Brown Pelicans

Brown Pelican

If you go to the New Jersey shore this summer, you may see a funny-looking bird with an oversized bill and a big, stocky, dark body. It probably is a Brown Pelican, which can be found along the Atlantic shore during the summer months.

These shorebirds have thin necks and very long bills with a stretchy throat pouch used for capturing fish. Their wings are very long and broad, and are noticeably bowed when gliding.

Brown Pelicans mostly eat small fish that form schools near the surface of the water. They can spot the fish from the air and dive head-first from as high as 65 feet. They tuck and twist to the left to cushion their trachea and esophagus from impact. As the pelican plunges into the water, the throat pouch expands to trap the fish, filling with as much as 2.6 gallons of water. While the pelican drains the water out of its bill, seagulls may try to steal the fish right out of the pouch!

Feeding time!

Brown Pelicans have two choices for nesting. Some nests are mere grassy depressions while others are bulky structures of sticks, grass and seaweed. Other pelicans nest in trees on platforms of sticks lined with grass or leaves. Pelicans incubate their eggs with the skin on their feet, essentially standing on them to keep the eggs warm.

In the mid 1900s, the commonly used insecticide DDT caused egg shells to become very thin, which cracked under the weight of the parents. After nearly disappearing from North America in the 1960s and 1970s, Brown Pelicans have made a full comeback.

They are masterful fliers. They fly in V-formations or straight lines. We once were on the beach in Cape May and looked up to see a line of pelicans flying along the water's edge. True to form, each pelican matched the beat of the wing of the other's. It was quite a show!