Tom B.
Yelp
FOLLY BEACH. For three years, I worked at the Marine Laboratory at Fort Johnson, on James Island, and my apartment was on Folly Beach. My apartment was on West Ashley Avenue, halfway between Folly Beach Country Park and Folly Beach Road. I had two roommates and one of them worked in my laboratory and the other worked at the nearby NOAA marine laboratory. My job was to study oyster immunology, and I got one publication out of my lab work (Tom Brody (1989) Release of zinc from leukocytes provoked by A23187 and EDTA is associated with the release of enzymes. Comp. Biochem. 94:693-697). One of my roommates was Bill Buzzi and, whenever he went out for a swim, he gave me a tiny whistle and said, "Tom, if you see a shark coming, just blow on the whistle." Bill Buzzi had a clever sense of humor.
My devotion to Folly Beach did not involve swimming or surfing, but instead it took the form of photographing pelicans. From Folly Beach itself, I used a telephoto lens for taking photos of pelicans flying in formation (see, one photo), and of groups of pelicans flying in a line resembling a spring standing on its side. This was a line of pelicans flying in a spiraling formation, where line of pelicans ascended and ascended (this photo not posted here).
CROSBY SEAFOOD LOCATION. I devoted a dozen photo sessions to taking photographs of pelicans on the dock at Crosby Seafood and also from the nearby bridge. This bridge connects Pea Island (to the north) to Oak Island (to the south). Regarding my color photographs, please see the VERY UNUSUAL PHOTO showing a pelican standing on a box with its beak open, where this pelican is biting down on the beak of a pelican flying directly overhead. VERY STRANGE. Pelicans have an unusual habit, which I've never seen in egrets, herons, or cormorants but, it is possible that these other birds do have that habit. Pelicans like to fling their beak towards the sky, so that the beak points directly upwards. What are they doing? Clearing their throat? I have no idea.
BLACK & WHITE PHOTOS. Regarding my B & W photos, one of my photographs shows a pelican landing on a wooden post (post sticking out of the water near Crosby Seafood). In this photo, the pelican looks like an umbrella, because its body and head are concealed behind the wings, and all you can see of the pelican are its WINGS and its BEAK, where the beak sticks downwards like an umbrella's handle. Also, I have a series of eight B & W photographs, taken rapidly with a motor drive. This series shows a flying pelican trying to knock a standing pelican off of the wooden post. Attached is the first photo in the series of eight pictures, where the flying pelican initiates its aggressive behavior. The other B & W photos show hungry piggy-pelicans diving into a box of seafood scraps, sitting on the dock in back of Crosby Seafood. Yum-yum-yum ! Seafood scraps. Yum-yum-yum !