Great White Pelican

The great white pelican, also called the eastern white pelican or rosy pelican, is a huge bird, 140–180 cm long with an enormous pink and yellow bill of about 29–47 cm and a dull pale-yellow gular pouch. The wingspan is 226–360 cm, the highest among living flying animals outside the great albatrosses. Only the Dalmatian pelican is, on average, larger among pelicans (Wikipedia, general species account).

It breeds from south-eastern Europe through Asia and Africa in swamps and shallow lakes. Wintering birds may occur from north-eastern Africa through Iraq to north India, with a particularly large number of Asian breeders wintering around Pakistan and Sri Lanka, and northern populations migrate to China, India and Myanmar. SoIB 2023 rates it a High conservation priority: a winter migrant of wetland with a long-term decline of about 42% and a current decline of about 6% a year (Wikipedia, general species account; SoIB 2023).