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Movements and Daily Activity Patterns of a Brown Pelican in Central California ’ 258 SHORT COMMUNICATIONS R. McClelland, pets. comm.). These, however, were not LITERATURE CITED obvious factors influencing Rough-legged Hawk move- ments. BENT, A. C. 1937. Life historiesof North American birds Range fidelity was determined from seven hawks that of prey. U.S. Nat. Mus. Bull. 167. were trapped in winter 1981-1982, and 15 others in win- BOCK, C. E., AND L. W. LEPTHIEN. 1976. Geographical ter. 1982-1983. Eleven females and eleven males were ecology of the common speciesof Buteo and Para- captured,and two birds were in juvenile plumage. Eleven buteo wintering in North America. Condor 78:554- sightingsofat leastsix marked hawkswere made in winters 557. up to three years subsequentto their being marked. All CRAIGHEAD,J. J., AND F. C. CRAIGHEAD.1956. Hawks, observationswere along highways. Hawks were seen 225 owls and wildlife. Stackpole Co., Harrisburg, PA. km southeast(Labarge,-w), 440 km south (Scipio, UT), HARNISS,R. O., AND N. E. WEST. 1973. Vegetation pat- 295 km north (Wilsall. MT) and 260 km west (Namna. terns of the National Reactor Testing Station, south- ID) of the study area. Three’ marked hawks were%seen-on eastern Idaho. Northwest Sci. 47:30-43. the INEL. Lack of individual identification precludedde- KLEIN, R. J., AND D. R. MASON. 1981. Change in raptor termining if hawksreturned to rangesoccupied in previous hunting behavior following heavy snowfall. Raptor winters. However, all birds seenon the INEL were located Res. 15:121. on seasonalranges previously occupiedby marked hawks. MARION, W. R., AND R. A. RYDER. 1975. Perch-site The wide distribution of hawks sighted in surrounding preferenceof four diurnal raptorsin northeasternCol- areas was not unexpected since the major prey species orado. Condor 771350-352. (voles and rabbits) are subject to population fluctuations SCHNELL,G. D. 1968. Differential habitat utilization by and low availability in certain years and were at lower wintering Rough-leggedHawks. Condor 70:373-377. densities in winters following the marking of hawks (J. SCHNELL,G. D. 1969. Communal roosts of wintering Anderson, pers. comm.; B. Keller, pers. comm.). Thus Rough-leggedHawks (Euteo Zagopus).Auk 86:682- hawks moved through ranges they previously occupied 690. and remained where sufficient prey was available. SYLVAN,M. 1978. Interspecific relations between sym- patrically wintering Common Buzzards and Rough- This research was a contribution of the INEL Radio- leggedBuzzards (Buteo lugopus). Omis Stand. 9: 197- ecologyand EcologyProgram and was funded by the Office 206. ofHealth and Environmental Research,United StatesDe- WATSON,J. W. 1984. Rough-leggedHawk winter ecology partment of Energy, in cooperation with the Fish and in southeasternIdaho. M.S. thesis,Montana St. Univ., Wildlife Program, Department of Biology, Montana State Bozeman. University. Published as Journal Series No. 1732. Mon- WATSON,J. W. 1985. Trapping, marking and radio-mon- tana Agri&ltural Experiment Station. Thanks are extend- itoring Rough-leggedHawks. N. Am. Bird Bander 10: ed to R. L. Eng and 0. D. Markham for supervisingand 9-10. coordinating this research and to D. Burkhalter, T. H. WATSON,J. W. 1986. Temporal fluctuationsof Rough- Craig, E. H. Craig, and R. A. Watson for assistance.K. L. leggedHawks during carrion abundance.Raptor Res. Bildstein, W. S. Clark, R. L. Eng, F. N. Hamerstrom, 0. 20142-43. D. Markham, and K. Steenhofprovided helpful comments on the manuscript. The Condor88:258-260 0 The CooperOrnithological Society 1986 MOVEMENTS AND DAILY ACTIVITY PATTERNS OF A BROWN PELICAN IN CENTRAL CALIFORNIA ’ DONALD A. CROLL~ Moss Landing Marine Laboratories,Box 223, Moss Landing, CA 95039 LISA T. BALLANCEAND BERND G. W~RSIG Moss Landing Marine Laboratories,Box 223, Moss Landing, CA 95039 WM. BRECK TYLER Institute of Marine Sciences,University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064 Key words: Brown Pelican, Pelecanusoccidentalis, ra- yet little is known of its daily movements and activity diotelemetry. patterns. Bringset al. (1983) presenteddata showing that attendanceof Brown Pelicanson central California roosts during the fall was lowest around midday, suggestingan INTRODUCTION activity peak at that time. Herbert and Schreiber (1975) The Brown Pelican (Pelecanusoccidentalis) has been the found that Brown Pelican attendanceat a Florida marina subjectof numerousstudies (Schreiber and Schreiber1980), was highest during midday and suggestedthat the birds foraged mostly during the morning hours. In this paper we present results of a radiotaggingstudy designedto follow the daily activity patterns of a Brown I Received 22 July 1985. Final acceptance11 December Pelican near Monterey Bay, California, during the fall of 1985. 1983. Our study demonstrates a successfulmethod of * Present address: Physiological Research Laboratory, transmitter attachment that allows collection of detailed ScrippsInstitution of Oceanography,La Jolla, CA 92093. data in a continuousmanner. SHORT COMMUNICATIONS 259 004:30 07:30 10:30 13:30 l&30 19:30 TIME OF DAY FIGURE 2. Daily activity patternof a radio-taggedBrown Pelican. Activity is shown as a percentageof total time observed (68.8 hours). We did not monitor the pelican between 1930 and 0430. We always left the bird in an inactive state and returned in the morning to find it inactive and in the same location. Therefore, we assumed it had been roosting the entire night. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION FIGURE 1. Daily movements of a radio-taggedBrown Numerous methods for the attachment of radio tags to Pelican. Bold type representsroosts. birds have been tried, including harnesses(Sibley and McCleery 1980) and the sewing of transmitters to tail feathers (Dunstan 1973, Kenward 1978). We believe the METHODS method usedin this studywas highly successfulfor several The study area included the southern part of Monterey reasons.The tag was easily and quickly applied. We ob- Bay, California, from Elkhom Slough to Cypress Point served the bird diving into the water without any obvious and south to Point Sur (Fig. 1). This is an important feed- hindrance several minutes after being tagged.We believe ing area for Brown Pelicans during the summer and fall that the loss of the signal was not due to tag detachment (Briggset al. 1983). or transmitter failure, but was due to the bird’s traveling A Brown Pelican was captured on 26 October at 1600 out of receiving range too quickly to be followed. The just offshore of the Salinas River mouth (Fig. l), by at- signal had been strong and consistent;the bird was trav- tracting it to the side of a boat with chum and netting it eling at the time the signal was lost, and the signal grew with a large dip net. Based on its plumage, we estimated weakerand weaker as if the transmitter were progressively the bird to be a 3-year-old subadult (Palmer 1962). farther away. Becausea plunge diver such as the pelican The radiotransmitter was securedwith Supergluee to makes rigorous demands on a transmitter, we feel this the contour feathers of the midsection of the pelican’s method of attachment would be applicableto many other spinal tract, and was then permanently set with lo-minute seabirds.We followed only one pelican, however; gener- epoxy. The antenna ran down the back toward the peli- alizations from this bird to an entire population must be can’s tail. When the bird’s wings were folded, the trans- made with caution. Nevertheless, our experiment dem- mitter was not visible. The transmitter (Telonics, Model onstratesa successfulmethod of radiotaggingthat could RB5) measured 1.7 cm in diameter and 5.6 cm in length, prove to be an effective way to study free ranging seabird weighed 27 grams, and had a 45-cm-long one-quarter behavior. wavelengthantenna. To monitor signalswe used a Telon- The pelican was monitored for a total of 68.8 hours. Of its receiver (Model TR-2) and a 2-element Yagi-Uda di- this, the bird spent 22.7 hours (32%) active and 46.1(68%) rectional antenna on a 5-m pole. inactive. If the presumablyinactive night roosting time is We followed the pelicanfrom a 6-m-long BostonWhaler included with the hours of monitored time, the pelican during the first day and a car during the rest of the study. was active 22.7 hours(19%) and inactive 9 1.2 hours (8 1o/o). The directional antennaand a compasswere usedto obtain This low value of percent time active may indicate that bearingsof the pelican’s position. We monitored the pel- the Brown Pelican is a very efficient predator, or that each ican’s movements for four consecutive days, from 0430 individual prey item has a high degree of food value. to 1930 each day. On 31 October at approximately 1200 The pelican exhibited a clear diurnal pattern. Almost we lost the signal while the pelican was traveling south. all activity occurredduring daylight hours, probably none We characterizedthe pelican’s behavior into two cate- during dark hours, and very little during twilight hours gories based on variations in the signal. When the signal (Fig. 2). A similar diurnal pattern was found by Briggset was constant in strength and direction, we assumed the al. (1983) for pelicans near Elkhom Slough, California, animal was inactive. When the signalfluctuated in strength that left by the hundreds in the morning and returned to or changed direction, we assumed the bird to be active. roost again at dusk. This correlation of activity with day- Other researchershave used similar signal variations to light hours may represent a strong dependenceon vision characterizeactivities of pinnipeds (Siniff et al. 1971) and for flight and predation. During a plunge dive a pelican cetaceans(Read and Gaskin 1983). orients itself visually towards its prey (Schreiber et al. 260 SHORT COMMUNICATIONS TABLE 1. Distance traveled per day by a Brown Pelican. technical and field advice. Frank Cipriano and James Heimlich-Boran provided valuable assistanceto the study. The Moss Landing Marine Laboratoriesprovided research Distance vesselsto catch and track the pelican.
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