Very nice Dan. The brown pelican almost makes me think about trading the D750 for a D500. Almost ...
Obviously there were some difficult light angles with those scenes but you have nicely overcome all the potential problems.
I'm sold on the bodies without the anti-alias filter. I wasn't that big a fan of the D500 when I first got it but now I love it. It performs much better in the real world than on paper.
The egret and pelican were intentionally shot with back lighting. Not the cormorant. Not sure anyone would intentionally shoot a black bird in that light if there was another option.