American White Pelicans are known for their conspicuous black and white coloration, cooperative foraging techniques and large body size. But what I enjoy most about them is the contrast between the goofy, almost comical proportions of their huge bill and pouch and their graceful, choreographed flight patterns when flying in flocks.
I don’t post images of these two species as often as I should. Both are common in my area and such large birds are relatively easy to photograph in flight so I hope the reason I’ve largely ignored them has nothing to do with snobbishness on my part.
American White Pelicans eat fish almost exclusively and the size range of fish they’ll attempt to swallow can be extreme. If they show poor judgment they can get into serious trouble.
This post is largely a collection of photos that documents some of the bird species I photographed on our recent camping trip to southwest Montana. Most of these images have flaws and as I’m prone to do I’ll be pointing those flaws out but for me each of the images has something positive to offer to make up for their shortcomings.
The webbed feet of American White Pelicans function like skis when landing on water.
This is a continuation of the events from yesterdays post where an American White Pelican had repeatedly tried to swallow a very large, headless carp but due to the size of the fish and persistent pressure from other pelicans the effort (and the fish) had been abandoned.
American White Pelicans are known to do some pretty strange things with their pouch – one of them is pouch stretching (I’ve been unable to find an official term for the behavior). A four year old image – I no longer have the original file so can’t access exif data They pull their head back and force their very flexible pouch down over their neck and upper chest in a process that looks, well.. bizarre. I don’t think this behavior is particularly unusual as I’ve seen and photographed it several times. According to Birds of North America Online the function of this display is “uncertain”. Canon 7D, 1/5000, f/6.3, ISO 500 However, these birds are also fully capable of pulling the bottom of their pouch up above the level of the lower mandibles without having to pull the pouch down over their neck. I don’t fully understand how they’re able to do this since the pouch itself is non-muscular. Internet research on the subject has been unproductive. I assume there must be some form of bony or cartilaginous rod that extends from the throat area down the middle of the bottom of the pouch about half way to the tip of the bill. With muscular control of the base of that extension in the throat area they would be able to raise the bottom of the pouch above “horizontal”. I’ve seen them do it twice – the first time without a camera while the bird was perched. But the second time, a couple of weeks ago, it was done in flight which…
