Hi Tweeters

Re whether these late May Amer. White Pelicans in Vancouver BC are migrants
or failed breeders,

Al Jaramillo said:

>You mentioned that these are Definitive Alternate birds, does this mean
>that they have the vertical plate on the bill? If they do, I think that
>this would be evidence that these late birds are failed breeders. As far
as >I know (and I don't know much about pelicans) only the full breeding
adults >get this bill adornment.

Al, there's a photograph showing a flock of 12--15 AWPE flying by the
Roberts Bank Coalport Jetty in late May nineteen eighty-something, and I'm
pretty sure that one or two had the male bill-plate.

A few years later, still in the early to mid-Eighties, four or five piled
in the bay between the Roberts Bank Jetty and Brunswick Point to the N, put
their feet up and hung around for over a week. At least one and possibly
two males had this plate.

Though I had a small, secret wish they constituted an unknown breeding
population, because the idea of a small discrete population moving by in
its entirety seemed kinda cool to me, I'm persuaded you're right about them
being failed breeders. So, then, why the Coast rather than a freshwater
lake somewhere out of the breeders' hair? Do saltwater fish taste better
than freshwater fish to these guys?

Michael Price
Vancouver BC Canada
michael_price at mindlink.bc.ca