PELICAN ISLAND 



89 



coast do not nest until April, the earliest recorded date for 

 egg-laying being April 21. There is occasionally a supple- 

 mentary breeding season on Pelican Island ; from one hun- 

 dred to three hundred birds sometimes laying late in April. 

 Whether this represents a first or second brood is unknown, 

 hut it is apparently comparable to the normal west coast 

 breeding season. 



That there should be six 

 months difference in t h e 

 breeding time of birds which 

 pass their year under essen- 

 tially similar conditions, is as 

 surprising as though the 

 mangroves of eastern Plor- % 

 ida were to blossom half a 

 year earlier than those of the 

 west coast. With the infor- 

 mation now at our command 

 the case appears to be inex- 

 plicable. 



As late at least as April 1 

 one rarely if ever sees a 

 Brown Pelican on the gulf 

 coast of Florida with the full 

 brown hind neck of the breed- 

 ing plumage; while on Atlan- 

 tic Coast, I have seen but one 

 adult bird with the white hind 

 neck of the non - breeding 

 plumage. Birds from the two coasts possibly therefore do 

 not intermingle and the difference in their nesting seasons 

 which this difference in plumage correlates, may be a result 

 of long continued isolation. The April nesting of a few east 

 coast birds may, therefore, represent the survival of a near- 

 ly obsolete habit. 



Adult Pelicans in Breeding (brown 

 neck) and Non-breeding (white 

 neck) Plumage 



