Leonardo Carrillo protector of a colony of migratory pelicans in Playa Canimar

June 7, 2021

"Michel the Noble" and "Panchito the Affectionate" are some of the names with which Leonardo Carrillo has baptized the pelicans that migrate each year to a beach on the south coast of Havana, very close to his wooden cabin on the coast and whom he considers as his children.

The migration occurs every May for two decades on Guanimar beach, where around 100 brown pelicans arrive in December to spend the winter months and take refuge in the Caribbean fleeing the low temperatures. Then they return north for the summer.

"They (pelicans) come from the North here because they are weak to the cold. In the United States there is a lot of cold, so they migrate throughout the Caribbean (and) they come in late December and they are here with me for six months," Carrillo explained to Reuters.

Guests in the surroundings of a muddy coast, the pelicans can be seen among rocky cliffs, mangroves and sites where there are trees near the coast. For Carrillo, who worries about their feeding, care and protection, they are his daily concern.

Brown pelicans, one of eight species that exist, are typically gray-colored birds with a long beak and an elastic pouch in the throat that they use to catch fish.

"There are some (pelicans) that I name and I know them, although they may seem all the same, but in reality they have different characteristics," said Carrillo, 62 years old.

While pelicans can feed themselves, Carrillo says he collects food scraps from the neighborhood of the town and also heals them if they have wounds caused by fishermen's hooks.

"I like to take care of them because they are noble and affectionate birds," he said, showing how they reach food directly from his hand while standing in a small boat before jumping to the nearby mangroves or the muddy coast.

Carrillo worked for a state fishing company, but since it closed eight years ago he has subsisted on occasional work such as selling ice and remittances he has received from his family in the United States.

"I feel very lonely when the pelicans leave. When they fly into the air I feel sadness and despair because November arrives again. They are practically my children and something is missing from me daily," he said.

Carrillo, who lives alone, has three children and five grandchildren, but lately he has not been able to see them due to the pandemic. However, he keeps active by feeding them three or four times a day, something difficult at a time when the country is going through an economic crisis that has unleashed a shortage of basic products.

"As long as I live, I will continue to take care of them," he said cheerfully.