The spot-billed pelican (''Pelecanus philippensis'') or gray pelican is a member of the
pelican
Pelicans (genus ''Pelecanus'') are a genus of large water birds that make up the family Pelecanidae. They are characterized by a long beak and a large throat pouch used for catching prey and draining water from the scooped-up contents before s ...
family. It breeds in southern
Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...
from southern
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
across
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
east to
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially large lakes. At a distance they are difficult to differentiate from other pelicans in the region although it is smaller but at close range the spots on the upper mandible, the lack of bright colours and the greyer plumage are distinctive. In some areas these birds nest in large colonies close to human habitations.
Taxonomy
The spot-billed pelican was
formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist
Johann Friedrich Gmelin
, fields =
, workplaces = University of GöttingenUniversity of Tübingen
, alma_mater = University of Tübingen
, doctoral_advisor = Philipp Friedrich GmelinFerdinand Christoph Oetinger
, academic_advisors =
, doctora ...
in his revised and expanded edition of
Carl Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...
's ''
Systema Naturae
' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomen ...
''. He placed it with the other pelicans in the
genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...
''
Pelecanus'' and coined the
binomial name
In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...
''Pelecanus philippensis''. Gmelin based his description on "Le pélican des Philippines" that had been described and illustrated in 1760 by the French zoologist
Mathurin Jacques Brisson
Mathurin Jacques Brisson (; 30 April 1723 – 23 June 1806) was a French zoologist and natural philosopher.
Brisson was born at Fontenay-le-Comte. The earlier part of his life was spent in the pursuit of natural history; his published works ...
. Brisson's specimen had been collected on the island of
Luzon
Luzon (; ) is the largest and most populous island in the Philippines. Located in the northern portion of the Philippines archipelago, it is the economic and political center of the nation, being home to the country's capital city, Manila, as ...
in the Philippines. The species is
monotypic
In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...
: no
subspecies
In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...
are recognised.
Description
![Spot Billed Pelican Vedanthangal TN Dec21 D72 21952](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Spot_Billed_Pelican_Vedanthangal_TN_Dec21_D72_21952.jpg)
The spot-billed pelican is a rather large
water bird
A water bird, alternatively waterbird or aquatic bird, is a bird that lives on or around water. In some definitions, the term ''water bird'' is especially applied to birds in freshwater ecosystems, although others make no distinction from seabi ...
, often the largest or one of the largest native birds in the southern stretches of its range, albeit it is fairly small for a pelican. It is long and a weight of . The wingspan can vary from while the typically large beak measured from . It is mainly white, with a grey crest, hindneck and a brownish tail. The feathers on the hind neck are curly and form a greyish nape crest. The pouch is pink to purplish and has large pale spots, and is also spotted on the sides of the upper mandible. The tip of the bill (or nail) is yellow to orange. In breeding plumage, the skin at the base of the beak is dark and the orbital patch is pink. In flight they look not unlike the Dalmatian pelican but the tertials and inner secondaries are darker and a pale band runs along the greater coverts. The tail is rounder.
The newly hatched young are covered in white down. They then moult into a greyish speckled plumage. The spots on the bill appear only after a year. The full adult breeding plumage appears in their third year.
Distribution and habitat
![Spot-billed Pelican (Pelecanus philippensis) at Garapadu, AP W IMG 5369](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Spot-billed_Pelican_%28Pelecanus_philippensis%29_at_Garapadu%2C_AP_W_IMG_5369.jpg)
The species is found to breed only in peninsular India, Sri Lanka and in Cambodia. A few birds from India are known to winter in the Gangetic plains but reports of its presence in many other parts of the region such as the Maldives, Pakistan and Bangladesh has been questioned.
[ The main habitat is in shallow lowland freshwaters. The spot-billed pelican is not migratory but are known to make local movements and are more widely distributed in the non-breeding season.
]
This species is a colonial breeder, often breeding in the company of other waterbirds. The nests are on low trees near wetlands and sometimes near human habitations. Many large breeding colonies have been recorded and several have disappeared over time. In June 1906, C E Rhenius visited a colony in Kundakulam in Tirunelveli district where the villages considered the birds semi-sacred. The same colony was revisited in 1944, and was found to have about 10 nests of pelicans and nearly 200 nests of painted stork.
The Sittang River in Burma was said by E W Oates to have "millions" of pelicans in 1877 and in 1929 E C Stuart Baker
Edward Charles Stuart Baker CIE OBE FZS FLS (1864 – 16 April 1944) was a British ornithologist and police officer. He catalogued the birds of India and produced the second edition of the ''Fauna of British India'' which included the introdu ...
reported that they were still nesting in thousands along with greater adjutant storks:
This colony was however reported by B E Smythies to have disappeared between the 1930s and the 1940s.
Another colony was discovered in 1902 at a village called Buchupalle in the Cudappah district
Kadapa district (officially: YSR district; formerly: Cuddapah district) is one of the twenty six districts in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. On 19 August 2005 nomenclature of “Cuddapah” has been changed as “Kadapa” by the Governm ...
, where these pelicans nested along with painted storks during the month of March. This colony was never traced again.[ The ]Kolleru Lake
Kolleru Lake is one of the largest freshwater lakes in India located in state of Andhra Pradesh and forms the largest shallow freshwater lake in Asia (with 245 km2 of lake area and 302 km2 of total Ramsar designated wetland), 15 kilometers aw ...
colony was discovered by K K Neelakantan
K. K. Neelakantan (1923 - 14 June 1992) better known by his pen name Induchoodan, was a leading Indian ornithologist. He is widely regarded as a pioneer of the environmental movement in Kerala for popularizing bird study through his books writt ...
in 1946. Nearly 3000 pelicans nested in this colony at the time of discovery. This colony however disappeared around 1975.
Due to habitat loss and human disturbance, the spot-billed pelican's numbers have declined and many populations in Southeast Asia (including parts of China) are now extinct. The specific name refers to the Philippines, where the species was abundant in the early 1900s[ but declined and become locally extinct in the 1960s. The populations in southern India are thought to be on the rise. Estimates suggest that increased protection has since enabled a recovery in their numbers and the status of the species was changed from vulnerable to near threatened in the 2007 ]IUCN Red List
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...
.
Behaviour and ecology
They are very silent although at their nests they can make hisses, grunts or snap their bills.[ Some early descriptions of nesting colonies have claimed them to be distinctive in their silence but most have noted colonies as noisy.][
Like most other pelicans, it catches fish in its huge bill pouch while swimming at the surface. Unlike the ]great white pelican
The great white pelican (''Pelecanus onocrotalus'') also known as the eastern white pelican, rosy pelican or white pelican is a bird in the pelican family. It breeds from southeastern Europe through Asia and Africa, in swamps and shallow lakes. ...
it does not form large feeding flocks and is usually found to fish singly or in small flocks. Groups may however sometimes line up and drive fish towards the shallows. When flying to their roosts or feeding areas, small groups fly in formation with steady flapping. During the hot part of the day, they often soar on thermals. They may forage at night to some extent.
The birds nest in colonies and the nest is a thick platform of twigs placed on a low tree. The breeding season varies from October to May.[ In Tamil Nadu, the breeding season follows the onset of the northeast monsoon. The courtship display of the males involves a distention of the pouch with swinging motions of the head up and down followed by sideways swings followed by the head being held back over the back. Bill claps may also be produced during the head swaying movements.][ The nests are usually built alongside other colonial waterbirds, particularly ]painted stork
The painted stork (''Mycteria leucocephala'') is a large wading bird, wader in the stork family. It is found in the wetlands of the plains of tropical Asia south of the Himalayas in the Indian Subcontinent and extending into Southeast Asia. Thei ...
s. Three to four chalky white eggs is the usual clutch. The eggs become dirty with age.[ Eggs hatch in about 30–33 days. The young stay in or near the nest from three to five months.] In captivity the young are able to breed after two years. Like other pelicans, they cool themselves using gular fluttering and panting.
The trematode parasite ''Renicola pelecani'' was described from the kidneys of a specimen of a Sri Lankan spot-billed pelican that died at the London zoo.
In culture
This species was once used by fishermen in parts of eastern Bengal as decoys for certain fish. These fishermen believed that an oily secretion from the bird attracted certain fish such as '' Colisa'' and '' Anabas''.
The propensity of these birds to nest close to human habitations has been noted from the time of T C Jerdon:
Several colonies have since been discovered and while many of these have vanished others have been protected and a few villages with nesting colonies have become popular tourist attractions. Well known villages with colonies include Kokrebellur
Kokkarebellur, usually shortened by the colloquial usage to Kokrebellur is a village in Maddur taluk of Mandya district of Karnataka, India. The village is named after the painted stork (''Mycteria leucocephala''), which is called "kokkare" in ...
, Koothankulam and Uppalapadu
Uppalapadu is a village in the Guntur district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. It is located in Pedakakani mandal of Guntur revenue division.
Geography
Uppalapadu is located at . it is located 2km from Pedakakani.
Bird sanctuary
...
.
References
External links
Photos and videos
A pelican regurgitating
{{Taxonbar, from=Q180360
spot-billed pelican
The spot-billed pelican (''Pelecanus philippensis'') or gray pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Iran across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially larg ...
spot-billed pelican
The spot-billed pelican (''Pelecanus philippensis'') or gray pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Iran across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially larg ...
Birds of South Asia
Birds of Southeast Asia
spot-billed pelican
The spot-billed pelican (''Pelecanus philippensis'') or gray pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Iran across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially larg ...
spot-billed pelican
The spot-billed pelican (''Pelecanus philippensis'') or gray pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Iran across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially larg ...