The White Pelican 



For eons the great white birds 

 have circled and soared over 

 the desert wastes of interior 

 western America. For genera- 

 tions uncounted they have fished 

 in the salty waters of Lake 

 Lahontan, of Lake Bonneville, 

 and their successors; or they 

 have foregathered ashore in 

 snowy windrows to meditate, 

 to digest, and to gladden withal 

 the retrospective eye of the 

 rare man who, like his Creator, 

 enjoys the simple bliss of the 

 undisturbed wild. The Pelican 

 and the wilderness stand to- 

 gether in their mute appeal. 

 When the one is fully "re- 

 claimed," the other must per- 

 ish. 



It need not be supposed 

 that these ponderous fowls, the 

 largest of water-birds by avoir- 

 dupois, are to be set down as 

 awkward simply because they 

 have big bills. Viewed at a 

 distance, as they rest on shore 

 or near some low mud island, 

 their stately ranks present a 

 most impressive spectacle. In 

 flight they are calm, almost 

 majestic; and their white plu- 

 mage, set off by black wing-tips, 

 makes a fine showing in the 

 morning sun. They sit the water almost as gracefully as swans, and "tip" 

 in a dignified way, immersing the entire head and neck — again much after 

 the fashion of swans. Being provided, also, with an extensive system of 

 air-sacs, they ride high and get credit for all their inches. 



Two pictures come most vividly before the mind's eye of the author. 

 One is of a company of about 300 pelicans who daily resorted to the 

 western end of the Salton Sea, then, in 1913, near Mecca. Although the 

 Farallon Cormorants were nesting feverishly, February 1st, the Pelicanos 



1962 



Taken on Saltoti Sea Photo by the Author 



A PASSING PLANE 



