Subject: re. Pelicans (was Early Arrivals)
Date: Apr 11 17:04:10 1995
From: Jack Bowling - Jack_Bowling at mindlink.bc.ca


Michael Price wrote:

>Hi Tweeters

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

<info re. bill ornamentation deleted>

>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 and Al et al - The description of the AWPE's situation in B.C. as
given by Campbell et. al. in Birds of B.C. was accurate at the time of
writing (data cutoff Nov. 1990). Since then an aerial survey of the AWPE's
breeding and feeding grounds was done in 1991 by biologist Mari Wood. Her
data confirmed the info in BBC. However, over the past three years, pelican
sightings away from the traditional feeding lakes (shallow, weedy lakes
between the breeding ground of Stum Lake and Fraser Lake - a distance of
230 km) in central B.C. have been increasing. We inland birders feel that
the carrying capacity of Stum Lake may now be overreached. This may explain
the increased sightings on the coast: young birds all pumped up with no
where to go. There are many small lakes similar to Stum L. within the
birds' normal feeding grounds. It is likely that another colony will be
discovered in the future by the next aerial survey or by someone on the
ground.

cheers,
Jack







// Jack Bowling jack_bowling at mindlink.bc.ca //
// Prince George, BC //
// CANADA //