My blog entry today is about brown pelicans. I love these birds. They are now my favorite bird, displacing my much loved chickadee. Awkward and ungainly on land, they're graceful in flight. They're also an incredible predator, diving on their prey from above.

DDT almost wiped these birds out, but since the DDT ban and Monsanto's ability to genetically create pesticides right within our vegetables, brown pelicans now number about 650,000. They are Louisiana's state bird. Starting this year, the NBA New Orleans Hornets will be the New Orleans Pelicans.