Brown Pelican
There are six different species of pelican in the world and the
brown pelican is the one most often found in Florida. Pelicans
are large, stocky seabirds with thin necks and characteristic
long, pouched bills which are used for capturing fish. A
pelican will dive head-first into the ocean from as high as 50
feet to catch a fish. During dives, pelicans use a maneuver
to cushion their trachea and esophagus from the impact by
tucking their head and rotating their bodies to the left. Their
throat pouches expand, filling up with over two gallons of
water. Once they capture the fish, they tip their head upward
or to the side to drain the water from their bill pouch. They
will also feed by sitting on the surface and grabbing prey
with their bills. Pelicans eat mostly small fish such as mullet,
anchovies and herring.
Photo by Jean Schuster
Florida Cottontail
The Florida or Eastern cottontail is best known for its
white cotton ball-type tail. The cottontail, which is a vegetarian, can be seen hopping through local fields feeding
on flowers, fruits and grasses. The cottontail normally
weighs about three pounds, can grow up to eighteen inches in length and can reach running speeds of up to sixteen
miles per hour. The cottontail gives birth to live young or
kits and can mate year round, producing over four litters a
year and birthing over 30 kits per year. The cottontail has
a life expectancy of about 14 to 16 months and it typically
stays within 20 acres of its birthplace.
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Brown pelicans live in estuaries and coastal marine habitats
along the southern coast of North America. In Florida they
nest mostly in mangroves. Their coloring is grayish-brown,
but during the breeding season their feathers turn bright
yellow on the head and white on the neck. These feathers
will fade to dull yellow and brown during non-breeding
season. Juvenile birds are almost completely brown with
a whitish belly. The brown pelican was once endangered
with populations dwindling in the 1960s and 1970s due to
the use of dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT), an insecticide. While their population has rebounded since the
banning of DDT, other threats include habitat degradation,
pollution, destruction of coastal wetlands and sea level rise.