302 



AVES-ORDER PELECANIFORMES. 



Fig. 58.— The Eoseate Peucan 

 (Pelecanvs 07iocrotalus). 



have alluded above (p. 288). They are birds which are found in the temperate 

 and tropical portions of both hemispheres, and in America the Knob-billed 

 Pelican (P. erylhrorhynchus) has a remarkable bony excrescence on the 

 upper mandible, which is put on during the breeding season, and afterwards 



falls off. Nearly every species assumes a 

 patch of yellow or brown colour on the 

 chest during the nesting season, at which 

 time, too, a crest is generally donned. 



On the habits of the Roseate Pelican in 

 the delta of the Danube the following note 

 has been published by Messrs. Slntenis :— 

 "The islands where they breed are 

 more or less composed of reed-fragments, 

 often without any fresh vegetation, often 

 also bordered by green rushes and other 

 high plants. The aspect of the large white 

 eggs shining through the green afl round 

 is very charming when seen from the 

 middle of the lake ; but when closely 

 inspected, the places look very dirty and 

 slovenly. The smell was bearable, the 

 process of fermentation and putrefaction 

 being generally over — a sign that the birds 

 had not laid since the 7th instant. Gener- 

 ally there were two eggs in a nest; but 

 there were also plenty of single onea. 

 JNearly half as many eggs as were lying on the islands were floating on the 

 surrounding water. The latter keeps sending up air-bubbles, by which it is 

 kept in constant commotion, no doubt caused by the substances putrefying 

 at the bottom. The eggs were in all stages of hatching ; but in most of 

 them the young birds were fully developed, so that we had a trouble to find 

 a number which could yet be blown. The eggs which our chasseur had taken 

 on the 7th were, on the average, far less advanced ; and it does not seem to 

 us at all improbable that the heat of the sun may have had some influence 

 upon the abandoned eggs, at least to a certain extent." 



Of the breeding of the spotted-billed Pelican in Burma (P. manilknsis), Mr. 

 Eugene Oates givesa very interesting account :— "The whole forest consisted 

 of very large trees, but a portion— about one in twenty — was made up of 

 wood-oil trees, gigantic fellows 150 ft. high and more, and with a smooth, 

 branchless trunk of 80 to 100 ft. These are the trees selected by the 

 Pelicans. I was out one day till 3 p.m., continually moving, and must have 

 walked at least twenty miles in various directions, but never from first to 

 last was I out of sight of either a Pelican's or Adjutant's nest. From what 

 I saw, and from what the Burmans told me, I compute the bl-eeding-place 

 of these birds to extend over an area about twenty miles Ions and five 

 broad. '' " 



" With regard to the Pelicans, I noticed that no tree contained less than 

 three nests, and seldom more than fifteen. Some birds select the upper 

 branches, placing their nests on the nearly horizontal branches of the tree, 

 not far from the trunk. In all cases the nests on one branch touch each 

 other, and when these nests are on a horizontal branch they looked like an 

 enormous string of beads. 



