A large flock of American White Pelicans landed in a slough next to Sequoyah Nuclear property in North Hamilton County on Christmas Eve. The flock encompassed an area more than half the length of the slough. The large birds breed in the northern Great Plains and fly to Middle and East Tennessee and Southern Kentucky during the winter.
The white pelicans are not really new to the area. They have been migrating through the Tennessee Valley for many years. However, they usually migrate through when it is still cold and there are not as many people on the lake.
The American white pelican is unique in that it has the second largest average wingspan of any North American bird, after the California condor. This large wingspan allows the bird to easily use soaring flight for migration. They can weigh up to 30 pounds but typically average between 11 and 20 pounds.
The plumage is almost entirely bright white, except the black primary and secondary feathers along their wing tips, which are hardly visible except in flight. From early spring until after breeding has finished in mid-late summer, the breast feathers have a yellowish hue.
The bill is huge and flat on the top, with a large throat sac below, and, in the breeding season, is vivid orange. In the breeding season, there is a laterally flattened “horn” on the upper bill, located about one-third the bill’s length behind the tip. This is the only one of the eight species of pelican to have a bill “horn”. The horn is shed after the birds have mated and laid their eggs.
Apart from the difference in size, males and females look exactly alike. Immature birds have light grey plumage with darker brownish nape.
American white pelicans nest in colonies of several hundred pairs on islands in remote brackish and freshwater lakes of inland North America. About 10–20 percent of the population uses Gunnison Island in the Great Basin’s Great Salt Lake as a nesting ground.
They winter on the Pacific and Gulf of Mexico coasts from central California and Florida south to Panama, and along the Mississippi River at least as far north as St. Louis, Missouri.
Unlike the brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis), the American white pelican does not dive for its food. Instead it catches its prey while swimming. Each bird eats more than four pounds of food a day.
Excerpts from The Chattanoogan & New Channel.
Reposted by Mike Hogan, Lakefront Living, On The Lake Realty, TN