The Brown Pelican is a comically elegant bird with an oversized bill, sinuous neck, and big, dark body. I captured this bird in flight after feeding on fish in the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve waterway near Huntington Beach, California. On the Pacific Coast, Brown Pelican adults have red skin on their throats in the breeding season as you can see by this photo. On the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts, Brown Pelicans are slightly smaller and their throat skin is greenish black.
The double-crested cormorant is a member of the cormorant family of seabirds. Its habitat is near rivers and lakes as well as in coastal areas and is widely distributed across North America, from the Aleutian Islands in Alaska down to Florida and Mexico.
