Published by: https://www.facebook.com/friendsofthepelicans November 20, 2025
Friends of the Pelicans, Inc.
Update: 51 Rescued, 12 Dead in two weeks
Since our last update two weeks ago, we have rescued 51 birds (50 juvenile brown pelicans and one snowy egret) and have also come upon 12 dead pelicans for a total of 63 birds. That’s 63 in just two weeks (from Nov 6 to Nov 19), all from the Skyway Fishing Pier location.
We have such a wonderful group of volunteers. Not only do we have our rescuer on the Pier and all of the people who help him, but we have a great group of transporters and rescuers who monitor two roosts by the Skyway Fishing Pier every single day. If for some reason, we have to miss a day that is when we usually find one or two dead. We also take our boat and jet ski at least weekly to scoop up any pelicans floating around tangled in line.
To further break this down, of the 51 birds that we rescued, 26 were rescued by our full time rescuer, Rahat Khan, on the Skyway Fishing Piers, 15 were rescued by our wonderful group of Mangrove Monitors from the two roosts by the Skyway, 7 were rescued from our boat at the Skyway and 3 were rescued by two of our rescuers on a jet ski at the Skyway. All together a total of 51 birds in just two weeks.
Of the 12 dead pelicans, four of them came from the roost by the south Skyway fishing pier and eight of them came from the roost by the north Skyway fishing pier.
We have photos and can document every single one of these as well as all the rehab records since pretty much every one of these had to go into rehab.
This was from a two-week period and does not include the dozens we see flying with line, hooks, weights and lures.
We understand that people love to fish on this pier/bridge and that they don’t intend to harm the pelicans but it is inevitable with such a high pier/bridge. We wish the state had built a regular concrete pier instead – one where the pelicans could not fly back and forth underneath the pier or hunt and dive underneath it, which they do constantly. A Pier where fishermen could easily bring in a hooked bird instead of cutting the line or having it break because of the height of this pier.
But that is not the case, so we will continue to do this even though it is exhausting trying to keep up. This is the busiest time of the year at the Skyway with all of the pelicans and people coming here for the winter. So far it has not been as bad as this same time last year so that is something to be thankful for.
We also want to thank the wonderful rehab facilities who we unfortunately overload with pelicans. We are grateful to Seaside Seabird Sanctuary, Save Our Seabirds, and Peace River Wildlife Center – PRWC who together have taken all of these pelicans. We could not do this without their help. Please visit their websites and help them with a donation if you can.
Thank you, everyone!
