EARTH CHANGES

27,000 pelicans abandon their nests to places unknown

Wildlife officials estimate nearly 27,000 pelicans have abandoned their summer nesting grounds at Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge. The question is why - and where they went.
'They just left,' said Ken Torkelson, a spokesman for the US Fish and Wildlife Service in Bismarck. Abandoned were thousands of eggs, which are unlikely to hatch.
The refuge is the home of the largest known nesting colony of white pelicans in North America.
'We don't think they were killed. We think they abandoned their nest,' said Kim Hanson, refuge manager of the Arrowwood complex, which includes Chase Lake. Officials suspect some kind of disturbance -- human or animal -- because some of the remaining birds appear more skittish than usual, Hanson said.

[Of course, they may be "more skittish than usual" because all their neighbours have just disappeared.]