Northern Gannet, in Pillar Point Harbor, CA, US This is Morris. Morris is a local celebrity: the only known Northern Gannet ( Morus bassanus ) in the entire Pacific Ocean.
The photographer captured a Northern Gannet, Great Blue Heron, and California Brown Pelican in Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, California, using a 200‑800mm Canon EF lens. The birds were observed congregating beneath a harbor sign, providing a striking image of wildlife in their natural habitat.
The California Brown Pelican has taken over the Pacifica Pier in San Mateo County, CA, after the pier was shut down in early June due to a cracked concrete walkway that made it unsafe for public access. The pelicans have occupied the area, effectively replacing human use of the pier. The incident highlights how wildlife can quickly reclaim abandoned or unsafe human structures.
The article is a comment by Simon Willison on the Mistral Large 4 model, posted on Hacker News. He discusses the saturation of benchmarks and humorously references a benchmark involving an armadillo in fishnet tights jaywalking on Mars, comparing the performance of several large language models including Claude Opus, GPT, Gemini, and Mistral Large 4.