We sit at a bend in the river where it widens to a fair size and while we can’t see the town upriver, down river we can see the mouth of the river opening into the Gulf of Mexico. There are boats of many sizes, most are motor boats with just a dash of sailboats to make it interesting for us. But I didn’t come here to talk about boats. Pelicans are my topic. We see many birds both land and water birds, but the brown pelican holds my interest more often than not. They are magnificent as flyers especially when several of them fly together inches above the water like the finest squadron of Blue Angels. You can tell they know their business well when you watch them go from a tranquil floating position to launch themselves with a few short hops into full flight. After circling high above the water they easily configure their body into a straight-on, death defying dive, beak first, into the water after fish.
We do have tides in this southern most state called Florida. Those of you in New Brunswick, Canada, and most especially along the Fundy coast, can feel free to snicker at the 3 foot tide here in Tarpon Springs, I do myself, :). But even though the tide is small the current is strong both coming and going. We watch kayakers struggling against the current or sitting back enjoying the ride as they catch a more favourable current. There are tiny spoil islands covered in dense mangroves, good havens in the Spring for roosting birds or as resting spots as they travel up and down the river. Gulls, cormorants, pelicans and all the wading birds make full use of these. The crows and Ospreys, however, they like to sit in the taller trees or on any handy sailboat mast.
Aboard our boat, Jack and I find our second favorite time of the day to be early evening, sitting in the cockpit, enjoying a libation and watching the boats coming home and the birds going to roost. This time of the year, most of them go out to the barrier islands or the larger spoil islands at the mouth of the river. Some like to fly high, some like to fly alone, some like to call out as they fly, others are silent with their passing. One lone pelican has caught our attention. If the tide is going out about 6 or 7 of the o’clock, this solitary bird rides the current down the river to one of the spoil islands across the river from our boat. He gives himself a rinse off then flies up into the mangroves. We think he spends the night there. We may see him once or twice a week. We wonder why he does this. Only he knows.
There is an ancient legend about pelicans. In time of famine, the mother pelican wounded herself, striking her breast with her beak to feed her young with her blood to prevent starvation. Another version of the legend was that the mother fed her dying young with her blood to revive them from death, but in turn lost her own life. The Christians adopted the pelican as a symbol of charity and self sacrifice. References to the pelican and its Christian meaning are found in Renaissance literature: Dante (1321) in the "Paridiso" of his Divine Comedy refers to Christ as "our Pelican." John Lyly in his Euphues (1606) wrote, "Pelicane who striketh blood out of its owne bodye to do others good." Shakespeare (1616) in Hamlet wrote, "To his good friend thus wide, I’ll ope my arms / And, like the kind, life-rendering pelican / Repast them with my blood." John Skelton (1529) in his Armorie of Birds, wrote, "Then sayd the Pellycan: When my Byrdts be slayne / With my bloude I them revyve. Scripture doth record / The same dyd our Lord / And rose from deth to lyve."
But this is not why I like pelicans. Like all creatures on this earth, we all generally go about our business of living according to our form. Once in awhile something extraordinary (well at least to this casual observer) happens which draws our attention and causes us to marvel. We look a little harder and assume a more personal connection. This is where I find my rapture.
