Brown Pelicans and Breaking Waves
Brown Pelicans and Breaking Waves.-On December 12, 1943, at Dillon Beach, Marin County, California, my attention was drawn to four Brown Pelicans (Pelecanw occidentalis) which were moving back and forth along the beach in the usual single file. Several times prior to IO:30 a.m. I had noticed four pelicans soaring along the crest of a wave and about ten feet above it. Finally it occurred to me that the four were always the same birds; the second and third birds in the line were in immature plumage. By watching them make a round trip, which measured about three miles, I found that they were the same individuals. Between IO:30 and 11:02 a.m. they made six round trips, or a distance of approximately 18 miles at an average speed of 35 miles per hour.
The wind was offshore and from ‘the northeast, but was not strong. The pelicans soared just inside the mounting wave no matter whether they were going north or south. On the southward trip the speed was apparently greater, but in the 32 minutes I timed them I did not see any individual flap its wings. The altitude varied little, if at all. No fishing was observed, and the birds never pointed the bill downward as is customary when actively fishing.-HARVEY I. FISHER, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Berkeley, California, March 4, 1944.
