BIRDS FOUND NEAR SHORE OR IN BAYS 53 



be recoguized by a white patch on each flank. They 

 breed in very small rookeries of ten or a dozen pairs, — 

 instead of several hundred as is the case with Brandt 

 cormorants, — and are frequently found nesting alone. 

 Their site is usually the most inaccessible rocks in the 

 vicinity. Frequently, so narrow is the ledge chosen 

 that the young are crowded off and are killed by the 

 fall to the water or rocks below. Each season the old 

 nests are used, being repaired with kelp or relined with 

 fresh sea moss. Baird Cormorants, though so retiring, 

 are particularly courageous in defence of their nests and 

 young, and are either so devoted to the former or so 

 stupid that they will return after being robbed and 

 brood upon the empty nest. Their nests are con- 

 structed with greater care than those of the other 

 species mentioned, and are lined with the more deli- 

 cate varieties of sea moss as well as the coarse kelp. 

 They become cemented into a more or less solid mass 

 and also glued to the rock with guano. Some of them 

 are so solid as to warrant the opinion that they have 

 been in use many years. The feeding habits of this 

 species are like those of the Brandt and Farallone 

 cormorants. 



125. AMERICAN WHITE PELICAN. — Pelecanus 

 erythrorhynchos. 



Family : The Pelicans. 



Length : 4J-6 feet. 



Adult Nuptial Plumage : Entirely white, quills Hack, whitish at base ; 

 a pendant crest of pale yellow feathers, and a horny protuberance on 

 top of bill ; poach and bill reddish ; feet bright red. 



