Least ConcernGreat White Pelican
Pelecanus onocrotalus
72 countries22 parks
Species group · Birds
WAnimals has 8 species of pelican, in the family Pelecanidae.
Each one has its own full profile. This group does not replace them: it brings them together.
No species documented in this group is genuinely at risk according to the IUCN, with the data available today.
Recorded in 119 countries. The ones with the most species in the group:
It can hold several litres of water and fish in the elastic pouch of its lower bill, draining the water off before swallowing the catch.
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It is one of the widest-winged birds in the world, at up to 3.6 m from wingtip to wingtip.
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It is the type species of the genus Pelecanus, described by Linnaeus in 1758.
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It split from the brown pelican only 0.64-1.54 million years ago, through partial oceanographic barriers (the Humboldt and Equatorial currents) combined with different selective regimes.
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Although its range overlaps widely with that of the brown pelican, the two do not hybridise: one of the arguments that led to it being recognised as a species of its own.
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Fledglings have been documented attacking and eating unrelated younger birds of their own species.
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It is one of only two pelicans that live in Africa, along with the great white pelican.
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Ranges calculated from the profiles that record the figure, not from all 8.
It has been wiped out in Madagascar, where it used to breed.
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