Great white pelican

Pelecanus onocrotalus
Pelicans (Pelecanidae)

CC-BY-SA 2.0 rights : Lip Kee Yap

White pelican with a yellow throat sac. A yellow marking on the breast and black quills clearly visible in flight. The large beak is blue-grey ending with a sharp hook. The legs are orange pink with webbed feet. Around the eyes, the skin is bare and yellow to pink in colour.
While breeding the bare facial skin becomes pinkish and swollen, the yellow throat marking becomes brighter and the beak discolours to blue with pink. The white feathers become pinkish.

Lives in large colonies up to thousands of birds without hierarchy and rarely aggression. It fishes from the surface and does not dive. A group forms a half circle in which fish are chased.  Most fish are caught by stabbing with their large beaks in the water.

⇔ l. 140-180 cm

syn. Eastern white pelican, Rosy pelican, White pelican

A migratory bird breeding in central and south Europe and wintering in east Africa.

LA:
≈ The PELECANUS ERYTHRORHYNCHOS (American white pelican) lives in America and has no pink beak during breeding.
≈ The PELECANUS CRISPUS (Dalmatian pelican) are a little larger and more grey. With long feathers on the head and while breeding a red beak. See photo LA.

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Size

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Colour

Legs

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