Pelican Grace @ National Geographic Magazine
Pelican Grace - Ungainly Grace, The American White Pelican Feature Page - National Geographic Magazine
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By
Mel White
Photographs by
Klaus Nigge
On land, the bird has been called "a feathered basset hound." In the air, pelicans are poems on the wing.
Should we pity the poor young pelican?
The Ugly Duckling, after all, grew up to be a beautiful swan, while the baby pelican—surely among the homeliest creatures on Earth—can look forward only to becoming . . . an adult pelican. Whether this constitutes much of an improvement is debatable.
Consider some of the words used by writers from Audubon onward to describe the American white pelican: clumsy, awkward, ungainly, grotesque, and absurdly ridiculous. Even the authoritative and no-nonsense new series
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