trail follows closely the trail as it was constructed in 1929. Modifications have been made due to erosion, rock fall, etc., however these are to be expected given the character of the natural environment within BRCA. This trail continues to provide access to the formation known as "Queen Victoria" and provides hikers with vistas that are little changed since the historical period. (1)
References (1) NRHP Nomination Form npgallery.nps.gov/pdfhost/docs/NRHP/Text/95000422.pdf
Hey all!
So I applied for the Better Photography Wedding Photographer of the Year Contest back in February.
What I ended up with:
- 3 Top 6 Nominations in 3 different categories (including the 12-shot Wedding Series!)
- 5 Top 15 Shortlists in 4 different categories
Look forward to the April 2010 issue of Better Photography and do pick up one to check out the nominated photos!
I guess the best part of this is that all the photos are from the first wedding I ever shot completely! :D
:)
Tag Game: Day 4 of 5 Day Black & White Challenge
I got nominated by SintHonya and Idrusa (thank you so much !! <3)
This is actually an ongoing photo challenge on Facebook and a flickr poster decided to bring it here to flickr... the game, for every day for the next 5 days post one black and white photo of your dollies and for each day you nominate 1 or more flickr friends to do the same. GAME! I
I nominate: morghetta
If you want to join but no one nominated you, you can always join the game.
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a yellow bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
The cover Ingrid did for Wallpaper* has been nominated for the prestigious Dutch Design Awards 2009. For more information see the following link: www.dutchdesignawards.nl/en/home/
Blue Whistling Thrush
(Nominate with a black bill)
The blue whistling thrush (Myophonus caeruleus) is a whistling thrush present in the mountains of Central Asia, China and Southeast Asia. It is known for its loud human-like whistling song at dawn and dusk. The widely distributed populations show variations in size and plumage with several of them considered as subspecies. Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.
This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail. The wing coverts are a slightly different shade of blue and the median coverts have white spots at their tips. The bill is yellow and stands in contrast. The inner webs of the flight and tail feathers is black. The sexes are similar in plumage.
It measures 31–35 cm (12–14 in) in length. Weight across the subspecies can range from 136 to 231 g (4.8 to 8.1 oz). For comparison, the blue whistling thrush commonly weighs twice as much as an American robin. Among standard measurements, the wing chord can measure 15.5–20 cm (6.1–7.9 in) long, the tarsus is 4.5–5.5 cm (1.8–2.2 in) and the bill is 2.9–4.6 cm (1.1–1.8 in). Size varies across the range with larger thrushes found to the north of the species range and slightly smaller ones to the south, corresponding with Bergmann's rule. In northern China, males and females average 188 g (6.6 oz) and 171 g (6.0 oz), whereas in India they average 167.5 g (5.91 oz) and 158.5 g (5.59 oz).
Several populations are given subspecies status. The nominate form with a black bill is found in central and eastern China. The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma. The population eugenei, which lacks white spots on the median coverts, is found south into Thailand. Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra. The Javan population, flavirostris, has the thickest bill. The subspecies status of several populations has been questioned.
It is found along the Tian Shan and Himalayas, in temperate forests and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. They make altitudinal movements in the Himalayas, descending in winter.
The blue whistling thrush is usually found singly or in pairs. They hop on rocks and move about in quick spurts. They turn over leaves and small stones, cocking their head and checking for movements of prey. When alarmed they spread and droop their tail. They are active well after dusk and during the breeding season (April to August) they tend to sing during the darkness of dawn and dusk when few other birds are calling. The call precedes sunrise the most during November. The alarm call is a shrill kree. The nest is a cup of moss and roots placed in a ledge or hollow beside a stream. The usual clutch consists of 3 to 4 eggs, the pair sometimes raising a second brood. They feed on fruits, earthworms, insects, crabs and snails. Snails and crabs are typically battered on a rock before feeding. In captivity, they have been known to kill and eat mice and in the wild have been recorded preying on small birds.
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 2679. Eleanor Parker in The Man with the Golden Arm (Otto Preminger, 1955).
American actress Eleanor Parker (1922-2013) appeared in some 80 films and television series. She was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, for Caged (1950), Detective Story (1951) and Interrupted Melody (1955). Her role in Caged also won her the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival. One of her most memorable roles was that of the Baroness in The Sound of Music (1965). Her biographer Doug McClelland called her ‘Woman of a Thousand Faces’, because of her versatility.
Eleanor Jean Parker was born in 1922, in Cedarville, Ohio. She was the daughter of Lola (Isett) and Lester Day Parker. Her family moved to East Cleveland, Ohio, where she attended public schools and graduated from Shaw High School. She appeared in a number of school plays. When she was 15 she started to attend the Rice Summer Theatre on Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts. After graduation, she moved to California and began appearing at the Pasadena Playhouse. There she was spotted by a Warners Bros talent scout, Irving Kumin. The studio signed her to a long-term contract in June 1941. She was cast that year in They Died with Their Boots On (Raoul Walsh, 1941), but her scenes were cut. Her actual film debut was as Nurse Ryan in the short Soldiers in White (B. Reeves Eason, 1942). She was given some decent roles in B films, Busses Roar (D. Ross Lederman, 1942) and The Mysterious Doctor (Benjamin Stoloff, 1943) opposites John Loder. She also had a small role in one of Warner Brothers' biggest productions for the 1943 season, the pro-Soviet Mission to Moscow (Michael Curtiz, 1943) as Emlen Davies, daughter of the U.S. ambassador to the U.S.S.R (Walter Huston). On the set, she met her first husband, Navy Lieutenant. Fred L. Losse, but the marriage turned out to be a brief wartime affair. Parker had impressed Warners enough to offer her a strong role in a prestige production, Between Two Worlds (Edward A. Blatt, 1944), playing the suicidal wife of Paul Henreid's character. She played support roles for Crime by Night (William Clemens, 1944) and The Last Ride (D. Ross Lederman, 1944). Then she got the starring role opposite Dennis Morgan in The Very Thought of You (Delmer Daves, 1944). She was considered enough of a ‘name’ to be given a cameo in Hollywood Canteen (Delmer Daves, 1944). Warners gave her the choice role of Mildred Rogers in a new version of Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage (Edmund Goulding, 1946), but previews were not favourable and the film sat on the shelf for two years before being released. She had her big break when she was cast opposite John Garfield in Pride of the Marines (Delmer Daves, 1945). However two films that followed with Errol Flynn, the romantic comedy Never Say Goodbye (James V. Kern, 1946) and the drama Escape Me Never (Peter Godfrey, 1947), were box office disappointments. Parker was suspended twice by Warners for refusing parts in films – in Stallion Road (James V. Kern, 1947), where she was replaced by Alexis Smith and Love and Learn (Frederick De Cordova, 1947). She made the comedy Voice of the Turtle (Irving Rapper, 1947) with Ronald Reagan, and the mystery The Woman in White (Peter Godfrey, 1948). She refused to appear in Somewhere in the City (Vincent Sherman, 1950) so Warners suspended her again; Virginia Mayo played the role. Parker then had two years off, during which time she married and had a baby. She turned down a role in The Hasty Heart (Vincent Sherman, 1949) which she wanted to do, but it would have meant going to England and she did not want to leave her baby alone during its first year.
Eleanor Parker returned in Chain Lightning (Stuart Heisler, 1950) with Humphrey Bogart. Parker heard about a women in prison film Warners were making, Caged (John Cromwell, 1950), and actively lobbied the role. She got it, and won the 1950 Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival and was nominated for an Academy Award. She also had a good role in the melodrama Three Secrets (Robert Wise, 1950). In February 1950, Parker left Warner Bros. after having been under contract there for eight years. Parker had understood that she would star in a film called Safe Harbor, but Warner Bros. apparently had no intention of making it. Because of this misunderstanding, her agents negotiated her release. Parker's career outside of Warners started badly with Valentino (Lewis Allen, 1951) playing a fictionalised wife of Rudolph Valentino for producer Edward Small. She tried a comedy at 20th Century Fox with Fred MacMurray, A Millionaire for Christy (George Marshall, 1951). In 1951, Parker signed a contract with Paramount for one film a year, with an option for outside films. This arrangement began brilliantly with Detective Story (William Wyler, 1951) playing Mary McLeod, the woman who doesn't understand the position of her unstable detective husband (Kirk Douglas). Parker was nominated for the Oscar in 1951 for her performance. Parker followed Detective Story with her portrayal of an actress in love with a swashbuckling nobleman (Stewart Granger) in Scaramouche (George Sidney, 1952), a role originally intended for Ava Gardner. Wikipedia: “Parker later claimed that Granger was the only person she didn't get along with during her entire career. However they had good chemistry and the film was a massive hit. “MGM cast her into Above and Beyond (Melvin Frank, Norman Panama, 1952), a biopic of Lt. Col. Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. (Robert Taylor), the pilot of the aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. It was a solid hit. While Parker was making a third film for MGM, Escape from Fort Bravo (John Sturges, 1953), she signed a five-year contract to the studio. She was named as star of a Sidney Sheldon script, My Most Intimate Friend and of One More Time, from a script by Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin directed by George Cukor, but neither film was made. Back at Paramount, Parker starred with Charlton Heston as a 1900s mail-order bride in The Naked Jungle (Byron Haskin, 1954), produced by George Pal. Parker returned to MGM where she was reunited with Robert Taylor in an Egyptian adventure film, Valley of the Kings (Robert Pirosh, 1954), and a Western, Many Rivers to Cross (Roy Rowland, 1955). MGM gave her one of her best roles as opera singer Marjorie Lawrence struck down by polio in Interrupted Melody (Curtis Bernhardt, 1955). This was a big hit and earned Parker a third Oscar nomination; she later said it was her favourite film. Also in 1955, Parker appeared in the film adaptation of the National Book Award-winner The Man with the Golden Arm (Otto Preminger, 1955), released through United Artists. She played Zosh, the supposedly wheelchair-bound wife of heroin-addicted, would-be jazz drummer Frankie Machine (Frank Sinatra). It was a major commercial and critical success. In 1956, she co-starred with Clark Gable for the Western comedy The King and Four Queens (Raoul Walsh, 1956), also for United Artists. It was then back at MGM for two dramas: Lizzie (Hugo Haas, 1957), in the title role, as a woman with a split personality; and The Seventh Sin (Ronald Neame, 1957), a remake of The Painted Veil in the role originated by Greta Garbo and, once again, intended for Ava Gardner. Both films flopped at the box office and, as a result, Parker's plans to produce her own film, L'Eternelle, about French resistance fighters, did not materialise.
Eleanor Parker supported Frank Sinatra in a popular comedy, A Hole in the Head (Frank Capra, 1959). She returned to MGM for Home from the Hill (Vincente Minnelli, 1960), co-starring with Robert Mitchum, then took over Lana Turner's role of Constance Rossi in Return to Peyton Place (José Ferrer, 1961), the sequel to the hit 1957 film. That was made by 20th Century Fox who also produced Madison Avenue (H. Bruce Humberstone, 1961) with Parker. In 1960, she made her TV debut, and in the following years, she worked increasingly in television, with the occasional film role such as Panic Button (George Sherman, Giuliano Carnimeo, 1964) with Maurice Chevalier and Jayne Mansfield. Parker's best-known screen role is Baroness Elsa Schraeder in the Oscar-winning musical The Sound of Music (Robert Wise, 1965). The Baroness was famously and poignantly unsuccessful in keeping the affections of Captain Georg von Trapp (Christopher Plummer) after he falls in love with Maria (Julie Andrews). In 1966, Parker played an alcoholic widow in the crime drama Warning Shot (Buzz Kulik, 1967), a talent scout who discovers a Hollywood star in The Oscar (Russell Rouse, 1966), and a rich alcoholic in An American Dream (Robert Gist, 1966). However, her film career seemed to go downhill. A Playboy Magazine reviewer derided the cast of The Oscar as "has-beens and never-will-bes". From the late 1960s, she focused on television. In 1963, Parker had appeared in the medical TV drama about psychiatry The Eleventh Hour in the episode Why Am I Grown So Cold?, for which she was nominated for an Emmy Award. She also appeared in episodes of Breaking Point (1964). And The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1968). In 1969–1970, Parker starred in the television series Bracken's World, for which she was nominated for a 1970 Golden Globe Award. Parker also appeared on stage in the role of Margo Channing in Applause, the Broadway musical version of the film All About Eve. In 1976, she played Maxine in a revival of The Night of the Iguana. Her last film role was in a Farrah Fawcett bomb, Sunburn (Richard C. Sarafian, 1979). Subsequently, she appeared very infrequently on TV, most recently in Dead on the Money (Mark Cullingham, 1991). Eleanor Parker was married four times. Her husbands were Fred Losee (1943-1944), Bert E. Friedlob (1946-1953; the marriage produced three children Susan Eleanor Friedlob (1948), Sharon Anne Friedlob (1950), and Richard Parker Friedlob (1952)), Paul Clemens, American portrait painter (1954-1965; the marriage produced one child, actor Paul Clemens (1958)), and Raymond N. Hirsch (1966- 2001 when Hirsch died of esophageal cancer). She was the grandmother of actor/director Chasen Parker. Eleanor Parker died in 2013 at a medical facility in Palm Springs, California of complications of pneumonia. She was 91.Parker was raised a Protestant and later converted to Judaism, telling the New York Daily News columnist Kay Gardella in August 1969, "I think we're all Jews at heart ... I wanted to convert for a long time."
Sources: Jon C. Hopwood (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.
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