. Half hours with fishes, reptiles, and birds . AND DUCKS The boobies, the cormorants, and the gannets havecousins in the pelicans — the long-beaked, pouched crea-tures of solemn mien, found in almost all tropical Florida the brown pelican(Fig. 133) is the common land it is very clumsy, itsshort legs being poorly adaptedfor locomotion, yet with theirwide webs excellent pelican has an extraordinarypouch beneath the lower jaw,which is really a huge dip net,to aid the clumsy bird in thecapture of food. Although alarge bird, it is extremely lightin tHe air, on accoun
. Half hours with fishes, reptiles, and birds . AND DUCKS The boobies, the cormorants, and the gannets havecousins in the pelicans — the long-beaked, pouched crea-tures of solemn mien, found in almost all tropical Florida the brown pelican(Fig. 133) is the common land it is very clumsy, itsshort legs being poorly adaptedfor locomotion, yet with theirwide webs excellent pelican has an extraordinarypouch beneath the lower jaw,which is really a huge dip net,to aid the clumsy bird in thecapture of food. Although alarge bird, it is extremely lightin tHe air, on account of thepresence of air sacs under the*skin. It is particularly buoyanton the surface of the water, which is the position of its choice. The birds move inflocks, paddling slowly along with bills lying close to theirbreasts, giving them a very dignified appearance. At suchtimes the birds are resting, but when hungry they rise andfly with heavy beating of the wings forty or fifty feet abovethe water, eagerly scanning the surface, When a school. Fig. 133. — Brown Pelican. 168 THE PELICANS AND DUCKS of fish is observed, the pelican turns and plunges down,head first, like a catapult, opening the mouth wide justbefore it reaches the water. As the fishes can not see up-ward, it engulfs scores in its capacious pouch, out of whichthe water drains, leaving the fishes, which are afterwardswallowed with an upward, tossing motion of the head. I found the pelicans nesting in mangrove trees on BushKey. The nests were the rudest piles of brush imaginable,on the top of which the eggs were placed. The youngwere strange creatures, and not particularly agreeableneighbors, with their insistent, asthmatic voices. I keptseveral as pets. They followed the boat over the reef,alighted on it at times, and roosted on the side of a fisher-mans hut when ashore. The fisherman, by fastening astrap about their necks, obliged the patient birds to fishfor him. On the upper Florida reef the pelicans nest in v
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectzoology, bookyear1906
