THE WHITE PELICAN* 



Pelicans are familiar to most of us as absurdly dignified, 

 ungainly inhabitants of zoological gardens ; but it is perhaps 

 hardly fair to judge them in an environment for which they 

 are not responsible. 



While in nature we shall not find Pelicans endowed with 

 that degree of intelligence and responsiveness which distin- 

 guishes certain birds higher in the evolutionary scale ; they, 

 nevertheless, possess their own unequalled attractions. 



However awkward White Pelicans may appear in cap- 

 tivity, when on the wing, they display a superb mastery of 

 the air. I know of no birds which in flocks present so 

 grand a sight. TheMan- o '-War Bird is the epitome of grace 

 and repose, in motion. A flock of Flamingos is thrilling, 

 vivid, spectacular, but a flock of White Pelicans is indescrib- 

 ably majestic and impressive. 



I recall a gathering of four or five hundred of these birds, 

 which, one blustery June day, in Saskatchewan, had left the 

 troubled waters of a shallow lake to rest upon the prairie. 

 In the distance, en masse, they could not have been distin- 

 guished from a patch of snow. As our wagon approached, 

 they arose, all flapping heavily, their wing strokes strongly 

 emphasized by the now exposed black flight feathers. For 

 a few moments they seemed to be in confusion, but unity of 

 movement was quickly developed, and the whole flock, dense- 

 ly massed and gleaming with strange whiteness against the 

 dark, threatening sky, moved toward the lake. 



The direction of flight seemed well established, when a 

 single bird left the flock, flying at right angles to the left. 



* Although some of the observations herein recorded were not made in 

 Canada, it seems desirable to include this chapter in a part of the book 

 which relates to a region in which the White Pelican is probably most 

 numerous. 



