30 NOTES ON THE 
Family PELECANID. 
PELECANUS ERYTHRORHYNCHUS Ge tin. § (125.) 
AMERICAN WHITE PELICAN. 
This immense bird usually signals his arrival in the early 
part of April by his characteristic notes from an elevation 
beyond the range of vision except under the most favorable 
circumstances. The sound of those notes is difficult to de- 
scribe, but unforgetable when once certainly heard from their 
aerial heights. I have sometimes scanned the heavens in vain 
to see them, but am generally rewarded for my vigilance and 
patience if the sky is clear, and if cloudy, also, when I watch 
the rifts closely with my field glass. 
They more commonly are in flocks of from thirty to fifty, 
rarely more; but when materially less than the former number, 
the flock has been divided, and they then fly lower. During 
the incoming migration of the spring of 1864 it was not an 
unusual thing to have them descend nearly to the tops of the 
trees, long before reaching a section for alighting. I secured 
one at that time which was eleven feet in extent and weighed 
twenty-two pounds. For more than twenty years after I 
came here to reside they bred in Grant county in a large 
community. Several of my ornithological friends visited the 
place from time to time, first of which Mr. J. N. Sandford of 
Elbow lake, who guided Mr. G. B. Sennett of Meadville, Pa., 
to the pelicanery subsequently, but after several years’ antici- 
pation of seeing it with Mr. Sanford myself, professional 
duties and ill health prevented, until, persecuted, robbed and 
mercilessly slaughtered, they finally deserted their ancient — 
dwelling place, since which I have had no reliable evidence 
that they bred within our borders. It is persistently claimed 
by duck-hunters that they have renewed their limited breeding, 
but exactly where, rumor has not decided. I think that there 
is little reason to doubt that the pelicanery alluded to was the 
only one within our borders, for wherever these easily identi- 
fied birds were observed during the period of breeding in the 
early morning and late in the day, the line of general flight 
pointed to that same locality. Shortly after their arrival in 
spring they pair for breeding, after which little is seen of 
them until late in the autumn, when they begin to flock for 
their late migration, which time depends entirely upon the 
