250 



SNODGRASS AND HELLER 



than a foot in length. Fish also form a part of their food. The 

 young are fed by the parents with disgorged food until they have 

 attained nearly adult size. A large, immature bird may often be seen 

 pursuing an adult through the surf with loud cries and savage thrusts 

 of the beak, until the latter comes to terms, thrusts its beak into the 

 open mouth of the young and disgorges into it a mass of partially 

 digested food. 



In January, at Black Bight, Albemarle, a small rookery was found, 

 consisting of four occupied nests. The nests were placed on a flat, 

 smooth sheet of lava at the edge of a small lagoon. They were made 

 of brown algae heaped up into cone-shaped masses about a foot high, 

 hollowed out at the top to receive the eggs. A nest measured had the 

 following dimensions: External diameter, seventy-five centimeters; 

 internal diameter, forty centimeters ; depth of the cavity, ten centi- 

 meters. The birds here were all in pairs, the females sitting on the 

 nests, the males standing quietly nearby. The females stubbornly de- 

 fended their nests when disturbed, making savage thrusts with their 

 bills and hissing loudly. Two of the nests contained each three well in- 

 cubated eggs. One of the others contained two eggs and one young, 

 the other one egg and two young. The nestlings were black and 

 naked. The eggs are elongate-oval or narrowly elliptical in shape 

 and have a light bluish-green color. This color is usually, however, 

 hidden by a white chalky deposit. The eggs of the two sets measure as 

 follows: 71x42.5, 67x42.5, 67x43, and 68x41, 68x45, 59 X4 1 - 



MEASUREMENTS OF ADULT SPECIMENS OF PkalaCTOCOraoC 



harrtst. 



Family PELECANEXE. 

 Genus Pelecanus Linnasus. 

 Pelecanus LINN^US, Syst. Nat., ed. x, i, p. 132, 1758. 



Range. Cosmopolitan, except Polynesia. Galapagos Archipelago. 



